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Quoted By:
https://thehill.com/opinion/congress-blog/5489547-tim-kaines-embarrassing-constitutional-blasphemy/
> Sen. Tim Kaine (D-Va.) this week warned the American people that a Trump nominee for a State Department position was an extremist, cut from the same cloth as the Iranian mullahs and religious extremists.
> Riley Barnes, nominated to serve as assistant secretary of State for democracy, human rights and labor, revealed his dangerous proclivities to Kaine in his opening statement when he said that “all men are created equal because our rights come from God, our creator; not from our laws, not from our governments.”
> It was a line that should be familiar to any citizen — virtually ripped from the Declaration of Independence, our founding document that is about to celebrate its 250th anniversary.
> Yet Kaine offered a very surprising response in the Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing.
> “The notion that rights don’t come from laws and don’t come from the government, but come from the Creator — that’s what the Iranian government believes,” he said. “It’s a theocratic regime that bases its rule on Shia (sic) law and targets Sunnis, Bahá’ís, Jews, Christians, and other religious minorities. They do it because they believe that they understand what natural rights are from their Creator. So, the statement that our rights do not come from our laws or our governments is extremely troubling.”
> The idea that laws “come from the government” is the basis of what is called “legal positivism,” which holds that the legitimacy and authority of laws are not based on God or natural law but rather legislation and court decisions.
> Sen. Tim Kaine (D-Va.) this week warned the American people that a Trump nominee for a State Department position was an extremist, cut from the same cloth as the Iranian mullahs and religious extremists.
> Riley Barnes, nominated to serve as assistant secretary of State for democracy, human rights and labor, revealed his dangerous proclivities to Kaine in his opening statement when he said that “all men are created equal because our rights come from God, our creator; not from our laws, not from our governments.”
> It was a line that should be familiar to any citizen — virtually ripped from the Declaration of Independence, our founding document that is about to celebrate its 250th anniversary.
> Yet Kaine offered a very surprising response in the Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing.
> “The notion that rights don’t come from laws and don’t come from the government, but come from the Creator — that’s what the Iranian government believes,” he said. “It’s a theocratic regime that bases its rule on Shia (sic) law and targets Sunnis, Bahá’ís, Jews, Christians, and other religious minorities. They do it because they believe that they understand what natural rights are from their Creator. So, the statement that our rights do not come from our laws or our governments is extremely troubling.”
> The idea that laws “come from the government” is the basis of what is called “legal positivism,” which holds that the legitimacy and authority of laws are not based on God or natural law but rather legislation and court decisions.
