What principles apply to the "right to repair" debate?
Religious traditions across the world endorse stewardship of material goods and treat wasteful disposal of repairable items as a moral failing. The Constitution protects both property rights (which historically included the right to repair what you own) and intellectual property (which manufacturers increasingly use to restrict repair). The current right-to-repair movement is essentially an attempt to restore the traditional balance — letting owners actually own what they bought — through state legislation and federal antitrust enforcement. The religious-traditional answer is unambiguous: repair beats wasteful replacement. The constitutional answer is contested but trending toward stronger repair rights as legislatures and courts respond to manufacturer overreach.
Religious perspectives
Religious traditions consistently endorse stewardship of material goods and warn against the waste produced by treating repairable items as disposable.
Christianity: "Gather the pieces that are left over. Let nothing be wasted" (John 6:12) — Jesus's instruction after the feeding of the five thousand. The principle of stewardship over creation (Genesis 1:28, 2:15) extends to the things humans make from creation. Pope Francis's encyclical Laudato Si' explicitly addressed the "throwaway culture" and called for its replacement with a "culture of care."
Judaism: Bal tashchit ("do not destroy") is a foundational Jewish ethical principle, derived from Deuteronomy 20:19-20's prohibition on cutting down fruit trees in wartime. Maimonides extended the principle to wasteful destruction of any useful thing. The Talmud applies it specifically to tearing clothes, breaking dishes, or wasting food when no benefit is gained.
Islam: "Eat and drink, but do not waste. Indeed, He does not love the wasteful" (Quran 7:31). The Prophet Muhammad taught: "Whoever clings to needless extravagance and waste does not deserve a place in Paradise" (Hadith). Islamic ethics treats wasteful consumption as a serious moral failing.
Buddhism: Mindful consumption is a central practice. The principle of reducing unnecessary harm (ahimsa) extends to the harm caused by extractive production cycles when repair would suffice.
Indigenous and traditional ethics: Many Indigenous traditions emphasize obligations to seven generations of descendants — a framework that treats the wasteful disposal of repairable goods as theft from future people.
Constitutional & legal framework
The right-to-repair debate involves a genuine tension between property rights (which the Constitution protects strongly) and intellectual-property law (which the Constitution also authorizes).
Property rights: The Fifth Amendment's Takings Clause protects property from uncompensated seizure. Traditional property doctrine held that ownership of a physical item included the right to modify, repair, or dispose of it. Modern manufacturer practices — software locks, parts pairing, refusal to sell repair parts — have effectively constrained traditional ownership rights without formal legislative change.
Intellectual property authority: Article I, Section 8 gives Congress power "to promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries." Copyright protects software embedded in devices; patents protect mechanical designs. Manufacturers have used both to restrict third-party repair.
The DMCA Section 1201 question: The Digital Millennium Copyright Act (1998) prohibits circumventing technological measures that control access to copyrighted works. Manufacturers have used Section 1201 to argue that bypassing software locks to repair devices is itself illegal. The Copyright Office has granted limited exemptions every three years; the underlying statute remains.
State legislation: As of 2026, more than 30 states have considered right-to-repair legislation; Minnesota, Colorado, California, New York, and several others have enacted laws requiring manufacturers to provide repair documentation, tools, and parts on reasonable terms.
Federal action: The FTC under both administrations has expressed support for repair rights, citing competition and consumer-welfare grounds. The FTC's 2021 report "Nixing the Fix" documented manufacturer practices that limit repair. President Biden's 2021 executive order on competition included right-to-repair language; subsequent administration policy has continued to evolve.
Magnuson-Moss Warranty Act: Federal law since 1975 has prohibited tying warranty protection to use of authorized parts and service — though enforcement has been limited.
See: FTC Nixing the Fix report → | Article I, §8 (IP clause) →
Sources cited:BibleTorahQuranBuddhismConstitution