U.S. Gun Control Laws & The Second Amendment

[Punzie]

The New York Times
June 14, 2007


House Votes to Bolster Database on Gun Buyers

http://i71.photobucket.com/albums/i130/Rapunzel61/EWNY/Current-Events/mccarthy.jpg
Doug Mills/The New York Times
Representative Carolyn McCarthy, a co-sponsor of the gun bill.

By JACQUELINE PALANK and IAN URBINA (http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/u/ian_urbina/index.html?inline=nyt-per)

WASHINGTON, June 13 — The House voted Wednesday to close a loophole in gun control laws that allowed the Virginia Tech (http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/organizations/v/virginia_polytechnic_institute_and_state_universit y/index.html?inline=nyt-org) gunman to buy firearms even though he had been committed to a mental hospital. The Senate is likely to follow suit, marking the first time since 1996 that Congress has approved a measure strengthening gun control.

The bill’s approval, on a voice vote, came on the same day as the release of a report President Bush ordered after the shootings in April at Virginia Tech, in which a student killed 32 people and himself. The cabinet agencies that wrote the report found that schools, doctors and the police were not fully aware of what information could legally be shared in a web of confusing and overlapping privacy laws.

The House bill, a compromise between gun rights supporters and gun control advocates on both sides of the aisle, would provide grant money for states to update the national database that gun dealers use for background checks on prospective buyers. The update would add more criminal records and mental health information to the database.

One of the sponsors of the bill was Representative Carolyn McCarthy (http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/m/carolyn_mccarthy/index.html?inline=nyt-per), a New York Democrat who has led other efforts to tighten gun control laws and whose husband was killed by a gunman on the Long Island Rail Road in 1993. Ms. McCarthy called the bill a “good policy that will save lives.”

Two co-sponsors were her ideological opposites: Representative Lamar Smith (http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/s/lamar_smith/index.html?inline=nyt-per), a Texas Republican who supports gun rights, and Representative John D. Dingell (http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/d/john_d_dingell/index.html?inline=nyt-per), a Michigan Democrat who served on the board of the National Rifle Association (http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/organizations/n/national_rifle_association/index.html?inline=nyt-org). Both the N.R.A. and the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence supported the measure.

“This act will ensure that the background check system really is instant and accurate,” Mr. Smith said.

Another gun rights group, Gun Owners of America, opposed the measure. Erich Pratt, the organization’s communications director, said it forces “honest, law-abiding people to have to prove their innocence to a bureaucrat before they exercise their constitutional rights.”

Senator Charles E. Schumer (http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/s/charles_e_schumer/index.html?inline=nyt-per), Democrat of New York, said that he hoped to introduce the bill in the Senate without amendments “very soon” and that passage was likely.

“When the N.R.A. and I agree on legislation, you know that it’s going to get through, become law and do some good,” Mr. Schumer said.

Passing an unchanged bill in the Senate is paramount, said Wayne LaPierre, the executive vice president of the N.R.A..

“If this were to turn into a gun-control wish list on the Senate side, we would withdraw our support and go back looking for another way to pass the bill,” Mr. LaPierre said.

President Bush is “broadly supportive” of the measure and is inclined to sign it, said Tony Fratto, the deputy White House press secretary,
although Mr. Fratto said the White House still had questions about how the program would be financed. “We’re supportive of the substance of the bill, the policy,” he said.

The bill provides a right of appeal to those who believe they are unfairly included in the database, which is maintained by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/organizations/f/federal_bureau_of_investigation/index.html?inline=nyt-org). That provision was a particular concern of the rifle association.

Since the Brady gun control act was passed in 1993, states have been required to submit information to a national database on people who are not allowed to buy firearms under federal law. Those prohibited from gun ownership include convicted criminals, those involuntarily committed to mental health facilities, and those whom courts have deemed “a mental defective,” meaning they are a danger to themselves or to others.

The last gun-control measure passed by Congress, in 1996, prohibited those convicted of a misdemeanor domestic violence offense from buying or owning firearms.

The report to the president found that complicated laws protecting privacy have confused education, health care and law enforcement officials about the types of information they can legally share concerning dangerous and mentally ill people, limiting the ability of these officials to prevent the kind of violence that occurred at Virginia Tech.

The report, prepared by the Departments of Health and Human Services, Justice and Education, also found that many states and communities had not done enough to enact emergency preparedness and violence prevention plans in schools.

Additional federal guidelines should be written to clarify how information can be shared legally under federal privacy laws, the report said, and the Department of Homeland Security (http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/organizations/h/homeland_security_department/index.html?inline=nyt-org) should offer grant programs for joint training exercises for state, local and campus law enforcement.

The federal report comes two days after the state office charged with scrutinizing Virginia’s mental health agencies highlighted other problems in tracking and treating potentially dangerous mental health patients. That report described mental health services in Virginia as being underfinanced and ill-equipped to evaluate whether people are a danger to themselves or others.

Both reports were partly a response to questions raised about the handling by state, local and university staff members of the Virginia Tech gunman, Seung-Hui Cho (http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/c/cho_seunghui/index.html?inline=nyt-per), and his mental health problems, which were demonstrated long before the shootings.

After Mr. Cho made suicidal comments in December 2005, a judge ordered him to have outpatient treatment on campus. But it appears that his condition was not tracked and that he did not receive the treatment when he returned to campus.

The state’s mental health report concluded that it often takes more than a month for someone to receive court-ordered or voluntary counseling for a mental illness, a lag based in part on a lack of financing.

More than half of community mental health providers say they have less capacity today than they did a decade ago, according to the report, which recommended that Virginia officials consider giving health care professionals more time and resources for initial screenings of the mentally ill. The report also suggested that local mental health agencies better monitor and follow up with people receiving counseling in the community.

Sheryl Gay Stolberg contributed reporting.

Copyright 2007 (http://www.nytimes.com/ref/membercenter/help/copyright.html) The New York Times Company (http://www.nytco.com/)

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/06/14/washington/14guns.html?_r=1&adxnnl=1&adxnnlx=1181903736-s5AYpl7lg/vgC68Epzo08Q&oref=slogin

[Punzie]

To My Congresswoman, Carolyn McCarthy:

I am seeking your advice.

In the past, I have been able to get my mentally-challenged and substance-abusing relatives to therapy because they knew that what they said in therapy would be held in confidence.

My relatives say that if there's any chance that information about them would be put on a computer data base, they would stop going to therapy. Knowing how much they value their privacy, I am certain that they will carry out this threat.

Ms. McCarthy, they really need therapy. They need to stay on their meds and continue with their counseling sessions and support groups. How can I get them to therapy once your law is passed?

Signed,
A Hairy'd Constituent

[Ninjahedge]

Um, that's great.

I understand where that is coming from, but how many would not do this because of this law?

Also, would this only be subject to a comittal by a medical professional or leagal order or would any visit to a psych ward be deemed admissable to a background check?

They need to clarify the line. Also, whether he person was comitted or not, I think that proof of sanity would probably be a better affidavit for gun ownership than proof of instability being an inhibitor.

[Jasonik]

Scenario A:
Over time the minimum for being denied access to handguns will change from being comitted to a mental health facility, to having been ordered by a court to take antipsycotic drugs, to having ever been prescribed antidepressants, to an anonymous tip to a security agency that one was acting suspicious.

Scenario B:
Protesters asking for a new inquiry into 9/11 with testimony under oath etc. are arrested after agent provocateurs who have infiltrated the protest cause violence with the overvigilant police. Upon being processed and questioned, disbelievers of the official gov't story are deemed mentally unstable and a threat to themselves and others and committed to a mental health facility. These people will then be on watchlists and databases all accross the country taking away bill of rights protections and chilling those of other dissenting citizens.

Scenario C:
NSA internet data-mining will find my post here and deem my concern for the threat against bill of rights protections and the potential for proto-fascists and police state homeland security authoritarians to misuse regulations and databases - and deem me 'paranoid' and commit me to a mental health facility, thereby taking away my right to own a handgun and chilling any others from making statements against the rising totalitarian bureaucracy and freedom stealing security justifiers.

[Capn_Birdseye]

Just an question from a perplexed "outsider" - why is the gun lobby, and indeed the whole gun culture so strong in the US?
Surely its a no-brainer?

[ZippyTheChimp]

^
The 2nd Amendment to the US Constitution.

A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.

The central debate over ratification of the Constitution in 1789 was the concept of a strong federal government vs the individual rights codified in the Articles of Confederation (1781), the first governing document of the US. This debate led to the inclusion of the Bill of Rights (first 10 amendments) into the Constitution. The 9th Amendment addresses rights not specified in the Constitution:

The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.


Over the centuries, the meaning of militia, keep and bear arms, and the punctuation used in the text have further complicated the debate.

http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/data/constitution/amendment02/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Amendment_to_the_United_States_Constitution

[Punzie]

I understand where that is coming from, but how many would not do this because of this law?
You're very lucky, Ninja. By asking that question, you're implicitly saying that nobody very close to you has ever been seriously mentally ill and/or a dysfunctional substance abuser.

The answer: anybody who would stay "bottomed out" -- or chance a relapse -- rather than have their problems recorded on a database.

Another problem: people who continue to go to support groups are much less likely to open up. Who at an AA meeting is going to confess that s/he almost punched someone at a bar once?

[ZippyTheChimp]

Scenario A:

Scenario B:

Scenario C:
These scenarios, onerous as they are, arise from a need to temper the consequences of the belief that carrying a handgun is an intrinsic freedom.

[Jasonik]

These scenarios, onerous as they are, arise from a need1 to temper the consequences of the belief2 that carrying a handgun is an intrinsic freedom3.

1. The need of a tyranical gov't to have a docile and unarmed populace?

2. Rights are not given by the Constitution, but recognized as intrinsic and guaranteed protection from gov't intrusion.

3. The 9th Amendment suffices if you twist the 2nd somehow.


If we learn anything from the Framers of the Constitution, it is that government shall never be trusted with the means to oppress citizens. The possibility of these onerous scenarios arises from our abdication of the responsibility to withold from government the tools of tyranny. The people should never give to the government any authority that they cannot rescind.

We are fast entering an era where in popular thought only the police and criminals have guns. Where the act of posessing a gun is criminal on its face. God forbid a fascist police state where the only guns around show up at your door in uniform making demands.

Soon enough merely owning a gun will be a de facto revolutionary act.

