NYT Mistakes ‘Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness’ as Constitutional Right

You know, if you saw this at some small time newspaper, or a blog without multiple levels of editors, you'd be quite forgiving.

But when the supposedly most respected newspaper on the face of the planet, with a large office building filled with writers, editors, and staffers, mistakes a key phrase from the Declaration of Independence as a "constitutional right," one has to wonder what's going on with the Old Gray Lady.

Such is doubly the case when this mistake is made in an editorial (h/t Glenn Reynolds, emphasis added):

It is an eminently good thing that the anti-suicide measure would require medical specialists to keep track of veterans found to be high risks for suicide. But that's to care for them as human beings, under that other constitutional right - to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

Ahem, gentlemen, might I direct you to paragraph two of The Unanimous Declaration of the Thirteen United States of America (emphasis added):

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.

Of course, it's really not a surprise that the editorial staff of the Times doesn't know which document this is from, is it?

For those interested, Reynolds has comical observations from others in the blogosphere here.