A Short Introduction to Libertarianism,

The Basic Principles

1. Self Ownership - You own your life, you own your body.
2. All Rights Derive From Property - You have the exclusive right to exercise control over your property.
3. Non-Aggression - The Only limitation to your rights is the equal rights of others.
4. The Right To Contract - The Right to contract is one of the most fundamental human rights, and
is essential to economics and human interaction.
5. The Only Purpose of Government is to Protect The Rights - Including and especially, the rights of the minority.

These rights do not come from government, the constitution, citizenship, or any other source but the laws of nature.

Examples,

You have the right to freedom of speech, not because of the first amendment, but because you own your lungs, you own your lips, your vocal cords, and your mind and your ideas. If someone tried to limit your freedom of speech, they would be implying some ownership over these things.

You have the right to keep and bear arms, not because of the second amendment, but because you have the right to protect your property.

Your freedom of speech is limited by the property of others. I do not have the right to say whatever I like on this your website, it is a privilege for me to do this, because the database is owned by you and you have the absolute right to delete any post I make or ban me from the site. If you host other peoples blogs and such on your website, the blogger has made a contract with you (his agreement and payment to run the blog), so he has the right to delete my post or ban me from the blog at any time, for any reason or no reason at all. Either or both entities may do this because they have the right to protect their property.

You have the rights, and have made a contract with the blogger to delegate some of those rights to him. President Obama cannot grant the blogger the authority to exercise control over your database because President Obama does not own the database.

Only the owner of the property can exercise control over property, or delegate authority to someone else to exercise control over the property.

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Government is made up of human beings, and they have no rights or claims higher than any other human beings, you cannot grant the government any powers that you do not have yourself.

You have the right to protect your property, so you make a contract (your vote and taxes) with the government to protect your property for you (Police). This is important because for an economy to thrive, people need to be able to trade without threat of violence or coercion.

You have the right to contract, so you make a contract (your vote and taxes) with the government to create courts which will enforce contracts. This is important because without contracts, our economy would shrivel up and die.

You have the right to travel, so you make a contract (your vote and taxes) with the government to make sure there are paths by which you may travel without violating private lands (roads).

You do not have the right to someone else's property. You have no right to make a contract with your vote to take away my money to pay for your health care, nor can you make a contract with the government to compel doctors to treat you for free.

You do not have the right to abridge someone else's right to contract. You have no right make a contract with your vote to prevent two men, or a man and five women, from making a marriage contract. You do not have the right to decide who an employer may or may not make an employment contract with (immigration).

You do not have the right to kill, outside of self defense. So you have no right to make a contract with your vote to have the government kill outside of self defense on your behalf.

You have the right to use drugs, it is your body, your life, you have the exclusive right exercise control over them, to destroy them if you see fit, you also have the right to shoot yourself in the foot, or burn your house down, I don't recommend you do any of these things, but I support your right to do so. But you do not have the right to steal to obtain drugs, or to collect welfare because you are unable to work due to your addiction.

It is the role of government to secure borders to guard against aggressors
It is the role of government to protect, not redistribute, property
It is the role of government to enforce, not abridge, contracts
It is the role of government to punish aggressors

It is not the role of government to grant any preference to one culture or religion over another
It is not the role of government to legislate morality
It is not the role of government to create a perfectly safe environment
It is not the role of government to make sure you have what you need or want