Blackwell Reference Online

Extract

It is axiomatic that the state must suppress lawless violence within its jurisdiction. Yet, the “public service doctrine” holds that the state owes no duty to protect any individual from violence, irrespective of the fact that it regularly encourages reliance on its protective services. “Reliance,” especially when encouraged, tends to be duty-creating, but the “no-duty rule” eliminates negligent failure to protect as a cause action against the state. Since no one has a right against the state to minimally adequate protection from violence, the state has no liability for discriminatory failure to protect-a Fourteenth Amendment, equal protection violation otherwise. The problem of gun control for practical ethics arises from considering critically the following propositions: (1) the state prohibits violent victimization and must use its police power to suppress it; (2) the state must respect the fundamental individual right to bodily integrity; (3) the state's police power to suppress gun violence includes the authority to threaten non-felons with criminal penalties for having arms for self-preservation and defense; (4) the state has no duty to provide minimally adequate protection to any individual. Affirming (l)-(4) is incoherent: (2) and (4) rule out (3) ( Wheeler, 1997 ). Gun laws marginally affect the balance between (1) and (2) for each person, directly or indirectly. If the ... log in or subscribe to read full text