Wellman 5 and 6

After rereading others' posts and thinking about the currents of our class discussion from Thursday, I was thinking about moral rights as I was reading these two chapters. My thoughts were going in many directions, and then I read Wellman's ending to chapter 5. He writes:

"There is, however, considerable agreement that there really is something distinctive and important about moral rights. If only we could identify and define this, then we would be able to know why it matters whether or not animals have rights such as the rights to life, liberty, and not to be tortured" (128).

The remainder of this post represents my attempt to wrestle with this quotation. I thought it might be useful to put forth some ways in which moral rights are "distinctive and important."

1) Law is not universal. Every day, we are subject to a variety of laws that come form many different sources. As Drake students, we are subject to local ordinances made by the city of Des Moines, state laws made by the Iowa legislature, and national laws made by Congress. Additionally, we may also be subject to international law (leaving aside the enforcement concerns that arise when one speaks of international law). As such, not every individual in the United States (let alone the world) is subject to the same set of laws. As such, the possibility emerges that some individuals may be afforded a legal right by a particular jurisdiction, but others outside that jurisdiction may not receive those rights. Thus, since morals do not follow the same strict jurisdictional boundaries as law, moral rights could (theoretically) be more universal.

2) Moral rights seem to be more personal than legal rights. Legal rights become codified when a legislative or judicial body formalizes a particular right into the body of law. As such, the decision-makers here are either popularly elected or selectively appointed. While legislators are supposed to accurately represent the views of their constituents, such a job is difficult because reasonable constituents often disagree over particular points and policies. As such, one can argue that legal rights more accurately represent the will of the politically powerful than the masses. On the other hand, it is much easier for an individual to hold a particular set of moral beliefs; as such, it seems to be more possible that those who lack political power could find an easier path to the creation of a moral right rather than a legal right. However, there are a myriad of questions that emerge out of this logic. First, what type of consensus is required to create a moral right? Second, who has the authority to declare that a moral right is a right? In other words, when does a commonly held moral belief become a right?

3) Morals are individually held. Whereas all individuals are expected to follow the law, we don't expect all individuals to follow the same moral code. Whereas all reasonable people follow the law, reasonable people can disagree about the moral action to take in a particular circumstance. Of course, reasonable people can also disagree about the proper legal action to take; however, the written nature of law makes it much easier to determine an absolute standard by which to judge another's actions. As such, it seems that moral rights are more apt to represent a person's feelings as an individual than a legal right. However, I'm left with the same questions that I had in part (2) above--put simply, although reasonable people can (at least in my experience) disagree about morals, does the structure of rights theory allow reasonable people to disagree about moral rights, or is a disagreement about a moral right simply a claim that a particular moral right does not exist?