OF RIGHT AND PRIVILEGE

OF “RIGHT” AND “PRIVILEGE” By Rev. Dr. Larry Delano Coleman Saturday, November 16, 2013 A “right” is from God. A “privilege” is from man. Don’t get them twisted. No one and nothing has a “right” to life. Life is a “gift” from God. Ephesians 2:8-10 King James Version (KJV) 8 For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: 9 Not of works, lest any man should boast. 10 For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them. “Rights” are from God, not from man. "Right" is to life as shadow is to substance. The life-giving light of God gives rise to both “right” and “shadow.” Without that life-giving light, neither right nor shadow could be. In short,” rights” are not derivable from man. Neither are rights conferrable by man. "Privileges" are from man, and may be bestowed by man. Man through conquest, persuasion, or mutual convenience, allots conditional privileges to those who pay tribute to him, who defer to him or trade with him. It is frequently foolish to trade one's God-given "rights" for man's arbitrary "privileges". Yet, many people do precisely that without coercion, voluntarily! The Declaration of Independence recognizes, “that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness...” Yet, the U.S. Constitution converts those “rights” into “privileges” accorded only to some, not to all, men. There is a historical disconnect between the aspiration and the manifestation! Blacks, whether enslaved or free, were excluded as “free persons” from that phrase in the Constitution by the U.S. Supreme Court in its infamous, Dred Scott v. Sanford decision in 1857. Being deemed “Non- free persons,” blacks were judicially deemed to be “all other persons.” “All other persons” is found in the 3/5’s clause of the Constitution: “Representatives and direct Taxes shall be apportioned among the several States which may be included within this Union, according to their respective Numbers, which shall be determined by adding to the whole Number of free Persons, including those bound to Service for a Term of Years, and excluding Indians not taxed, three fifths of all other Persons. ARTICLE I, SECTION 2, CLAUSE 3” Our black and enslaved forebears were irrepressible in celebration of their right to life! For our sake, and our children’s sake, they suffered the denial of the privileges afforded to those judicially-defined “free persons,” in accordance with the teaching of Job 14:14, “until my change comes”… “If a man die, shall he live again? all the days of my appointed time will I wait, till my change come.” When, that change came, when their chance came, they took it! Whether on land or on sea; whether by running away or by stowing away; whether by armed mobilization or by nonviolent demonstration-- self-liberation of their God-given “right” to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness , joy, was their aim. Our enslaved forebears intuitively understood that “rights,” our “joy” was from God, even if America’s courts still do not! “This joy that I have the world didn’t give it and the world can’t take it away,” sings Shirley Caesar out of the righteous wisdom idioms of our enslaved forebears. That song most fittingly concludes this essay ! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tlgl54RaMmY #30