[Capn_Birdseye]

To an "outsider" it just seems an archiac law that belongs to a past era, not one that is relevant to 2007, but then I speak as someone who is merely an observer. I read that it is estimated there are over 200 million guns in the US, around 65 million being hand-guns! Thats an awful lot of weaponry! For what purpose are these weapons held? Is there that much hunting in the US to warrant such numbers of guns?

Yes there is the occasional gun-crime in the UK but our cops here remain largely unarmed - long may that continue!

[ablarc]

Is there that much hunting in the US to warrant such numbers of guns?
Hard to hunt with a handgun.

Folks don't trust the police to protect them in their homes, cars or on the street ...and other folks don't trust the government, period --though it's a bit naive to think an armed citizenry can hold off a determined government police state. See Jasonik's posts for a raw statement of this belief.

It's true there would be much fewer killings if no one had a gun. Makes it so easy to off someone you get mad at.

[ZippyTheChimp]

though it's a bit naive to think an armed citizenry can hold off a determined government police state. See Jasonik's posts for a raw statement of this belief.Well. if you're going resist government troops, at least a few people in the nabe should be armed with SAWS (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Squad_automatic_weapon).

[Jasonik]

it's a bit naive to think an armed citizenry can hold off a determined government police state.

Even more so considering all the firsthand training our military is getting fighting just such a force in Iraq.

[Jasonik]

Well. if you're going resist government troops, at least a few people in the nabe should be armed with SAWS (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Squad_automatic_weapon).

Will they take out SWORDS (http://www.defensereview.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=657)?

[ablarc]

Even more so considering all the firsthand training our military is getting fighting just such a force in Iraq.
Back home, we don't have fiery Allah and a heaven full of virgins to motivate us.

[ZippyTheChimp]

Back home, we don't have...a heaven full of virgins to motivate us.You've totally ruined Father's Day.

[Jasonik]

Back home, we don't have fiery Allah and a heaven full of virgins to motivate us.

Yeah, I guess Liberty isn't much of a motivator.

[ablarc]

Yeah, I guess Liberty isn't much of a motivator.
Wasn't for the folks in Germany in 1933. Didn't seem to mean much hereabouts in 2004.

[ZippyTheChimp]

2. Rights are not given by the Constitution, but recognized as intrinsic and guaranteed protection from gov't intrusion.This does not answer the question of why carrying a handgun is an intrisic right.

In fact, the statement is ironic, in that it is usually the gun-lobby that trots out the Constitution to "prove" the inalienable right to carry a handgun.

So if the Constitution is only recognizing this intrinsic right, it must originate from some other source. I can only conclude that it is intrinsic to the nature of a human being; and if so, humans in countries with reasonable gun-control laws are actually living in repressive states.

[Punzie]

Yeah, I guess Liberty isn't much of a motivator.
I think that in order to truly appreciate liberty, you have to either have:
- been born without it (or not enough of it), or
- had it taken away from you at some time, or
- had an experience(s) that gave you the feeling that your liberty will never be guaranteed.

In other words, you need a "before/after" basis for comparison.

I'm probably going to get wacked for my opinion, and my defense is, "you had to be there."

[ablarc]

^ The irony is that the government we most need to worry about taking our liberty will be one the gun lobby worked to get elected. It'll be a majority government, won't it, and we'll be subject to the tyranny of the majority, which will wholeheartedly support its assault on freedom. Isn't that what happened in the Thirties in Germany? Now that was a popular government.

Didn't we get a little taste of that right here the last six years?

Free access to guns and eroded liberty. It's OK, it was just a little taste, but I can't imagine why anybody thinks having people own guns will preserve liberty when it's the gun aficionados' preferred governments we most need to worry about.

[ZippyTheChimp]

^
That's right.

And gun ownership not so much an expression of liberty, but of American individuality, the pioneer spirit, now largely a myth.

Rapunzel: I don't agree.

[Punzie]

I was talking about liberties in general...http://i71.photobucket.com/albums/i130/Rapunzel61/Smileys/Eek-RollEyes/oops.gif

I, too, don't think that handgun ownership is an expression of liberty.
That embarrassing Second Amendment must be repealed.

[ZippyTheChimp]

I was talking about liberties in general...http://i71.photobucket.com/albums/i130/Rapunzel61/Smileys/Eek-RollEyes/oops.gif
So was I.

[Punzie]

You had to be there.
http://i71.photobucket.com/albums/i130/Rapunzel61/Smileys/Razz/smileys_stick_tongue_out.gif

[ZippyTheChimp]

Explanation?

[Punzie]

Zippy, you disagreed with my opinion on the conditions one has to have been in (or be in) in order to truly appreciate liberty. But you didn't specify how you disagree. Maybe it was because it was late at night and you were too tired; maybe you never feel like discussing it...

"I disagree" without qualification gets a razz. Nothing personal.:D

[Capn_Birdseye]

And gun ownership not so much an expression of liberty, but of American individuality, the pioneer spirit, now largely a myth.
"American individuality"? - An interesting concept in a country consumed by "brands" and "designer labels". Thats no disrespect to the US as the UK is going down the same road.
Surely with there being in excess of 200 million guns in circulation in the US, "American individuality", if that is the term we use, is best expressed by NOT having a gun?
Again, as a non-American I always associate guns in America with the right-wing anti-government militia's, (what are they about?), the rabid racists of the KKK etc, the hunting crowd, and the powerful gun lobby.
What are guns for if not to kill? The only decision is what to kill, animals or humans? There ain't much else!
Give peace a chance as John Lennon once said.

[ZippyTheChimp]

^
I did say that it is now largely a myth.

[ZippyTheChimp]

Zippy, you disagreed with my opinion on the conditions one has to have been in (or be in) in order to truly appreciate liberty. But you didn't specify how you disagree.I disagreed with the conclusion...

In other words, you need a "before/after" basis for comparison.

...that you need this experience. Sometimes it works, but often that experience produces an irrational response that actually blinds the population to the erosion of freedom.

You had this situation in Germany in 1933 - a humiliating defeat in WWI, postwar economic chaos, a sense that they did not control their own destiny. Burn the Reichstag, blame the Communists, and you have the opportunity for an emergency decree:
Restrictions on personal liberty, on the right of free expression of opinion, including freedom of the press; on the rights of assembly and association; and violations of the privacy of postal, telegraphic and telephonic communications and warrants for house searches, orders for confiscations as well as restrictions on property, are also permissible beyond the legal limits otherwise prescribed.

There are parallels to 09/11. Freedom was lost: the freedom from fear, freedom to get on an airplane, freedom to take a photo anywhere without being questioned.

As a result, we allowed our own citizens to be imprisoned without the Constitutional right of due process.

[Jasonik]

So if the Constitution is only recognizing this intrinsic right, it must originate from some other source1. I can only conclude that it is intrinsic to the nature of a human being; and if so, humans in countries with reasonable2 gun-control laws are actually living in repressive states.3
1. 'our creator', god, 'the spirit in the sky' etc.

2. to people in those countries apparently

3. I have no problem with this statement.


The irony is that the government we most need to worry about taking our liberty will be one the gun lobby worked to get elected.1 It'll be a majority government, won't it, and we'll be subject to the tyranny of the majority2 which will wholeheartedly support its assault on freedom. Isn't that what happened in the Thirties in Germany? Now that was a popular government3.

Didn't we get a little taste of that right here the last six years?

Free access to guns and eroded liberty. It's OK, it was just a little taste, but I can't imagine why anybody thinks having people own guns will preserve liberty when it's the gun aficionados' preferred governments we most need to worry about.4

1. Not necessarily, a uniform policy of preserving individual liberties would include gun ownership but also privacy, free speech, etc.

2. Only in a pure democracy. The strength of our form of government - Constitutional Republic - is that it guarantees the rights of the minority even if a majority would act to stifle them - as such, gun laws are unconstitutional.

3.One with civil rights, meaning the rights are granted by the authority of the government, just as easily taken away by the authority of the government. In the United States all authority of the government is derived from, and therefore subordinate to, the authority of the people. Our rights reside within us and are protected by government.

4. Two separate thoughts here. Pandering to a cause by unscrupulous politicians does not change the merit of the cause. And yes the Bush administraton has been the greatest threat to liberty, arguably, this country has ever seen.

[ablarc]

Two separate thoughts here. Pandering to a cause by unscrupulous politicians does not change the merit of the cause.
True enough. Who can be against motherhood?


And yes the Bush administraton has been the greatest threat to liberty, arguably, this country has ever seen.
Not much hope of redress from the gun-toters who elected him.

Why would this change in the future?

Aren't gun owners mostly control freaks or closet fascists about everything except gun control, where they're libertarians?

[Jasonik]

Aren't gun owners mostly control freaks or closet fascists about everything except gun control, where they're libertarians?

I don't know. Buit libertarians are always anti gun control, anti control freaks and anti fascists.

I think you may be inferring a false relationship causality from the facts.

-Gun control opponents vote.
-Gun control opponents vote for the candidate (on the ballot) most likely to preserve gun rights.
-The candidate (on the ballot) most likely to preserve gun rights is a proto-fascist.
-Gun control opponents vote for proto-fascists.
-Gun control opponents are proto-fascists.

Though the above may pass for logic in this crazy time - it isn't.

Believe me I am horrified by the implications of the situation. Not the least of which is that gun owners will self infer themselves to share the proto-fascist leanings of the one they elected and readily prostrate themselves to government in the name of security. For instance, registering all guns with the local gov't (to be added to a federal database) thereby criminalizing all guns the gov't can't locate- ie. revoke.

The way the political spectrum is set up right now; I fear it's almost inevitable the gov't will gain contol of the vast majority of guns in this country. The only way to protect our bill of rights guaranteed freedoms is to force the government to protect them all. For if we give up one, we effectively give up all.

[Jasonik]

The fundamental right to bear arms for protection is laid out here as it was for the founders.
*****
Locke, John. Second Treatise of Government. 1690. (http://www.gutenberg.org/catalog/world/readfile?fk_files=28217&pageno=1)

---Chap. I. Sect. 5. This equality of men by nature, the judicious Hooker looks
upon as so evident in itself, and beyond all question, that he makes it
the foundation of that obligation to mutual love amongst men, on which he
builds the duties they owe one another, and from whence he derives the
great maxims of justice and charity. His words are, The like natural
inducement hath brought men to know that it is no less their duty, to
love others than themselves; for seeing those things which are equal,
must needs all have one measure; if I cannot but wish to receive good,
even as much at every man's hands, as any man can wish unto his own soul,
how should I look to have any part of my desire herein satisfied, unless
myself be careful to satisfy the like desire, which is undoubtedly in
other men, being of one and the same nature? To have any thing offered
them repugnant to this desire, must needs in all respects grieve them as
much as me; so that if I do harm, I must look to suffer, there being no
reason that others should shew greater measure of love to me, than they
have by me shewed unto them: my desire therefore to be loved of my equals
in nature as much as possible may be, imposeth upon me a natural duty of
bearing to them-ward fully the like affection; from which relation of
equality between ourselves and them that are as ourselves, what several
rules and canons natural reason hath drawn, for direction of life, no man
is ignorant, Eccl. Pol. Lib. 1.

