-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Professor Froomkin writes: <snip>

I always understood "writing code" as in "cypherpuks write code" to mean computer code, that is FORTRAN, C++, assembler, perl or whatever. I understand "writing IN code" to be the use of cryptographic tools such as codes or cyphers.

Sorry I misunderstood you, professor. I had always heard those "computer codes" you mention referred to as "computer languages," and I thought of "code" as refering to use of cryptography software like Nautilus or (of course) PGP. A quick skim of your interesting article reveals that this "code" vs. "language" terminology nitpicking is no-doubt as important to you as it is to me, as we both know that's where legal and political debates are won and lost. I freely admit my "excess of libertarian paranoia," [though I prefer to term my feelings "healthy respect for world history"]. NOTE: I have always been computer-and-math-impaired compared to others who have been on this list much longer, so I'm *certainly* no final authority as to what stuff should be called. A later post indicates the professor's interesting article is at: www-swiss.ai.mit.edu/6095/articles/froomkin-metaphor/text.html

Thus my claim that the right to write IN code may have existed in the 1790s, but the right to write [computer] code could not (since there were no computers).

Or alternating current [thank you, Mr. Tesla]. The founders anticipated inventions such as both of these in Article 1, Section 8.

Of course, I could be wrong about this, since however you define it, it's debateable whether I'd pass the code test to qualify as a cypherpunk, since I stopped writing code when I gave up programming for lawyering, and I didn't start writing in code when I started writing about codes.

I'd certainly flunk *any* C-punk test, unless it involves just writing IN code by using PGP for both encryption and authentication, or the warm feeling I get in my heart for Phil Zimmermann.

In any case it's a matter of definitions, not timelines.

Note: I am not suggesting that the right to write code lacks constitutional protection; just that the protection wouldn't come from the 9th amendment.

Agreed. As my earlier post (sadly) admitted, the 9th is *NOT* in vogue these days. I also said that since the 9th is so universally ignored, it just clutters-up the rest of the Bill of Rights and [perhaps] it therefore should be repealed. The people who say, "The 9th Amendment means nothing," or "it has no teeth," seem to be the same folks most reluctant to even *discuss* repeal, perhaps because discussion would inevitably bring publicity to those of us who support a 9th Amendment *with* _plenty_ of teeth. For _much_ better "forgotten 9th" scholarship than my random thoughts on this list, I suggest the kind and cooperative "market liberal" folks at the suddenly-influential CATO Institute, located at URL: http://www.cato.org/main/ <snip> JMR Regards, Jim Ray "It is dangerous to be right when the government is wrong." Voltaire -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.6.2 Comment: Freedom isn't Freeh iQCVAwUBMAxxpG1lp8bpvW01AQG4TwP7BDhULQdsfbruwK59t+0s7NtkIZDfARl6 boKTQ1qbO8hQkEQJ+8d0L9p2RHmDlbS/MEwEY68sLRUT1MiP2ybT9UcHK/TPbial aOVLZLprWqVW2sAL+gx7A3JPsGYdY/s8ZVllsX1xxH52btoaish890OOG/3e7v7r afHBEWfP6k4= =3F7U -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----