Parental Rights and Child Welfare – A Lockeian Analysis of Second-Hand Smoke and the Right to Life
The California superior court decision stopping a mother from smoking around their 5-year-old son aligns with Locke’s social contract theory. The theory emphasizes a need for social order by placing inherent constraints that provide a natural basis for morality (Seabright et al., 2021). Any action that goes against social order is immoral, even if the other party is enjoying their rights. Although the mother has a right to take her cigarettes, the enjoyment of her rights stops at the point where they threaten the child. Besides, smoking around a child contravenes the right to life since it has been scientifically proven that second-hand smoke is harmful. Locke recognizes that people have natural rights to life, property, and liberty independent of the laws of any society (Seabright et al., 2021). Therefore, even if cigarette smoking is permissible by law, smoking around a child undermines their natural right endowment, hence immoral.
The case involved two main parties: the mother and the son. On the one hand, the mother was enjoying her right to liberty by smoking cigarettes. However, her actions put her son in danger by exposing him to second-hand smoke. The father who filed the suit was advocating for his underage son, whom he felt was endangered by the mother’s actions. Another party is the court, which reaffirmed the father’s concerns regarding his son’s safety.
One of the rights at stake was the son’s right to life and health. The mother’s smoking habits endangered her son’s right to life since second-hand smoke has been proven to cause health hazards. On the other hand, the mother’s right to liberty was at stake since, according to Locke, one is entitled to natural liberty free from earth, man, or any superior powers (Vincent Ryan Ruggiero, 2015). In this case,the Superior Court’s ruling protected the son’s right to life.
References
Seabright, P., Stieglitz, J., & Van der Straeten, K. (2021). Evaluating social contract theory in the light of evolutionary social science. Evolutionary Human Sciences, 3. https://doi.org/10.1017/ehs.2021.4
Vincent Ryan Ruggiero. (2015). Thinking critically about ethical issues. Mcgraw-Hill Education.
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Question 
Parental Rights and Child Welfare
For this module, you are required to complete a Written Case Analysis of approximately 200 words. Please read Thinking Critically About Ethical Issues, Case 4, p. 172. Identify the moral issue(s) and the parties involved; identify what rights are at stake.