---Sect. 6. But though this be a state of liberty, yet it is not a state
of licence: though man in that state have an uncontroulable liberty to
dispose of his person or possessions, yet he has not liberty to destroy
himself, or so much as any creature in his possession, but where some
nobler use than its bare preservation calls for it. The state of nature
has a law of nature to govern it, which obliges every one: and reason,
which is that law, teaches all mankind, who will but consult it, that
being all equal and independent, no one ought to harm another in his
life, health, liberty, or possessions: for men being all the workmanship
of one omnipotent, and infinitely wise maker; all the servants of one
sovereign master, sent into the world by his order, and about his
business; they are his property, whose workmanship they are, made to last
during his, not one another's pleasure: and being furnished with like
faculties, sharing all in one community of nature, there cannot be
supposed any such subordination among us, that may authorize us to
destroy one another, as if we were made for one another's uses, as the
inferior ranks of creatures are for our's. Every one, as he is bound to
preserve himself, and not to quit his station wilfully, so by the like
reason, when his own preservation comes not in competition, ought he, as
much as he can, to preserve the rest of mankind, and may not, unless it
be to do justice on an offender, take away, or impair the life, or what
tends to the preservation of the life, the liberty, health, limb, or
goods of another.

---Sect. 7. And that all men may be restrained from invading others
rights, and from doing hurt to one another, and the law of nature be
observed, which willeth the peace and preservation of all mankind, the
execution of the law of nature is, in that state, put into every man's
hands, whereby every one has a right to punish the transgressors of that
law to such a degree, as may hinder its violation: for the law of nature
would, as all other laws that concern men in this world 'be in vain, if
there were no body that in the state of nature had a power to execute
that law, and thereby preserve the innocent and restrain offenders. And
if any one in the state of nature may punish another for any evil he has
done, every one may do so: for in that state of perfect equality, where
naturally there is no superiority or jurisdiction of one over another,
what any may do in prosecution of that law, every one must needs have a
right to do.

---Sect. 8. And thus, in the state of nature, one man comes by a power
over another; but yet no absolute or arbitrary power, to use a criminal,
when he has got him in his hands, according to the passionate heats, or
boundless extravagancy of his own will; but only to retribute to him, so
far as calm reason and conscience dictate, what is proportionate to his
transgression, which is so much as may serve for reparation and
restraint: for these two are the only reasons, why one man may lawfully
do harm to another, which is that we call punishment. In transgressing
the law of nature, the offender declares himself to live by another rule
than that of reason and common equity, which is that measure God has set
to the actions of men, for their mutual security; and so he becomes
dangerous to mankind, the tye, which is to secure them from injury and
violence, being slighted and broken by him. Which being a trespass
against the whole species, and the peace and safety of it, provided for
by the law of nature, every man upon this score, by the right he hath to
preserve mankind in general, may restrain, or where it is necessary,
destroy things noxious to them, and so may bring such evil on any one,
who hath transgressed that law, as may make him repent the doing of it,
and thereby deter him, and by his example others, from doing the like
mischief. And in the case, and upon this ground, EVERY MAN HATH A RIGHT
TO PUNISH THE OFFENDER, AND BE EXECUTIONER OF THE LAW OF NATURE.

---Sect. 9. 1 doubt not but this will seem a very strange doctrine to
some men: but before they condemn it, I desire them to resolve me, by
what right any prince or state can put to death, or punish an alien, for
any crime he commits in their country. It is certain their laws, by
virtue of any sanction they receive from the promulgated will of the
legislative, reach not a stranger: they speak not to him, nor, if they
did, is he bound to hearken to them. The legislative authority, by which
they are in force over the subjects of that commonwealth, hath no power
over him. Those who have the supreme power of making laws in England,
France or Holland, are to an Indian, but like the rest of the world, men
without authority: and therefore, if by the law of nature every man hath
not a power to punish offences against it, as he soberly judges the case
to require, I see not how the magistrates of any community can punish an
alien of another country; since, in reference to him, they can have no
more power than what every man naturally may have over another.

---Sect, 10. Besides the crime which consists in violating the law, and
varying from the right rule of reason, whereby a man so far becomes
degenerate, and declares himself to quit the principles of human nature,
and to be a noxious creature, there is commonly injury done to some
person or other, and some other man receives damage by his transgression:
in which case he who hath received any damage, has, besides the right of
punishment common to him with other men, a particular right to seek
reparation from him that has done it: and any other person, who finds it
just, may also join with him that is injured, and assist him in
recovering from the offender so much as may make satisfaction for the
harm he has suffered.

---Sect. 11. From these two distinct rights, the one of punishing the
crime for restraint, and preventing the like offence, which right of
punishing is in every body; the other of taking reparation, which belongs
only to the injured party, comes it to pass that the magistrate, who by
being magistrate hath the common right of punishing put into his hands,
can often, where the public good demands not the execution of the law,
remit the punishment of criminal offences by his own authority, but yet
cannot remit the satisfaction due to any private man for the damage he
has received. That, he who has suffered the damage has a right to demand
in his own name, and he alone can remit: the damnified person has this
power of appropriating to himself the goods or service of the offender,
by right of self-preservation, as every man has a power to punish the
crime, to prevent its being committed again, by the right he has of
preserving all mankind, and doing all reasonable things he can in order
to that end: and thus it is, that every man, in the state of nature, has
a power to kill a murderer, both to deter others from doing the like
injury, which no reparation can compensate, by the example of the
punishment that attends it from every body, and also to secure men from
the attempts of a criminal, who having renounced reason, the common rule
and measure God hath given to mankind, hath, by the unjust violence and
slaughter he hath committed upon one, declared war against all mankind,
and therefore may be destroyed as a lion or a tyger, one of those wild
savage beasts, with whom men can have no society nor security: and upon
this is grounded that great law of nature, Whoso sheddeth man's blood, by
man shall his blood be shed. And Cain was so fully convinced, that every
one had a right to destroy such a criminal, that after the murder of his
brother, he cries out, Every one that findeth me, shall slay me; so plain
was it writ in the hearts of all mankind.

[ZippyTheChimp]

http://www.potowmack.org/


The issue is the relationship between citizen and state. The response on the gun rights ideologies side is that governmental authority can only be tolerated as long as there is an armed populace pointing guns at it. On the other side, it is that the only viable concept of nationhood is where the rule of law, the state's monopoly on violence and the state's internal sovereignty all mean the same thing; that there is a difference between civil society and the State of Nature as indicated in John Locke's The Second Treatise of Government from which the American Revolutionaries and the Framers of the Constitution took much of their instructions. On the gun rights side is a childish, anarchic political fantasy, a childish concept of the political self and the essence of political cynicism; on the other, the operating concepts of the system we live under. As the United States goes off on a global campaign against terrorism, terrorist states, terrorist harboring states and rogue states, the ultimate goal is to establish a viable concept of nationhood in politically dysfunctional parts of the world where the rule of law, the state's monopoly on violence and the state's internal sovereignty all mean the same thing. It is the nation state in the present world which is still the vessel for the rule of law, political authority, and the conservative, very unlibertarian heresy of political community. We ought to be able to arrive at some conclusions on what a viable concept of nationhood means in this country.

he issue the gun rights ideologies raise is a logical absurdity. When sovereign individuals in the State of Nature come together to form political community they create a higher law, a governing authority. Again, in political community the rule of law, the state's monopoly on violence and the state's internal sovereignty all mean the same thing. The right to be armed outside of the law is the right to individual sovereignty. Individual sovereigns by definition do not consent to be governed, do not give "just powers" to government, do not "quit everyone his Executive Power of the Law of Nature". They exist in the State of Nature before there is law and government. They still want this government to have the "just powers" to secure the rights they proclaim.

Whatever rights are guaranteed in the Bill of Rights, which is part of the Constitution, have to be consistent with what a constitution is. A constitution is the fundamental law of a political community. A civil right to be armed outside of the law would reduce the Constitution of this political community from a frame of government with "just powers" that derive from the "consent of the governed" to a treaty among sovereign individuals in the State of Nature who give no more than word of honor and promise of good faith.. Sovereign powers, whether sovereign states or sovereign individuals, do not accommodate to a law-giving, law-enforcing authority. They make a treaty not a government. Civil rights are defined in constitutional doctrine by the judiciary. To secure civil rights government needs "just powers" that derive from the consent of the governed. No "consent of the governed" means no "just powers" to secure civil rights or anything else. We are on our own to secure our own rights as individual sovereigns. That is why we need a gun in every pocket. It is not within the powers of the judiciary to reverse the process followed by the Framers of the Constitution from John Locke's The Second Treatise of Government, dissolve law and government, and return to the State of Nature— that is institute anarchy.

[Jasonik]

When sovereign individuals in the State of Nature come together to form political community they create a higher law, a governing authority.
This is a fundamental misunderstanding of Locke. The sovereign individuals delegate their authority to the government. The powers of the government authority are valid insofar as they are derived and limited to- and by the Natural authority of the individual.

The state of nature
has a law of nature to govern it, which obliges every one: and reason,
which is that law, teaches all mankind, who will but consult it, that
being all equal and independent, no one ought to harm another in his
life, health, liberty, or possessions...
These are the laws.

And that all men may be restrained from invading others
rights, and from doing hurt to one another, and the law of nature be
observed, which willeth the peace and preservation of all mankind, the
execution of the law of nature is, in that state, put into every man's
hands, whereby every one has a right to punish the transgressors of that
law to such a degree, as may hinder its violation: for the law of nature
would, as all other laws that concern men in this world 'be in vain, if
there were no body that in the state of nature had a power to execute
that law, and thereby preserve the innocent and restrain offenders. And
if any one in the state of nature may punish another for any evil he has
done, every one may do so:
All may apply these laws.

