Does a citizen have a right to the compulsory service of others? Most of us think that question was resolved with blood and treasure back during our Civil War but apparently there are many who have either forgotten that lesson or have always been clueless. While some of us know that we have the right to "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness", fewer note the very important role of the inclusion of the word "pursuit" in that expression. Do we have the right to happiness regardless our effort to pursue it and does somebody suffering from depression have a right to force others to affect his good cheer? While there are at present many “rights” the clueless “deem” to exist that were previously considered by science to be impossible in the physical universe, for example “something for nothing”, relatively few of them are derived from the enslavement of others. After all, even the hard working taxpayer shouldering the yoke for the clueless still has the freedom to choose to become one of them himself.
One could similarly argue that a citizen, let alone a resident opportunist, does not have the "right" to good health but merely the right to the pursuit of good health, which can be achieved in many ways not least of which are good diet, habits and exercise, all within the realm of personal responsibility. There is a gigantic difference between rights endowed upon us by our Creator from the moment of our existence... life and liberty, and rights that by necessity could only be granted or fulfilled by mere mortals, for example psychotherapy for our hapless depressive, abortion "care" for the inconvenient fetus or medical procedures for members of the ailing population at large. What if there were no psychiatrists, fetal evacuators or physicians who were willing to work for free, or at all?
Perhaps until recently, whenever you looked about you probably did not conclude you were living in the former Soviet Union or China where at some point in high school or earlier individuals are told, "You are going to be a doctor, you here are going to be a machinist and you over there are going to be a farmer" and carted off to the appropriate educational or training facility to prepare for their service to the state. As of this writing we are still entitled to our right to "the pursuit of happiness" by proceeding along whatever paths are within our motivation or ability to navigate.
So how can you guarantee a right to health care services, Christian Scientists aside, necessarily delivered by man and not our Creator if you cannot compel others to provide such services without denying their own liberty? If a physician or for that matter anybody who can provide care the afflicted are unable to deliver unto themselves (such as open heart surgery) is unwilling for any reason to deliver those services or is unavailable what recourse is there other than conscription in one form or another?
Certainly states through their regulatory, licensing and police power can impose servitude requirements as a condition of granting permission to conduct commerce in or practice such services just as they may require a driver enjoying the privilege of public thoroughfares to be licensed and carry insurance coverage for potential harm they may inflict upon others. But the government can no more compel an individual to become a health care provider and deliver services than it can compel you to purchase a vehicle and operate it outside the domain of your private property. Therefore it follows that the state cannot, in its capacity and responsibility to fulfill its constitutional obligations, uphold any "right" that can only be protected or sustained by the services of otherwise free individuals.
Now, some are going to argue that our long history of involuntary military conscription in the constitutional role of providing "for the common defense" would be the precedent for the conscription of health care providers, but the argument would be non sequitur because while one is indeed granted the right to life by her Creator at the moment of conception she does not have the right to the preservation of her life by others, or even her own mother... as has apparently and exquisitely been upheld by the Supreme Court "Roe v Wade" decision. Thus with the possible exception of Moses and the Jews protection from enemies foreign and domestic is a service offered by man, with conscription being an occasional means to that end, not a right endowed by our Creator.
Others may argue that wrongful death tort offers ample legal precedent, but there is a difference between inflicting wrongful death and failing to preserve the life of another. Physicians who freely choose to become licensed professionals certainly can be held accountable for their inadequacies, but they have chosen to be in the life preservation business and thus tort exposure goes with the territory. A police officer who casually observes a homicidal beating has also chosen the life preservation business and is thus exposed to tort for his inaction, but the only obligation you would have in such circumstances would be to your sense of morals and valor, which would explain why so many news reporters and cameramen choose to keep shooting video instead of giving CPR, grabbing the suicide jumper or trying to stop the beating.
No, as we have learned with the latest thwarted crotch-bombing, the lone individual in the passenger cabin of life is ultimately responsible for the preservation of his own, and among those responsibilities are a healthy diet, physical exercise, the avoidance of dangerous behavior and the accumulation of the marketable skills or financial means to enable him to acquire other products and services necessary to his preservation like food, shelter and appendectomies.
