This week marks the birth of the worlds' first real Bill of Rights, which oddly enough occurred in Virginia in 1776, nearly a century after England's landmark Bill of Rights of 1689.
In contrast to the "rudimentary" English version on which it was based, says historian Bernard Schwartz "the Virginia Declaration of Rights of 1776 was the first modern bill of rights, since it was the first to use a written constitution to insulate individual rights from the changing winds of legislative fancy."
Rick Sincere celebrates the birthday here. Compare it to the rather 'wet' version currently extant in New Zealand which has barely has any power at all, and that exhibits a version of 'Gresham's Law' in which bad rights drive out good.
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