This is an observation on a recent blog between a libertarian “judge” (the Honorable Walter Block) and a person with a question.
Block provided an example in which he would judge that person A commits murder of person B by refusing to be vaccinated. By contrast, Block has argued that if A is pregnant and kills the baby within her, this is not murder.
Both situations involve the body of A and A’s rights in her body. The Blockian judge rules that A’s body property right is limited, such that forced vaccination by other people doesn’t violate the NAP, the justification being that this use of force prevents the murder of B. The same judge rules that forced prevention of abortion by other people does violate the NAP, so that other people may not use force to prevent the murder of baby B. The two rulings are contradictory.
Forced vaccination of A means that other people have a right to vaccinate A, which means intrusion upon A’s property right in her body, i.e., A’s property right in her body is not total. The Blockian libertarian judge draws a line and declares that her body is open to vaccination without violating the NAP. The ruling is that the vaccination is not an aggression. Indeed, as the judge sees matters, forced vaccination saves B’s life and stops A’s aggression or crime of harboring the virus that can kill B.
Why shouldn’t the same Blockian judge rule that it is necessary to save a baby’s life in A’s womb; and to save that life other people than A have a right to call her taking of that life an aggression, namely, murder? And why, following the logic of forced vaccination, shouldn’t this right of prevention of abortion accorded to other people include penalties for such a murder? And if A’s property in her body is capable of being limited by the Blockian judge in the vaccine case, why isn’t her property in her body also capable of being limited in the abortion case?
It appears that the Blockian judge is being inconsistent if a forced vaccination (under the conditions stipulated by Block in the discussion) is not an aggression, while prevention of abortion by force is an aggression.
The above observation does not represent my position on either vaccination or abortion. It only points out a puzzling feature of Block’s positions.
5:27 pm on May 11, 2020