From these two distinct rights, the one of punishing the
crime for restraint, and preventing the like offence, which right of
punishing is in every body; the other of taking reparation, which belongs
only to the injured party, comes it to pass that the magistrate, who by
being magistrate hath the common right of punishing put into his hands,
can often, where the public good demands not the execution of the law,
remit the punishment of criminal offences by his own authority, but yet
cannot remit the satisfaction due to any private man for the damage he
has received.
The government may be delegated to apply these laws with the discretion of individuals applying the laws- except with regard to material damages.

Nowhere is it justified for the powers of the government to exceed the natural powers of the individual, i.e. if I cannot deny you property or liberty - guns and their use- the power of life preserving defense, neither can the government. Furthermore, nowhere is it justified that extension of the application of common rights held by individuals, to a government authority in any way prevents these so governed from retaining the free exercise of these common rights.

Again, in political community (http://www.cpjustice.org/guidelines/political_community.html) the rule of law (http://www.rule-of-law.info/), the state's monopoly on violence (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Max_Weber) and the state's internal sovereignty (http://magictheatre.panopticweb.com/aesthetics/writings/polth-derrida.html) all mean the same thing.
Saying it's so doesn't make it so. First off, within the Union of these United States, internal sovereignty belongs to the States and the Federal government is limited within the country- hence National Guard troops under the comand of Governors (http://www.intel-dump.com/posts/1126296246.shtml). This fundamental Federal position was somewhat blurred after the Civil War, but in interpreting the Constitution that blurring is immaterial. Thus the Federal use of force internally has always been limited except to "insure domestic Tranquility." (Though there is some concern about the recent dilution of the Insurection Act of 1807 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Insurrection_Act)).

Using Max Weber's Gewaltmonopol des Staates, force monopy of the state, in this context not only undermines the article's final argument, but is antithetical to the notion of the Constitution- that political and governmental authority shall flow from the control of power, not from the duty to protect liberty.

Whatever rights are guaranteed in the Bill of Rights, which is part of the Constitution, have to be consistent with what a constitution is. A constitution is the fundamental law of a political community.
No problem yet. I note that both the government and the people are bound by the "supreme Law of the Land."

A civil right to be armed outside of the law would reduce the Constitution of this political community from a frame of government with "just powers" that derive from the "consent of the governed" to a treaty among sovereign individuals in the State of Nature who give no more than word of honor and promise of good faith.
The government's powers are "just" because they are the same powers given to sovereign individuals by God- the people "consent" because this is so. There is no such thing as "armed outside of the law." There can be no civil law that contradicts or limits natural law in a free society. Only because the people first have guns (the inherent right of self preservation), can the government even have them. The Constitution of the United States is not a treaty among individuals, it is a contract between individuals and government. The people delegate certain authority, with the stipulation that the government can not assume a power it is not specifically given, and it must "secure the Blessings of Liberty" for the governed and their posterity.


...sovereign individuals in the State of Nature who give no more than word of honor and promise of good faith. In fact the inverse should make individuals suspicious of a government. Here the author cleverly- (if intentional) intimates, by confusing Lockean with Hobbesian states of nature, that people don't desire to enter into peacful agreements and would wish to suspend them at a moments notice. The strength of Locke is that there is no desire for the people to break the "social contract" because they have not given anything up to to enter into it, unlike Hobbes who insists the governed relinquish some of their liberty for the convenience government brings.

Sovereign powers, whether sovereign states or sovereign individuals, do not accommodate to a law-giving, law-enforcing authority.
Only insofar as the "law-giving, law-enforcing authority" doesn't break the original constitutional contract.

They make a treaty not a government. Civil rights are defined in constitutional doctrine by the judiciary. To secure civil rights government needs "just powers" that derive from the consent of the governed. No "consent of the governed" means no "just powers" to secure civil rights or anything else. We are on our own to secure our own rights as individual sovereigns. That is why we need a gun in every pocket. It is not within the powers of the judiciary to reverse the process followed by the Framers of the Constitution from John Locke's The Second Treatise of Government, dissolve law and government, and return to the State of Nature— that is institute anarchy.
Whatever argument this flacid reasoning attempts to 'prove', I can only conclude that a continuation of the "consent of the governed" is contingent on the government's justification as a protector of liberty, justice, and rule of law- not its reformation as an authoritarian police state. Or in the words of one who did all he could to ensure it is so:

The only refuge left for those who prophesy the downfall of the State governments is the visionary supposition that the federal government may previously accumulate a military force for the projects of ambition. The reasonings contained in these papers must have been employed to little purpose indeed, if it could be necessary now to disprove the reality of this danger. That the people and the States should, for a sufficient period of time, elect an uninterupted succession of men ready to betray both; that the traitors should, throughout this period, uniformly and systematically pursue some fixed plan for the extension of the military establishment; that the governments and the people of the States should silently and patiently behold the gathering storm, and continue to supply the materials, until it should be prepared to burst on their own heads, must appear to every one more like the incoherent dreams of a delirious jealousy, or the misjudged exaggerations of a counterfeit zeal, than like the sober apprehensions of genuine patriotism. Extravagant as the supposition is, let it however be made. Let a regular army, fully equal to the resources of the country, be formed; and let it be entirely at the devotion of the federal government; still it would not be going too far to say, that the State governments, with the people on their side, would be able to repel the danger. The highest number to which, according to the best computation, a standing army can be carried in any country, does not exceed one hundredth part of the whole number of souls; or one twenty-fifth part of the number able to bear arms. This proportion would not yield, in the United States, an army of more than twenty-five or thirty thousand men. To these would be opposed a militia amounting to near half a million of citizens with arms in their hands, officered by men chosen from among themselves, fighting for their common liberties, and united and conducted by governments possessing their affections and confidence. It may well be doubted, whether a militia thus circumstanced could ever be conquered by such a proportion of regular troops. Those who are best acquainted with the last successful resistance of this country against the British arms, will be most inclined to deny the possibility of it. Besides the advantage of being armed, which the Americans possess over the people of almost every other nation, the existence of subordinate governments, to which the people are attached, and by which the militia officers are appointed, forms a barrier against the enterprises of ambition, more insurmountable than any which a simple government of any form can admit of. Notwithstanding the military establishments in the several kingdoms of Europe, which are carried as far as the public resources will bear, the governments are afraid to trust the people with arms. And it is not certain, that with this aid alone they would not be able to shake off their yokes. But were the people to possess the additional advantages of local governments chosen by themselves, who could collect the national will and direct the national force, and of officers appointed out of the militia, by these governments, and attached both to them and to the militia, it may be affirmed with the greatest assurance, that the throne of every tyranny in Europe would be speedily overturned in spite of the legions which surround it. Let us not insult the free and gallant citizens of America with the suspicion, that they would be less able to defend the rights of which they would be in actual possession, than the debased subjects of arbitrary power would be to rescue theirs from the hands of their oppressors. Let us rather no longer insult them with the supposition that they can ever reduce themselves to the necessity of making the experiment, by a blind and tame submission to the long train of insidious measures which must precede and produce it.
-James Madison. The Federalist No. 46 (http://www.constitution.org/fed/federa46.htm)


Additionally:

U.N. v. Madison (http://www.nysun.com/article/35220)

For the Americans, fighting to forge a free political union, to contradict any principal element of Locke's world-view would therefore be to undercut the whole philosophy as such. Locke's basic principles, insofar as they relate to the Founders' principal political purpose, are these: (1) Reason (not one's unchecked passions or other men's opinions) as the proper and sole tool of cognition and guide to action-and so the basis for asserting men's natural rights; (2) Rights, therefore, as being brought with men into civil society, and not the mere creation of social or political institutions; (3) Government as a protector of rights-and not a provider of privilege, in the sense of furnishing material assistance to some, ultimately at the expense of others (rich or poor; landlord or laborer; farmer, furrier, or ferry boat captain); (4) Private property as sacrosanct; and so (5) Unregulated and politically unassisted markets as the basic rule of economic organization.
-Jerome Huyler How Lockean Was the American Revolution? (http://www.objectivistcenter.org/cth--10-How_Lockean_Was_American_Revolution.aspx)


The Constitution of the United States (http://www.usconstitution.net/const.html)

[ZippyTheChimp]

The government's powers are "just" because they are the same powers given to sovereign individuals by God- the people "consent" because this is so. There is no such thing as "armed outside of the law." There can be no civil law that contradicts or limits natural law in a free society. Only because the people first have guns (the inherent right of self preservation), can the government even have them.If anyone wants to observe the State of Nature in full flower, visit Iraq.

[Jasonik]

That is a specious comment. If anything it is a Hobbesian nightmare foist upon them by outsiders. The Iraquis are being imposed upon by at least 5 different parties. They have no sovereignty to speak of, individual or otherwise. They are like animals in a cage.

I see no path from that mess to what we have without leaving them alone to fight it out and come up with something that works. We are lucky enough to be born in a land where the founders of our government were completely free to make their plan without needing to compromise with an existing power system other than former colonial states. I can only wish this for the Iraqis.


I hope that you appreciate the difference between your assumed lawless, selfish, revengeful, violent anarchy, and the Natural Rights derived from Man's need for self preservation. Remember our unique human trait is reason- with it we don't have to live like savages.

A safe place to sleep = property rights
Recompense for theft or damage = property rights + courts
And on and on...

Some may see government as an authority that keeps people in line, like Giuliani or the aspired to Iraqi police state. Just because they will be given courts, and certain civil rights doesn't mean they are free. Their rights are given by the power, might, and authority of the government- it might as well be King George.
It is so sad to see today in this country such apathy and cynicism toward embracing and holding accountable our government for protecting our uniquely guaranteed set of god-given enumerated (and others not so numerated) rights. For crying out loud, Federal Judges are citing FOREIGN COURT CASES AS LEGAL PRECEDENT!?!

Fine. Rollover. Big Brother will throw you a bone.

[ablarc]

That is a specious comment. If anything it is a Hobbesian nightmare foist upon them by outsiders. The Iraquis are being imposed upon by at least 5 different parties. They have no sovereignty to speak of, individual or otherwise. They are like animals in a cage.
An accurate assessment.

Among their oppressors is a vengeful God and His Prophet.

[212]

Most Americans want more gun control, but support is slipping a bit lately:
http://www.pollingreport.com/guns.htm

[ablarc]

^ That's an opinion poll. Jasonik's talking about eternal verity.

