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 3 AdamsW_ 449 (1851) (Emphasis in original)°
 Thomas Jefferson declared in 1774 that the rights of
 Americans were "derived from the laws of nature°" Jeffersonp
 ____rz_View (1774) quoted in Co P. Patte_son, _____f at 52. In
 summarizing the philosophical background to the American
 Revolution, C oPo Patterson has stated:
 Natural rights, in conclusions was a juristic
 conception regarded as e_odied in immutable
 law. Violations of natural rights by the
 English Parliament were null and void since
 contrary to natural justice° To the
 forefathers, these rights were not merely
 moral beatitudes_ abstractions of the Age of
 Reason, but irrevocable rights conferred by
 the "law of nature and nature's God'--the
 basis of all law, to which man-made law must
 conform in order to be lawo
 C.P. Patterson, suigras at 49. "The ruling principle of (Hill_s)
 essay on Liberty.. o is similar in some respects 13o the ancient
 theory of natural rights°" Anschutz, The Philoso h of J.S.
 Hill, 58 (1953)o If Courts are going to protect rights which the
 framers of the Constitution meant to be protected, they must deal
 with "natural 'r or "inherent" rights no matter how difficult it
 might be in the modern era. It is this modern inability to treat
 natural law concepts that makes Mill_s work particularly
 valuable. He provides a workable criterion for determining which
 rights were considered protected by the authors of the
 Constitution°
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