On this episode of Dave Does History on Bill Mick Live we took a hard look at a statement from Senator Tim Kaine of Virginia that deserves more than a passing shrug. Kaine declared that our rights do not come from God or from nature, but from government.That claim cuts right into the heart of the American idea. Jefferson’s Declaration of Independence begins with the opposite truth, that we are created equal and endowed with unalienable rights. Government exists to secure those rights, not to invent them. If rights are created by government, then they are nothing more than privileges that can be withdrawn the moment power shifts.Jefferson refuted that view in 1776 and again in the Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom. Today we ask the same question he did: do rights belong to us by nature, or are they favors handed out by politicians?

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