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St. Thomas Law Review

First Page

32

Document Type

Article

Abstract

This Article seeks to open a dialogue about an individual's inalienable Right to Self-Defense and the interplay between that Right and Stand Your Ground doctrines. In Section II, this Article will present an overview of what, precisely, a Stand Your Ground statute actually encompasses and permits, as many misconceptions have arisen as to the effect of a Stand Your Ground law. Due to the position many political groups have taken, as well as inaccurate news reporting by the media, there is a mistaken belief that Stand Your Ground laws allow a shooter to become "judge, jury, and executioner." In Section III, the Article will seek to explain that, contrary to the contention that there is a "fundamental duty to avoid conflict," the right to defend oneself-self-preservation-is a Natural Right, not granted to the individual by the state. In that vein, the state cannot abrogate the right of an individual to defend himself, which the Duty to Retreat requires. Since the legal interpretation dovetails from the Natural Rights analysis, Section III will then explain when and why the Duty to Retreat entered American jurisprudence. The Duty, rather than being a "fundamental principle of the law, '' was actually a misreading or misunderstanding of the common law, all too readily expounded upon by the Progressives in the early Twentieth Century. In our conclusion, we ask whether a state Stand Your Ground statute is even required to extinguish the Duty to Retreat, given the inalienable right of the individual to defend himself. Correspondingly, the question must be asked as to whether a state is even authorized to abrogate the right to self-defense and require an individual to retreat. For if the right to self-preservation a fundamental, deeply rooted, and inalienable right is, the state's ability to infringe upon it is "off the table.

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