All in favor, fire!

I firmly believe my friends ask me questions just to see what wild tangent I'll go tearing off down. They get a political treatise to their reply and then compliment my work. I get more suspicious. Still, they continue to ask.

So for this one, thank or blame PH. He asked I comment on this article.

http://www.slate.com/blogs/outward/2015/06/12/gay_marriage_alabama_shows_why_civil_rights_shouldn_t_be_put_to_popular.html

My take, after a brief thought that may need even more thought application of cranial energy is multifaceted.

In the case of Loving v. Virginia, government has no business being involved in marriage of two or more adults. Said that for decades. No one's business but theirs. Move along, Benjamin.

This article poses the question, should we vote on civil rights?

This falls short of the real question.

What is a civil right?

Voting? Ayup. But with that "ayup" comes other questions: At what age do we allow someone to vote? Do we allow someone with an IQ of 35 to vote? The person is alive, aware, can mark up a piece of paper, but has no understanding of the voting process, no understanding of why a mark is being made on a piece of paper. Do we allow someone with advanced Alzheimer's to vote?

Is religion a civil right? On this one, my firm and solid opinion is no. If your religion involves the sacrifice of live chickens, then by all means do so, but you do not have the right to do this on the courthouse steps. This is a simple matter of hygiene. Chicken blood is extremely caustic, for blood anyway, and the birds carry salmonella. I can give you other instances.

Let's run this back to the OP question.

The unqualified answer is yes. We do this each and every time we go to the ballot box. It's done every time government does anything, absolutely anything. The Constitution, on which this whole "civil rights" question hangs was voted on. Amendments were voted on. Even SCOTUS takes votes, referred to as a decision, when ruling on a case. SCOTUS votes to overturn previous decisions.

Amendments may overturn SCOTUS decisions. In at least one case, a later Amendment overturned an Amendment.

We must vote on civil rights. Must. We absolutely HAVE to decide which rights are allowed in what measure. If we do not, then, the result becomes Somalia. In this case, rule of the strongest is the law and the weakest are dead. 

My anarchist friends argue that Somalia is not anarchy, but rather a failed state. They cannot explain the difference without engaging in tautology.

Terry Pratchett's Discworld had the city-state of Anhk-Morpork ruled by The Patrician. He operated under the one man, one vote rule. He was the man and he had the vote. Wanna live there? Some nations in this world do operate that way.

One more thought. This very nation was formed by voting. The voting was done in part with lead balls fired from muskets, knives across throats and ropes around necks, but make no mistake this was voting. It was an army of volunteers, each man electing to join the cause. Each man deciding. This is voting at its primal and basic level, one man deciding what he believes in is worth dying for. That is the ultimate civil right. Later, more votes were cast in actual ballot boxes.