It occurred to me while my dog and I were walking this morning that, in conversations about rights, the corresponding responsibilities are far too often left out. A prime example is the 2nd Amendment where the two are set in direct juxtaposition that should make them inseparable. The reasoning that separates a "right to keep and bear arms" from "A well-regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state" escapes me and always will. While not all other rights are so pointedly associated with their obligating accompaniments, the separation of privilege and responsibility invariably has and, I submit, always will result in a state of near anarchy where no one is fully aware of their status, where apparent rights to privacy and related privileges can be abruptly taken away and where those who abuse the privilege by using their free speech rights to incite an insurrectionary riot or by firing the gun they have a right to own into a group of people exercising their right to pursue happiness or just go to work are not merely not held accountable but are enabled by those who profit from their behavior.
Mr. Jefferson et al set up the same pairing in the Declaration when they said "...deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed," and "That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it." The recent actions of the Supreme Court, the ongoing entropy of Congressional legislative capability and the increasingly imperial nature attributed to the Presidency all indicate that our government has at least begun to be destructive of our freedoms, rights and privileges and it is clear that the first step in the necessary alteration is to remove by ballot all of those, in either party, who have contributed to it and see that they are replaced with people who have an understanding that, in being elected, they are being given not just the privilege of representing us but the obligation to do so.