There Is No Constitutional Right to Eat Dinner

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This historical evidence also shows that dinner involves a “profound moral question,” as Alito said of abortion in Dobbs. That sets it apart from other constitutional rights that don’t raise moral questions, like what counts as cruel and unusual punishment or what counts as religious freedom. The nature of dinner—when it can be eaten, what can be served, and who may take part in it—is also a matter of sharp and persistent division among the American people themselves. That distinguishes it from other constitutional rights like freedom of speech and the right to bear arms, where Americans rarely disagree. Dinner is just different, for reasons I will hint at but never explicitly say and that definitely have nothing to do with my personal views on the subject.

Now that I have laid out such a clear and convincing argument, I want to take a moment to address some potential criticism of it. Some might find my use of historical sources to be selective and unscholarly. It is true that I am neither a professional historian nor an expert on medieval England, though I do have a bachelor’s degree in history, which puts me one step ahead of most of the current justices. A professional background in history is also not necessary to unearth the original public meaning of the Constitution. It can even be a hindrance to that enterprise, as shown by Alito’s dismissal of briefs filed by historians in Dobbs that sought to explain how eighteenth-century and nineteenth-century Americans viewed abortion.

Another possible critique is that I am misreading Anglo-American legal history to arrive at a predetermined conclusion by leaving out crucial context. What these critics fail to understand is that I only need to think about the broader historical context of why and how these laws were passed when it is convenient for me. This is how Alito brushed aside arguments about the unseemly rationales of nineteenth-century state lawmakers who passed abortion bans in Dobbs as mere “alleged legislative motives,” while Justice Clarence Thomas cited an abundance of historical context in Bruen to explain how centuries of English and American laws that prohibit the public carriage of weapons actually prove that the public carriage of weapons was a deeply rooted tradition.

EfficientAsk3 on July 8th, 2022 at 22:25 UTC »

Justice keg stand can fucking deal with it. Eat your food at home if you don’t like being protested. Him and the rest of the conservative minority subverted the will of 70% of the country.

jlistener on July 8th, 2022 at 20:38 UTC »

In Lee v. Perrins (1838) the court ruled that steaks rights do not apply.

wederservebetter on July 8th, 2022 at 20:35 UTC »

If there's a constitutional right to dinner, I need to speak with them about the issue of poverty in the US.