Claim rights and liberty rights

Overview

To illustrate, a world with only liberty rights, without any claim rights, would by definition be a world wherein everything was permitted and no act or omission was prohibited; a world wherein none could rightly claim that they had been wronged or neglected. Conversely, a world with only claim rights and no liberty rights would be a world wherein nothing was merely permitted, but all acts were either obligatory or prohibited. The assertion that people have a claim right to liberty – i.e. that people are obliged only to refrain from preventing each other from doing things which are permissible, their liberty rights limited only by the obligation to respect others' liberty – is the central thesis of liberal theories of justice.

Second-order rights

Hohfeld's original analysis included two other types of right: besides claims (or rights proper) and liberties (or privileges), he wrote of powers, and immunities. The other two terms of Hohfeld's analysis, powers and immunities, refer to second-order liberties and claims, respectively. Powers are liberty rights regarding the modification of first-order rights, e.g. the U.S. Congress has certain powers to modify some of U.S. citizens' legal rights, inasmuch as it can impose or remove legal duties. Immunities, conversely, are claim rights regarding the modification of first-order rights, e.g. U.S. citizens have, per their Constitution, certain immunities limiting the positive powers of the U.S. Congress to modify their legal rights. As such, immunities and powers are often subsumed within claims and liberties by later authors, or grouped together into "active rights" (liberties and powers) and "passive rights" (claims and immunities).

These different types of rights can be used as building blocks to explain relatively complex matters such as a particular piece of property. For example, a right to use one's computer can be thought of as a liberty right, but one has a power right to let somebody else use your computer (granting them a liberty right), as well as a claim right against others using the computer; and further, you may have immunity rights protecting your claims and liberties regarding the computer.

See also

• Constitutionalism
• Constitutional economics
• Freedom versus license
• Negative and positive rights
• Rule according to higher law
• Wesley Newcomb Hohfeld

External links

• The Form of Rights: The Hohfeldian Analytical System, Rights section 2.1, Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
• Claim Rights & Liberty Rights, Human Rights section 3b, Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy
• The Difference Between a Right and Liberty, Professor William E. May