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by bdcravens 671 days ago
The appeal to authority via the "founding fathers" probably isn't the best argument one could make. The centuries have propped up a legendary version of them that is a bit different from the reality. In reality they weren't all Christians; Jefferson in particular. Jefferson also said the constitution should be rewritten every 19 years. History has lost the voices of those who dissented.

The point is that the values we have ascribed to them may not be accurate. I don't think they meant "free speech" to be a freedom orgy, but a tool to prevent abuse by those in power. Remember, moderation itself is a form of speech. The most democratic approach is public, transparent moderation. While it isn't perfect, I feel like HN does the best job of this I've seen.
1 comments
_heimdall 671 days ago
> In reality they weren't all Christians; Jefferson in particular.

That's an interesting inclusion if you're wanting to avoid appeals to authority. Why does it matter whether they were Christian?

It is a fine line between appealing to authority and pulling historical examples of lessons learned the hard way. I don't know what else to refer to those who wrote the constitution as, if "founding fathers" has some subtle whiff of appealing to authority I'm haply to refer to them as something else. The point remains, though, that freedom of speech was protected so early on based on what people of that time saw happen without free speech.

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bdcravens 671 days ago
My point was that the the first amendment says very little, so intuiting what they would think about situations other than Congress restricting free speech takes quite a big leap of inference, which often comes from a place of false information about what they truly believed. I was getting to the idea that much of what we believe about them is wrong or incomplete, so why would their values here hold any more to our preconceptions?
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_heimdall 671 days ago
There's actually a still a surprisingly long collection of the founders' writings. Jefferson alone has a 1,000 page book full of his writings from notes and letters related to the Virginia state house to a letter he wrote to the king enumerating a list of grievances.

Knowing their values is extremely important. As you note, many of the amendments are short and when legally challenged the court is generally left interpreting what was meant and intended by the amendment. How could we interpret what was meant or intended by the law without knowing everything we can about those who wrote and passed the legislation?

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