[MikeW]

I haven't read back through all the posts. But it looks like, at long last, we may get a final Supreme Court decision on whether the Second Amendment confers a direct individual right to own weapons (including, but not limited to, handguns).

There's a case out of DC (Parker v. Washington DC), which challenged what is essentially a ban on private handgun ownership. A panel of the DC Circuit overturned the law, and the full Circuit refused to review the ruling. This puts the DC Circuit in direct conflict with other circuits (most noteably the 9th in San Francisco). This means that this is likely heading to the SCOTUS.

Given that between the Reagan and two Bush appointment, the SCOTUS has gotten pretty conservative, I think it's a better than even chance that they'll uphold the DC Circuit ruling and read the 2A as conferring an individual right.

[Punzie]

This thread's title was changed from:
Bolstering the Database on Gun Buyers
to:
U.S. Gun Control Laws & The Second Amendment

[ablarc]

^ Why?

Folks who start threads: why not credit them with knowing what they want to title them --particularly in the case of someone as thoughtful as jasonik. He doesn't need to be second-guessed.

And neither do most of the rest of us. We don't need to be worrying about whether our posts will be "improved" or bowdlerized.

Spammers are fair game, but lighten up your "moderating", Punzi, or you may drive some people away who are the forum's backbone.

[Punzie]

^ Why?

Folks who start threads: why not credit them with knowing what they want to title them --particularly in the case of someone as thoughtful as jasonik. He doesn't need to be second-guessed.

And neither do most of the rest of us. We don't need to be worrying about whether our posts will be "improved" or bowdlerized.
. . .

I am the AUTHOR of the thread! I retitled my own thread!:p:D

[Punzie]

http://i71.photobucket.com/albums/i130/Rapunzel61/Adages/Eat-Crow/EatCrow.gif

[ablarc]

^ You beat me to it. I was fixin' to eat crow, but you got there before me. I would have apologized more elaborately if you hadn't.

So you'll have to settle for "Sorry, my bad."

The point about overzealous moderating remains valid.

[Punzie]

You can delete the apology altogether. I'd much rather read about how you're going to tackle down that bird.:)

[ablarc]

Bird flew the coop.

[Ninjahedge]

Abl, she set that up for you.

Why would someone who authored the thread need to notify herself that she changed the title? ;)

[Jasonik]

"When the people fear their government, there is tyranny; when the government fears the people, there is liberty."
-Thomas Jefferson

"The strongest reason for the people to retain the right to keep and bear arms is, as a last resort, to protect themselves against tyranny in government."
-Thomas Jefferson

"Rightful liberty is unobstructed action according to our will within limits drawn around us by the equal rights of others. I do not add 'within the limits of the law' because law is often but the tyrant's will, and always so when it violates the rights of the individual."
-Thomas Jefferson

[Ninjahedge]

Whatever J.

I know you have a lot of good points, and better quotes, but the simple fact of the matter is, the people would not be able to stand with our current military as it is. This is not the same US that the founding fathers started with, planned for or ever imagined.

In order to get back to that, we need to start breaking up the power centers and make this a set of united States, rather than a federal democracy that is sliding slowly towards imperialism.

If we can get the power back in the states, back TO the people, then maybe John Doe having an assault rifle or semi-automatic handgun will mean a bit more.

[Jasonik]

"The spirit of this country is totally adverse to a large military force."
-Thomas Jefferson

"When we get piled upon one another in large cities, as in Europe, we shall become as corrupt as Europe."
-Thomas Jefferson

To compel a man to subsidize with his taxes the propagation of ideas which he disbelieves and abhors is sinful and tyrannical."
-Thomas Jefferson

[Ninjahedge]

"The spirit of this country is totally adverse to a large military force."
-Thomas Jefferson

"When we get piled upon one another in large cities, as in Europe, we shall become as corrupt as Europe."
-Thomas Jefferson

To compel a man to subsidize with his taxes the propagation of ideas which he disbelieves and abhors is sinful and tyrannical."
-Thomas Jefferson


That's kind of what I was talking about J.

We have to fix the root of the problem first before we worry about the little things.

[Jasonik]

Iniuria non excusat iniuriam

[Punzie]

This thread's title was changed from:
Bolstering the Database on Gun Buyers
to:
U.S. Gun Control Laws & The Second Amendment
Abl, she set that up for you.
Because of problems with my relatives, I have had a long-time interest in seeing to it that nonviolent people who have been involuntarily committed to psychiatric facilities never get on the FBI's NCIC system. I have been fighting my Congresswoman, Carolyn McCarthy, on this since 2002. I started this thread with the express interest of discusussing the 2007 bill; this is a fact of which many people are aware.

It became apparent, however, that other members wished to discuss the broader implications of government databases, gun control, the Second Amendment, and civil liberties. I changed the name of the thread to accomodate the broader interests.

Why would someone who authored the thread need to notify herself that she changed the title? ;)
I was not notifying myself, I was notifying all the of the other participants in this thread, including future participants.


Ninja, I would appreciate if you question my motives in a PM, rather than second-guessing them publicly on a message board.

[Ninjahedge]

Rap. The reason why you generally say that a threads name has been changed is to notify the originator.

The way you stated it was no "I changed the title of MY post , etc etc, you used the same language you used when you changed mine, and others, hence the confusion.

Why are you getting so defensive all of a sudden? You do not like being cajoled?


As for the "Ones wrongs do not justify another's" J, it does not apply here. Even in Latin. Giving a bunch of people the right to have handguns and saying that it is based upon a reasoning that is no longer valid is not a valid chain of logic.

You must first validate the reason, THEN get the other pieces into effect. I believe it will be harder to get states rights back than it would be to get gun ownership rights, ESPECIALLY AFTER STATES RIGHTS HAVE BEEN RETURNED. (in the case of gun ownership).

SO if the main reason the right to bear arms was for the security of our individual sovereignty as individuals and local municipalities, that is no longer valid in the light of our growing federal power.

If we can get the military back into the hands, primarily, of the people that comprise it, then maybe the right to bear arms will have more meaning.

[Jasonik]

As for the "Ones wrongs do not justify another's" J, it does not apply here. Even in Latin.
The loss of State's rights and other geovernmental ills do not forgive the denial of Constitutionally guaranteed gun ownership rights.

Giving a bunch of people the right to have handguns and saying that it is based upon a reasoning that is no longer valid is not a valid chain of logic.Huh?

You must first validate the reason, THEN get the other pieces into effect. I believe it will be harder to get states rights back than it would be to get gun ownership rights, ESPECIALLY AFTER STATES RIGHTS HAVE BEEN RETURNED. (in the case of gun ownership).?

SO if the main reason the right to bear arms was for the security of our individual sovereignty as individuals and local municipalities, that is no longer valid in the light of our growing federal power.
Again; Iniuria non excusat iniuriam.

If we can get the military back into the hands, primarily, of the people that comprise it, then maybe the right to bear arms will have more meaning.
Yes, a military police state juggernaut would give gun rights meaning.

[ablarc]

Why would someone who authored the thread need to notify herself that she changed the title? ;)
Suppose it depends what you mean by "authored."

By a mainstream definition, Jcqueline Palank and Ian Urbina of the New York Times were the authors; they also appear to have chosen the original title. ;)

[Ninjahedge]

The loss of State's rights and other geovernmental ills do not forgive the denial of Constitutionally guaranteed gun ownership rights.

If the rights were given because of the power that is no longer has, yes indeed it does.

We are talking politics here, NOT religion. You know that some Jews eat pork now, right?


Huh?
?

I give you A because of B. If B no longer exists, how can you validate A until you restore B? Logic.


Again; Iniuria non excusat iniuriam.

Again you are automatically assigning it as a wrong without valid proof. the constitution has that little rider in there that meant for the right to bear arms as an enforcement for state and local soverignity over the national government. If that is no longer viable, neither is the argument that you somehow have a right to keep them.

What you have to do is reinstill what was lost BEFORE you start looking for the fringe benefits.

Get your car back before you worry about what tires you are allowed to put on it.


Yes, a military police state juggernaut would give gun rights meaning.

I don't know if "juggernaught" is teh right term, or if you are being serious or sarcastic, but suffice to say, people are less likely to attack their neighbors than to do the same to someone they do not know.

Suppression of "illegal" activities (which may vary from era to era) are usually handled best by soldiers or guardsmen NOT from that area. Why? They have little, if any connection.

What would happen if you needed to use Texas's military force to tell Texas to do something they vehemently opposed? Would you call in other states military forces? You think you could get a Texas Soldier to force his state to do something different?

I think this brings up a whole HOST of other problems, but it gives people back some of the sense of individuality.

Now if the Feds decided to force Texas, or several states to do what they wanted, then those states could get the support from their civilian population as well as their own military forces to reject the enforcement.

But what would it do now? Besides make people feel like they have more personal power (which can be taken from them faster than they know), what does this gun ownership do?

Crime prevention has already been proven false. State soverignity is not at stake, that is already gone. What does it allow?

[Ninjahedge]

Suppose it depends what you mean by "authored."

By a mainstream definition, Jcqueline Palank and Ian Urbina of the New York Times were the authors; they also appear to have chosen the original title. ;)

DON'T CAUSE TROUBLE YOU HOULIGAN!!!!!!!

[Jasonik]

If the rights were given because of the power that is no longer has...

I'm not going to cover ground I've covered extensively in previous posts. Read the Locke explanation, etc.

Rights are not given by the constitution. They are rights inherent in us as humans that are guaranteed protection from government intrusion by purposely limiting the governments authority.

For the second time:

"Rightful liberty is unobstructed action according to our will within limits drawn around us by the equal rights of others. I do not add 'within the limits of the law' because law is often but the tyrant's will, and always so when it violates the rights of the individual."
-Thomas Jefferson

There is no reason to prohibit gun ownership- ownership that does not infringe on other's rights. It is the tyrant's will that wishes posession of all arms.

[Ninjahedge]

I'm not going to cover ground I've covered extensively in previous posts. Read the Locke explanation, etc.

Fair enough.


Rights are not given by the constitution. They are rights inherent in us as humans that are guaranteed protection from government intrusion by purposely limiting the governments authority.

But this is not some "god given" right. I know where you are coming from, but TRTBA is window dressing. Without state power, all gun ownership does is hurt the citizens by putting the power of life and death at he hands of anyone with a license and the will to pull the trigger. While 99% of the people out there would respect this, it is that 1% that ruins the model for everyone.

It did not work in the "wild west" model (crimes and shooting were much higher then, per capita, than now), it would not work here.


