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From: kjm@ut-ngp.UUCP (Ken Montgomery)
Newsgroups: net.politics.theory
Subject: Re: Libertarianism & property
Message-ID: <1404@ut-ngp.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 1-Mar-85 10:50:52 EST
Article-I.D.: ut-ngp.1404
Posted: Fri Mar  1 10:50:52 1985
Date-Received: Mon, 4-Mar-85 06:19:15 EST
References: <408@ssc-vax.UUCP>
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Organization: U.Texas Computation Center, Austin, Texas
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[]
From: eder@ssc-vax.UUCP (Dani Eder)
> ...
> Take
>the case of present day Alaska, outside of the settled areas.  There
>is no present owner of the land.  Right now, anyone may roam unrestricted
>across the landscape, stop to drink from rivers, camp, etc.  If you
>wish to homestead there, obviously you have ownership rights to whatever
>you bring with you, and just as obviously you have ownership rights
>to your cabin, and whatever else you may build with your hands.
>
>     Now, how much land may you fence off and call your own?

You don't need to fence any of it off to claim it, and you may
claim as much as it not already owned by someone else.

> [ Irrelevant threshold questions deleted.  -KJM ]
> Does this give you the right to take ownership
>of hundreds of square miles?

Rights are axiomatic, not "given" or withheld.  Who would "give"
it, anyway?

>     The point I was trying to make in my previous article was that
>when formerly unclaimed land is homesteaded, the rest of society loses
>the right of access and use of the land that they formerly enjoyed.

If you want to secure right of access to unowned land, go claim it.

>If there is no compensating payment made by the homesteader, what will
>limit a greedy, somewhat wealthy person from fencing off great chunks
>of land?

Why should he/she be limited?

> ...
> Having to compensate society for
>a loss I cause is one thing.

Claiming something that is currently owned by nobody causes a loss to
nobody.  (Unless society is nobody, it does not own what nobody owns.)

> Taxing what is the fruits of my own labor,
>and hence my life, is another, and is unbearable.

Once again, to buy land requires that one expend the fruits of one's
labor.  Taxing land ownership is thus taxing the fruits of one's
labor, and is thus "unbearable".

>Dani Eder / Boeing / ssc-vax!eder

--
The above viewpoints are mine.  They are unrelated to
those of anyone else, including my cats and my employer.

Ken Montgomery  "Shredder-of-hapless-smurfs"
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