
September-October 2008 Newsletter
PaCkMaN's Corner
Our RIGHT to the Road
by
How many times have you heard from
motorists that you have no right to be on
the street with your bicycle because you
are not paying gasoline and automobile
taxes? Have you thought there must be
better answers than defensively asserting
that you do have a car at other times on
which you pay tax and that you pay a lot
of other taxes? Or maybe you don't have
a car or pay much tax. Still you feel you
must be in the right. And indeed you are.
There is a fundamental misunderstanding
in the first place that you need to pay for
a right. Rights do not depend on the
payment of taxes. Payment is not
required to speak, worship, vote or
assemble. Roads are called RIGHTS-ofway
for a reason. The First Amendment
to the Constitution, added in 1791,
guarantees the right of the people to
peaceably assemble. Assumed in that
right is the ability to get to places of
assembly, hence public rights-of-way in
order to get about. The right to be on the
road pre-existed the car or licensing or
gasoline taxes. Unlike the car however,
human-powered vehicles pre-date the Bill
of Rights by almost a century and possess
a status in the existing common law of
the time.
Driving a car on the road however,
imposes significant dangers and costs on
other people. Driving is therefore a
privilege predicated on the certification
of the responsibility of the driver to
minimize those risks through licensing
and bear those costs through insurance,
as well as to pay for wear and tear on the
infrastructure. One pays therefore for the
privilege to drive, not the right to be on
the road. Anyone who is resentful of your
free and relatively light and innocuous
presence on the road should be invited to
park their car forthwith and join you on
two wheels or walk.
Rights must be exercised (in this case
with literal exercise) and defended in
order not to wither, lapse or be taken
away. There is more respect in Europe
for cyclists who have been a continuous
presence on the road than in America
where we are reasserting a right that
almost entirely languished between the
World Wars and we are still struggling to
regain. A drive-thru/ride-by civics lesson
may not be welcomed but freedoms of
speech and assembly are your rights. You
might even copy this and hand it to them.
[
PREVIOUS ARTICLE |
LBC home |
Newsletters |
NEXT ARTICLE
]
Copyright ©2008 Louisville Wheelmen. All rights reserved.
contact the for question and/or comment about this page.
web posted: 17 Jan 2009
last updated: 17 Jan 2009
|