For the second time:

"Rightful liberty is unobstructed action according to our will within limits drawn around us by the equal rights of others. I do not add 'within the limits of the law' because law is often but the tyrant's will, and always so when it violates the rights of the individual."
-Thomas Jefferson

But the whole PURPOSE of the "right" to bear arms was not merely for the right to own a gun. The right was to have your own freedoms and the means to protect them. That being the case, a sidearm is not valid. A state guard is. A militia is.

I am not arguing individual rights here, just the logic train you are using. Philosophy works great until you bring it back to "A" and "B".


There is no reason to prohibit gun ownership- ownership that does not infringe on other's rights. It is the tyrant's will that wishes posession of all arms.

Um, it does infringe on others rights by the mere fact that it is something that can END another's life for no other reason than the person owning one desired it. It is not the same as putting people on "even ground". Hell, most fistfights do not end in death, but two guys, a relationship and a gun are a potent mixture, you know?


The importance here is that the freedom of gun ownership was not meant as the end. It was only the means to the broader protection of ones given rights. If those rights can no longer be won, protected, or regained by the possession of a lethal instrument with NO OTHER PURPOSE than to hurt, kill, or threaten to do the same, possession of that instrument can no longer be considered in and of itself as a right.

As soon as people separate the two and realize what was meant by the original authors of the constitution we can get back to the root and stop whining about the fact that you can't bring your 9mm to church. :p

[ZippyTheChimp]

"The strongest reason for the people to retain the right to keep and bear arms is, as a last resort, to protect themselves against tyranny in government."
-Thomas Jefferson
It's just silly for anyone to think that a handgun is going to afford any protection against government tyranny. When Jefferson made that statement, arms was a good rifle - state of the art for the military. In combat today, a handgun is useless.

What a tired argument. At least it made more sense as a deterrent to crime, but now that crime is dropping, we've tacked back to handguns as the bulwark of all our freedoms.

[ablarc]

Do you own a gun Zippy?

[Punzie]

That thing in his pocket? It could be a gun. Then again, it could be a banana.

[ZippyTheChimp]

Not for quite a while.

I did own an M1911 .45; it saved my life in combat. That may seem to be a contradiction of what I said above, but you had to be there.

I carried it on occasion in 70s New York, but during an incident, I did not have it, or my life today might be very different. I may have posted about it somewhere.

Being familiar with weapons, my experience is that while a rifle or assault weapon is more deadly, a handgun is much more empowering. Maybe because it's concealed, I don't know.

[Ninjahedge]

That thing in his pocket? It could be a gun. Then again, it could be a banana.

It's a rabbit silly woman!!!!!

http://www.quotationspage.com/weblog/wp-content/RogerRabbit.jpg

[MikeW]

Than why does the military buy them by the ten thousend?

I'll agree it isn't a PRIMARY weapon, but it still has it's place. But taking your logic the other way, if the 2A means what it says, I should be able to mound an Ma Deuce on my Hummer, shouldn't I.


It's just silly for anyone to think that a handgun is going to afford any protection against government tyranny. When Jefferson made that statement, arms was a good rifle - state of the art for the military. In combat today, a handgun is useless.

[Ninjahedge]

Than why does the military buy them by the ten thousend?

I'll agree it isn't a PRIMARY weapon, but it still has it's place. But taking your logic the other way, if the 2A means what it says, I should be able to mound an Ma Deuce on my Hummer, shouldn't I.

Don't get picky Mike, you know what he is saying.

A handgun, in the vein of what the 2nd amendment was written, to stand up agains a national governmental entity to ensure the individual and state rights of a region, is nearly worthless.

A handgun, along with a rifle, in the hands of a fully comissioned soldier or officer is not a good comparison.

[ZippyTheChimp]

Don't ever ask why does the military...In the field, we referred to tactical maps as comic books.


But taking your logic the other way, if the 2A means what it says, I should be able to mound an Ma Deuce on my Hummer, shouldn't I.What do you mean, the other way. That's the direction I was going.

Which was the point of my Iraq example. Today, arms should include RPGs, IEDs, and Stingers.

And if the right to bear arms is God given - well Allah is God too, right?

[MikeW]

There has never been a test of usefullness in confronting the goverment. Out of the old Miller decision, a test came out to the effect of asking if a weapon had a legitimate military use. The weapon in that case was a sawed off shotgun. The court decided that sawed off shotguns didn't have a military use.

However, as far as handguns go, that argument falls apart, based on the fact that the military buys and issues handguns.


Don't get picky Mike, you know what he is saying.

A handgun, in the vein of what the 2nd amendment was written, to stand up agains a national governmental entity to ensure the individual and state rights of a region, is nearly worthless.

A handgun, along with a rifle, in the hands of a fully comissioned soldier or officer is not a good comparison.

[MikeW]

They seem to have plenty of them, so it seems to apply there.

But I think we're on the same wavelength. Arms are arms. Any military weapon. I should be able to stroll through Time Square with and M4 slung over my shoulder.


Don't ever ask why does the military...In the field, we referred to tactical maps as comic books.

What do you mean, the other way. That's the direction I was going.

Which was the point of my Iraq example. Today, arms should include RPGs, IEDs, and Stingers.

And if the right to bear arms is God given - well Allah is God too, right?

[Jasonik]

Arms are arms. Any military weapon. I should be able to stroll through Time Square with and M4 slung over my shoulder.
I am kind of surprised (not really) that the response to 9/11 and the color coded threats freaking everyone out, that individuals weren't empowered more hardware-wise. Instead we're supposed to call in a tip or something similarly obsequious.

---

Police can't be everywhere all the time, so what's wrong with having the God given right of self protection?

As for the government being leery of overstepping its authority with an armed citizenry, it seems fair to propose that they feel they can take more rights away because they have vastly superior firepower.

My primary point is that the government is trying to incrementally take away Constitutional rights. It is disturbing to me that most of the conversation here has been trying to justify the taking, or ignore the utility of the right rather than the blatant abdication of public officials' oath of office to "protect and defend the Constitution."

As for reinstating the parity of firepower to a level of mutually assured distruction between the federal and local authorities I don't see how that could happen short of dissolving the standing military and distrubuting the equipment and personel to the various states as reserves. In such a scenario the federal bases, schools and training facilities would still be used, but no standing force would be under the federal control without a declaration of war by congress.

[Ninjahedge]

There has never been a test of usefullness in confronting the goverment. Out of the old Miller decision, a test came out to the effect of asking if a weapon had a legitimate military use. The weapon in that case was a sawed off shotgun. The court decided that sawed off shotguns didn't have a military use.

However, as far as handguns go, that argument falls apart, based on the fact that the military buys and issues handguns.


Nope.

You never see an assault force fgo in with only handguns. You jumped right over my point of contension to say "well if they buy it.."

On that rationalle, $500 allen wrenches should be considered protected by the 2nd amendment too... :crosseyed:

[Ninjahedge]

I am kind of surprised (not really) that the response to 9/11 and the color coded threats freaking everyone out, that individuals weren't empowered more hardware-wise. Instead we're supposed to call in a tip or something similarly obsequious.

---

Police can't be everywhere all the time, so what's wrong with having the God given right of self protection?

I hope that is a rhetorical question.

Simply because we, as a people, pose more of a hazard to OURSELVES than any exterior force if we were to arm ourselves to.

Even the NRA does not approve of giving guns out willy-nilly. Most are just gredy and don't want it to be any harder for them to get and keep what they have. They keep making reasons up for it, but it is simply greed.


As for the government being leery of overstepping its authority with an armed citizenry, it seems fair to propose that they feel they can take more rights away because they have vastly superior firepower.

No. They feel that way because we have allowed them to. You are stretching the point a bit. Next time you, or your neighborhood can afford a few Tomcats and an airstrip to use them from, come back and pose that same train of thought.

They are doing it because they can, and they have the political power to do so. Saying that giving people will give them more freedom may in fact work in the opposite drection.

One small group of "disgruntled" individuals could cause the implementation of martial law. Hell, we had something similar with teh Patriot Act (carte Blanche for a miriad of civil rights infractions).


My primary point is that the government is trying to incrementally take away Constitutional rights. It is disturbing to me that most of the conversation here has been trying to justify the taking, or ignore the utility of the right rather than the blatant abdication of public officials' oath of office to "protect and defend the Constitution."

I am not going to disagree with you there.


As for reinstating the parity of firepower to a level of mutually assured distruction between the federal and local authorities I don't see how that could happen short of dissolving the standing military and distrubuting the equipment and personel to the various states as reserves. In such a scenario the federal bases, schools and training facilities would still be used, but no standing force would be under the federal control without a declaration of war by congress.

I think that might be what we need. Just like the European Union, North Dakota can vote to send their forces in support of an action. If NJ votes against that, and it is NOT a matter of "national security" (Defense of a sworn ally, active homeland defense on a domestic scale) nobody should force them to give their resources to do so.

The United States should almost be treated as if we were a bunch of VERY friendly allied nations with a collective authority over us that would have the power of whatever resources each state was willing to give it.

In the very least, we would not have to pay NY tax dollars for an Alaskan bridge to nowhere, or a roadway improvement that would increase property values of a campaign contributor (Alaska again, florida roadway).

[pianoman11686]

I don't know if "juggernaught" is teh right term, or if you are being serious or sarcastic, but suffice to say, people are less likely to attack their neighbors than to do the same to someone they do not know.

This struck me as a wildly inaccurate statement, in a group of many others. Most violent crimes are committed among people who already know each other.


Simply because we, as a people, pose more of a hazard to OURSELVES than any exterior force if we were to arm ourselves to.

Um, I don't think that's quite how it works. Please explain to me how historical military campaigns, and even today's campaign in Iraq, somehow don't quite add up to several thousand homicides per year in the US.


Even the NRA does not approve of giving guns out willy-nilly. Most are just gredy and don't want it to be any harder for them to get and keep what they have. They keep making reasons up for it, but it is simply greed.

Every statement like this must be tempered with a consideration of the damaging and disproportionate role that illegal guns - and the crimes associated with them - factor into the equation.


My primary point is that the government is trying to incrementally take away Constitutional rights. It is disturbing to me that most of the conversation here has been trying to justify the taking, or ignore the utility of the right rather than the blatant abdication of public officials' oath of office to "protect and defend the Constitution."

Couldn't have said it better myself.

[MikeW]

Nope.

