An Inalienable Right to Rebel

Jefferson is saying that sometimes government does not work well, and there are times when people can not find a way to redress their grievances in any fashion other than by taking up arms. In that manner they so shock the nation that whatever caused their grief in the first place becomes openly discussed.

This raises the question: Do we all have an inalienable right to rebel against our own government? The First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution provides protection for people to peaceably assemble, and to petition the government for redress of grievances. It reads "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances". The Supreme Court has made it very clear in rulings that the right to assemble must be done peaceably, and that we do not have a Constitutional right to riot. Petition of grievances is a broad term that the Supreme Court has rarely taken up. There have numerous times in US History that sedition laws have been passed that have prevented people from speaking up against the government, and in each of those cases, the Court has refused to rule on challenges. Does any of this matter in a person's right to rebel? Even more importantly, doesn't this issue extend beyond U.S. borders? I'm speaking of human rights, not the rights of American citizens. I think we need to speak more broadly. First, however, I want to look at some terminology.

What Does It Mean to Rebel?
What does it even mean to rebel? Rebel comes from the Latin word bellum, meaning war, so its meaning is to make war against a person, idea or thing. The standard dictionary meaning is "To refuse allegiance to and oppose by force an established government or ruling authority". But you don't really need force to rebel do you? Ghandi led a rebellion against the colonial British authority without using force. The students in Tienanmen Square rebelled against the Chinese Authority during their democracy demonstrations, and they didn't act out of a violent spirit. I rebelled against my parents, not by force, but by sullenness and refusing to give in to what they would ask me to do. You probably did too. I don't believe that constitutes an act of force, unless we're going to include "force of will" which seems a distinct issue.

So to say that someone rebels means in essence that they no longer agree with the status quo and act outside the established methods of changing the system from within. They are instead seeking to redress their grievances in an unaccepted way. Certainly peaceful acts of civil disobedience, like the lunch counter sit-ins during the Civil Rights movement would qualify. So would Ghandi's non-violent protest. It would also include Shay's Rebellion, and of course the Revolutionary War. I don't think many people would claim that people don't have a right to conduct acts of civil disobedience to make their feelings known, but do people have a right to act out in violence against the government?

The Limits of Rebellion
I believe people do have a right to not only rebel against their government, but also to use violence against their government. However, I also believe that people should not initiate force against their government first, and that the bar is set very high on what would drive a person to act violently against anyone, including the government. I don't think that Timothy McVeigh was correct when he bombed the Federal Building in Oklahoma. I think he was very much in the wrong. Yes, the government initiated force against the Branch Davidians, and that was wrong. But to carry out the kind of horrific destruction that he did was not rebellion, it was terrorism, and terrorism of the most chilling kind.

People don't like the status quo disrupted. They don't want rebellion, which often threatens complete upheaval of a way of life. Most people would prefer that things change slowly, and from within. But is a person required to first address their grievances with their government? Indeed a government that suppresses its people and does not respect their rights will not accept change from within. Despotic governments seek to grip power perpetually. Can we honestly expect of people in places like North Korea to wait for small social changes to occur organically to improve their lives? I don't think that most people would support that position, just as most people, myself included, would not support someone like McVeigh, or Eric Rudolph given how open our culture and political system are. They had ways of addressing the situation without resorting to violence.

It would seem that the matter here is one of degree: you can rebel to the extent that your natural rights are withheld from you. If you live under a government, such as the United States, that does not withhold most of your natural rights than you should work within the framework the government provides. If you exist at the opposite end of the spectrum than you have the ability to take up arms and retake those rights. While that seems a good idea in writing, the practice of this idea is much harder to implement.

Whither Natural Rights?
What if your definition of natural rights is framed by the ideas espoused by Karl Marx? Then the US government is in opposition to your notion of rights and you should have the ability to rise up in armed insurrection against Washington. What if your concept of natural rights includes the "right" to live in a country free of people that do not look like you? Ditto then for rising up against Washington. I don't know that I, or any most other people would support a person's right to rebel in that circumstance. So the real question is not really whether a person has the right to rebel, but how do we come to a practicable definition of natural rights?

I understand natural rights to be those rights that afford me the maximum freedoms while not infringing on the freedoms of others. The Bill of Rights seems to stem from that same ideal, as does most declaration of human rights. We have the right to free speech, the association with others, freedom to worship how we choose, to be armed, to own property without undue interference by the government, to not be locked up without just cause, and to be tried fairly by a jury of our peers. Nothing in those enumerated rights lists a right to rebellion. The Bill of Rights also included the 10th Amendment, which states "The powers not delegated to the United States Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people". Again, it is not explicit in a statement that people have a right to rebellion, though it seems to imply that if such a right exists, it's reserved to the people.

That's one of the problems with "natural rights". Other than the works of philosophers and statesmen, none of which completely agree, there's no master list of natural rights. But we do tend, as free people, to agree on one thing: rights do not extend from the government, but rather are an inherent part of being human. A person living in Beijing has the same rights as a person living in Toronto, only they live under different governments which take divergent views on how to govern. It is, indeed, the nature of government that by forming, some rights end up being restricted, or worse, taken away altogether. Governments almost always work to extend and strengthen their grip on power, in part by restricting rights. People should, in response, push back on the government to assert their rights.

An Inalienable Right to Rebel
That asserting of their rights is in fact, rebelling. Just because it does not include guns, bombs, and conspiracies doest not mean it's not rebellion. We've stated it before: rebellion has been done and can be done in many ways. Rebellion can be acts of civil disobedience. Rebellion can be the act of speaking up. Rebellion is any act against the will of the government or the direction of the government. So perhaps we should reconsider: Man's right to rebellion should not be dependent on how free their government is. Rather, we should expect that the nature of man's rebellion be based on the nature of his government. If one's government is democratic and free, your rebellion should be tempered but if you are without your freedoms, your rebellion should escalate to meet force with force.

This is all rather silly in the end. I talk about limits on rebellion, as if it is something that can be limited. The act of rebellion is the act of working against limits, or trying to destroy them entirely. It is my opinion though that people do have the right to rise up against authority, in whatever manner it manifests, and push back, or in the more extreme case, fight back. All of the freedoms that we do have, the natural freedoms we possess by right of being born human mean nothing in the end if we are not allowed to defend them when they are under attack. It is for that reason that I believe man does have an inalienable right to rebel.