You never see an assault force fgo in with only handguns. You jumped right over my point of contension to say "well if they buy it.."

Who cares. Plenty of members of that assault force would have Beretta's strapped to their thighs. That Beretta definitely falls under the category of arms. And, directly by its use as a military weapon, "primary" or not, it would pass the Miller test.


On that rationalle, $500 allen wrenches should be considered protected by the 2nd amendment too... :crosseyed:

An allen wrench, by no reasonable use of the word, could be considerred a purpose designed armament. Now your getting absurd.

[ZippyTheChimp]

However, as far as handguns go, that argument falls apart, based on the fact that the military buys and issues handguns.


Who cares. Plenty of members of that assault force would have Beretta's strapped to their thighs. That Beretta definitely falls under the category of arms. And, directly by its use as a military weapon, "primary" or not, it would pass the Miller test.What are you going on about?

Were/are you in the military? In combat?

[ablarc]

... but during an incident, I did not have it, or my life today might be very different. I may have posted about it somewhere.
Link?

[ZippyTheChimp]

Police can't be everywhere all the time, so what's wrong with having the God given right of self protection?It's useless to debate this, because some will argue that protection from people walking the streets packing handguns is their God given right.


My primary point is that the government is trying to incrementally take away Constitutional rights. It is disturbing to me that most of the conversation here has been trying to justify the taking, or ignore the utility of the right rather than the blatant abdication of public officials' oath of office to "protect and defend the Constitution."

The right to bear arms that was codified in 18th century America put firepower in the hands of citizenry that was a real deterrent to government tyranny. That proportionality does not exist today.

Handguns as a safeguard against government oppression is a myth. So what we are left with is an abstract argument - the right to bear arms as the moat in defense of all our freedoms.

But the gun debate is a cultural one. Gun proponents who think of themselves as freedom loving Americans often think of their opponents as ACLU loving elitists. The libertarians are armed and ready behind their front doors, waiting for the military police to barge in. But they've empowered an electorate that installed a government that has already come in the back door, and is cleaning out the house.

[ablarc]

The libertarians are armed and ready behind their front doors, waiting for the military police to barge in. But they've empowered an electorate that installed a government that has already come in the back door, and is cleaning out the house.
There's the rub.

[ZippyTheChimp]

Link?Haven't a clue. It was quite a while ago, and could be in a crime thread, or subway thread.

Briefly...

We lived in Brooklyn Heights in the 70s. I was on a night work project. Clark St station, only elevator access. Two kids tried to rob me and someone else by pretending they had guns. When I found out they didn't, one ran toward the exit with the other guy in pursuit, and I intended to toss the other off the platform.

I don't know what stopped me, but if I had the gun with me, I would have used it.

[ablarc]

if I had the gun with me, I would have used it.
And lots of people do.

Best reason not to own one.

[Jasonik]

Handguns as a safeguard against government oppression is a myth. So what we are left with is an abstract argument - the right to bear arms as the moat in defense of all our freedoms.


Handguns are the canaries in the mine. The fearmongering about Americans not being able to handle personal liberty is the poison gas. What's next? Free political speech? (Oh right we already have 'free speech zones.')

Taking away peoples' self defense forces them to rely on government force for protection. So then; terrorizing of the populace justifies increased govenment authority which justifies itself by applying that authority and it can spiral without check into authoritarianism.

The problem is that most consider gun owners to be the cause of this dynamic- not abuse of government power.

[ZippyTheChimp]

Handguns are the canaries in the mine.Well, 200 million canaries have not done the job. I could just rehash post #81.


The problem is that most consider gun owners to be the cause of this dynamic- not abuse of government power.It's both. One does it, and the other enables (actually encourages) it.

Do you own a handgun, Jasonik?

[Ninjahedge]

This struck me as a wildly inaccurate statement, in a group of many others. Most violent crimes are committed among people who already know each other.

And you are applying it to an ENTIRELY different condition.

A military force is less likely to attack their neighbor, and by neighbor I mean "Bill and nancy down the street" and not Israel and Palestine, then they are to attack someone or something they do not know. Wasn't there a case where that was actually stated in US history where troops stationed in a different part of the country were brought in to stop rioting or student protest?




Um, I don't think that's quite how it works. Please explain to me how historical military campaigns, and even today's campaign in Iraq, somehow don't quite add up to several thousand homicides per year in the US.

Try and tell me how arming ourselves will make it so that war is not going to happen? AT ALL. You are doing an opposing argument by stating something as if it were a diametrically opposed condition.

Arming the people of the US, with handguns, poses more of a risk than it abates. I am not talking military force, I am talking citizenry. Please tell me how you related this to an outright military campaign.




Every statement like this must be tempered with a consideration of the damaging and disproportionate role that illegal guns - and the crimes associated with them - factor into the equation.

Look into how mant deaths are accidental. Also look at how many instances of domestic violence end in serious injury (not death, mind you) without a gun. You think they will somehow decrease with everyone having them? If someone is willing to go to extremes because of emotional circumstance, it is easier to pull a trigger while incensed than to repeatedly stab, or strangle a human being.

Your assertion about illegal guns has very little bearing on my statement. Look at most of the rules set up for gun ownership, and some of the proposed ones.

Things like waiting periods, background checks, training. Some things that even enthusiasts agree to, are still opposed by the NRA lobby and certain hardliners.

Why? Well it is obvious on some. It will hurt/slow the sale of their product. But more importantly, it is an inconvenience to them. Noone out there would be against making a law that would save lives, so long as it did not inconvenience them.



Couldn't have said it better myself.

And I still disagree that ownership of a lethal weapon is some god-given right to the people. It was an instrument to help preserve a freedom we had, not a freedom in and of itself.

[Jasonik]

Do you own a handgun, Jasonik?

I have researched buying one but am really put off by the bureaucracy and databasing I must submit to. As it is now in Massachusetts, local police departments must know the location of owners of all handguns within their jurisdiction. And let's be clear, this information is not so they can call me up and deputize me in case of an emergency.

The Brady laws have had the effect of limiting lawful ownership but doing nothing to combat crimes involving guns.


...licensed gun ownership has dropped 85 percent since 1998, when new gun laws were passed in Massachusetts, but gun homicides have still increased 64 percent, and gun-related assaults have increased 500 percent. source (http://www.goal.org/news/trackinggunowners.htm)

In fact there is a horrible story (http://www.boston.com/news/local/articles/2007/06/26/cousin_seen_as_accidental_killer_of_boy_8/) in the local papers today about an 8 yr old kid being shot by his 7 yr old cousin while they were playing with a gun they found around the house. This is clearly a case of criminal neglegence by the parent(s) but I'm sure will be used a a cudgel against lawful gun ownership in the state.

Oh and Rapunzel back to your original concern, there is a congressman who shares the sentiment.

HON. RON PAUL OF TEXAS
BEFORE THE US HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
June 13, 2007 (http://www.house.gov/paul/legis.shtml)

Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to H.R. 2640, the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS) Improvement Amendments Act, and I urge caution.

In my opinion, H.R. 2640 is a flagrantly unconstitutional expansion of restriction on the exercise of the right to bear arms protected under the Second Amendment.

H.R. 2640 also seriously undermines the privacy rights of all Americans--gun owners and non-gun owners alike--by creating and expanding massive federal government databases, including medical and other private records of every American.

H.R. 2640 illustrates how placing restrictions on the exercise of one right--in this case, the right to bear arms--inevitably leads to expanded restriction on other rights as well. In an effort to make the Brady background check on gun purchases more efficient, H.R. 2640 pressures states and mandates federal agencies to dump massive amounts of information about the private lives of all Americans into a central federal government database.

Among the information that must be submitted to the database are medical, psychological, and drug treatment records that have traditionally been considered protected from disclosure under the physician-patient relationship, as well as records related to misdemeanor domestic violence. While supporters of H.R. 2640 say that there are restrictions on the use of this personal information, such restrictions did not stop the well-publicized IRS and FBI files privacy abuses by both Democratic and Republican administrations. Neither have such restrictions prevented children from being barred from flights because their names appeared on the massive terrorist watch list. We should not trick ourselves into believing that we can pick and choose which part of the Bill of Rights we support.

I urge my colleagues to join me in opposing this bill.

Mr. Speaker, in addition, the NICS Improvement Amendments Act illustrates how laws creating new infringements on liberty often also impose large financial burdens on taxpayers. In just its first three years of operation, the bill authorizes new yearly spending of $375 million plus additional spending ''as may be necessary.'' This new spending is not offset by any decrease in other government spending.

[Ninjahedge]

Who cares. Plenty of members of that assault force would have Beretta's strapped to their thighs. That Beretta definitely falls under the category of arms. And, directly by its use as a military weapon, "primary" or not, it would pass the Miller test.

I don;t care if it would pass the Pabst Blue Ribbon test. A handgun is not the primary armorment of the US military, so your comparison is lame.


An allen wrench, by no reasonable use of the word, could be considerred a purpose designed armament. Now your getting absurd.

No, I am illustrating your qualification of purchase by the military as proof of viability in a resistance to a large scale military action or repression tactic is invalid.

[pianoman11686]

200 million. How many of those are legally registered, and how many are illegal? Even better question: what percentage of gun crimes are committed by those who own them legally?

[pianoman11686]

And you are applying it to an ENTIRELY different condition.

A military force is less likely to attack their neighbor, and by neighbor I mean "Bill and nancy down the street" and not Israel and Palestine, then they are to attack someone or something they do not know. Wasn't there a case where that was actually stated in US history where troops stationed in a different part of the country were brought in to stop rioting or student protest?

Why are you talking military all of a sudden? You said, and I quote: "people are less likely to attack their neighbors than to do the same to someone they do not know". I know you're talking about civilians, not the government, so don't try and spin this around into something else. Fact is, violent crimes are more likely to be committed against people that the criminal already knows, not against strangers.


Try and tell me how arming ourselves will make it so that war is not going to happen? AT ALL. You are doing an opposing argument by stating something as if it were a diametrically opposed condition.

Arming the people of the US, with handguns, poses more of a risk than it abates. I am not talking military force, I am talking citizenry. Please tell me how you related this to an outright military campaign.

That's not what I said AT ALL. You claimed we can do more harm to ourselves than external forces can do us. That's also patently false. Case in point: September 11th vs. all the high school shootings that have taken place in the past 20 years or so.

I'd also like to hear more about this increase in risk. Statistical analyses have been done that show no correlation between stricter gun control laws and lower crime.


Look into how mant deaths are accidental. Also look at how many instances of domestic violence end in serious injury (not death, mind you) without a gun. You think they will somehow decrease with everyone having them? If someone is willing to go to extremes because of emotional circumstance, it is easier to pull a trigger while incensed than to repeatedly stab, or strangle a human being.

Um, correct if I'm wrong, but I'd venture to guess MOST people would find it very hard to pull the trigger, no matter how emoitonal. A gun is a powerful object, laden with all kinds of stigma and social myth. Your claim that people will start just firing away as soon as they have one assumes that a gun is not a "big deal" for most people. I think it is.

About accidental deaths: Please. Based on that logic, we should put chain-link fences around every suburban pool so that no more children accidentally drown when they get away from their parents' supervision for a minute. We should also be addressing a litany of other sources of accidental death. I doubt we'll ever fully eradicate it.


Your assertion about illegal guns has very little bearing on my statement. Look at most of the rules set up for gun ownership, and some of the proposed ones.

I think it has a lot of bearing. People that are willing to engage in illegal behavior to obtain a gun will also be more willing to engage in illegal behavior in using a gun.


And I still disagree that ownership of a lethal weapon is some god-given right to the people. It was an instrument to help preserve a freedom we had, not a freedom in and of itself.

What freedom were we exactly preserving, which we no longer have today? Are you saying we just selectively start giving up certain freedoms that are somehow no longer relevant today?

[ZippyTheChimp]

I'd also like to hear more about this increase in risk. Statistical analyses have been done that show no correlation between stricter gun control laws and lower crime.Pointless debate. You can pull out statistics and counter-statistics till you're blue in the face. For whatever reasons, crime has dropped in areas with stricter gun-control regulations, and other countries do quite well with nationwide gun control.


Um, correct if I'm wrong, but I'd venture to guess MOST people would find it very hard to pull the trigger, no matter how emoitonal.Since you capped MOST, I assume you think 51 or 60 percent makes your statement acceptable. Correct yes, but not acceptable.


Are you saying we just selectively start giving up certain freedoms that are somehow no longer relevant today?Are you more interested in preserving the right to carry a concealed weapon, or the underlying right to privacy that the problems of gun ownership are contributing to eroding?

[Ninjahedge]

Why are you talking military all of a sudden? You said, and I quote: "people are less likely to attack their neighbors than to do the same to someone they do not know". I know you're talking about civilians, not the government, so don't try and spin this around into something else. Fact is, violent crimes are more likely to be committed against people that the criminal already knows, not against strangers.

No, I am not. I am not turning ANYTHING around.

Fact is, people are more likely to HURT EACH OTHER when guns are provided than they are to stop an invading military force using the same weapons.

As for ORIGINAL CONTEXT:


If we can get the military back into the hands, primarily, of the people that comprise it, then maybe the right to bear arms will have more meaning.
Yes, a military police state juggernaut would give gun rights meaning

I spoke of the juggernaut, and why Jason seemed to be so opposed to a state militia. He implied that somehow making the states more powerful would turn them into Juggernaughts and remove the "right" to individual freedoms like gun ownership. At least, that is what it seemed to be.

What I was saying was that a state militia is less likely to attack/oppress members of its own state than a federal one. Tactics like that HAVE been used in the past where units were deliberately chosen from outside the area being used to eliminate ANY POSSIBLE CONFLICTS OF INTEREST.



That's not what I said AT ALL. You claimed we can do more harm to ourselves than external forces can do us. That's also patently false. Case in point: September 11th vs. all the high school shootings that have taken place in the past 20 years or so.

FALSE!!!! You are taking one incident and ignoring all the fatal shootings, accidents that have happened with legal gun ownership. You also ignore the FACT that the kid had psychological problems, but was able to easily buy a gun from a VA shop. You also assume that somehow, if all kids were allowed to bring firearms to class, that someone would have gone Bruce Willis on him and taken him out.

You also fail to see what a potential hazard it would be to have the majority of students, on a COLLEGE CAMPUS, have lethal weapons. Go to a frat party or watch any of the "jackarse" films to get an idea of what people are capable of doing and you will see how this could pose a greater risk than one psycho on a shooting rampage.


I'd also like to hear more about this increase in risk. Statistical analyzes have been done that show no correlation between stricter gun control laws and lower crime.

But strangely enough they have shown direct correlation between gun ownership and shootings? Come on Piano! All we see when these laws are emplaced is how people will go to other states to get the guns legally. Why would someone bother going to VA to get a gun for NY if it was so readily available, illegally, in NY? Gun control opponents seem to talk all the time about how easy it is for criminals to get guns, but sidestep the fact that they are more likely to just take a drive down south and pick it up no muss, no fuss.

Didn't they say that somewhere near 40% of the guns confiscated in criminal cases in NYS came from VA?

If I had the raw numbers, I could probably show a correlation between legal gun sales in a state and the crimes committed by them. Or, to be more fair, ANY gun acquired in the state (not from places like VA) and their own murder rate.


But the thing that gets me is that you know it would be very hard to isolate this statistically unless we found a way to eliminate the effects of economy, police presence and other factors. Saying that there is no study showing something does not always mean that it does not happen, but that the data concerning it is not able to be isolated enough to provide a direct, viable, link.



Um, correct if I'm wrong, but I'd venture to guess MOST people would find it very hard to pull the trigger, no matter how emotional. A gun is a powerful object, laden with all kinds of stigma and social myth. Your claim that people will start just firing away as soon as they have one assumes that a gun is not a "big deal" for most people. I think it is.

You are wrong. It takes a split second of anger to do it, MUCH easier than bludgeoning, stabbing or otherwise harming another individual. You are saying that stabbing someone with a butcher knife is easier than shooting them?

Come on Piano!


About accidental deaths: Please. Based on that logic, we should put chain-link fences around every suburban pool so that no more children accidentally drown when they get away from their parents' supervision for a minute. We should also be addressing a litany of other sources of accidental death. I doubt we'll ever fully eradicate it.

We do. Don't be stupid, it is a law in NJ that you have to have a fence around every pool. And also do not bring in things that COULD be lethal, but whose primary purpose is not killing. I am SO tired of people telling me that you can get accidentally killed by a car and that more people die from cars, etc etc.

A gun does not carry groceries. A gun does not get you to work. A gun does not cool you off on a hot summer day. A gun does not give you exercise.

Stop comparing apples to elephants. They aren't even in the same family.




I think it has a lot of bearing. People that are willing to engage in illegal behavior to obtain a gun will also be more willing to engage in illegal behavior in using a gun.

No, it doesn't. I was not even talking about illegal guns, which is another stanchion of the gun control opponents.

You sidestepped my assertion of death toll through accidental, or purposeful, although unwarranted, owners of legal handguns.

Your statement is disqualified by your own positions statements saying "well criminals will always be able to get guns anyway..."

If that is the case, and we will assume it to be so for this argument, then the crime rates involving them and their shooting would stay about the same. Moderately reduced by threat of potential retaliation from the "new" gun owners.

But what happens to the death toll from accidental shootings? You prevent 60 killings at the university, a thing that has happened only once in many years, but in 1 year you have 60 accidental shootings where one kid accidentally kills his brother, or someone cleans the gun without checking, or a drunk guy at a frat party does not know the pistol he is twirling in front of the ladies is loaded.




What freedom were we exactly preserving, which we no longer have today? Are you saying we just selectively start giving up certain freedoms that are somehow no longer relevant today?

We would be preserving the power of the state. The STATE militia. The 2nd amendment was written as a bulwark against the threat of federal imperialism. As a check and balance against possible domination by a central authority akin to what they rebelled against as a colony of Britain.

If they had the same kind of power play happen, they could just fight to secede.

Now, do you think there is a chance in hell that we could have a viable civil war? You think we would just LET Texas grab Arizona and Colorado and say Adiós?

No.

The right to bear arms was a means to enable resistance against government centralization. That was already lost, as was mentioned, through the back door.

Now all the guys have left is the pistols they kept clinging to while they foolishly lost sight of what they were actually protecting.

[MikeW]

This was a reply to Ninja's post 75.


What are you going on about?

Were/are you in the military? In combat?

[ZippyTheChimp]

^
I realized that. But Miller ruling notwithstanding, do you think handguns are a viable weapon in modern combat?

Or look at it this way: Would a squad be deployed with only assault rifles vs, a squad deployed with only handguns?

The relevance in this topic is handguns as a deterrent to a tyrannical government.

[Ninjahedge]

^
I realized that. But Miller ruling notwithstanding, do you think handguns are a viable weapon in modern combat?

Or look at it this way: Would a squad be deployed with only assault rifles vs, a squad deployed with only handguns?

The relevance in this topic is handguns as a deterrent to a tyrannical government.

That is what I am going on.

And since when does service have anything to do with the knowledge that a rifle is a better combat weapon than a pistol anyday.


Hell, my limited exposure in combat sims has not yeilded any different. Noone runs around with a pistol against a bunch of guys with rifles. They just don't.

I have not seen it in film footage, news reels, or even fiction aside from the final shots fired futively by the division commander as he pulls his pistol out to shoot at some guys out of your FOV....



My line of logic is simple:

Gun ownership was granted to the people to help fight to keep their own regional political base/power. The constitution wanted to keep everything in the hands of the people. Gun ownership kept a balance.

Since that time, guns and government have evolved into something different. We have no real strong local government anymore. The system the founders tried to preserve is no longer present.

Arguing that guns are needed while ignoring their original purpose is pointless. The argument should be for restoration of the original system and ideals before we use the constitution, out of context, to "protect" the window dressing. It is useless to ask for outlets when all the wiring has been removed.

As an ADDED point of contention, saying that PISTOL ownership is somehow related ifnores the primary failure of the system in the first place, and then tries to assert itself as a viable instrument of actualization in the protection of a defunct system.

Two negatories on that one. First, obviously, that rifle beats pistol, no matter how many were used. Hell, F-16 beats just about anything you can keep in your dresser drawer. Moot point. Second, the system needs to be restored first before we start arguing about how to protect it. We also have to realize that THAT freedom is more important than owning something that will only give the illusion of personal power.

[Jasonik]

^
I realized that. But Miller ruling notwithstanding, do you think handguns are a viable weapon in modern combat?

Or look at it this way: Would a squad be deployed with only assault rifles vs, a squad deployed with only handguns?

The relevance in this topic is handguns as a deterrent to a tyrannical government.

I understand the point you are making and the answer would be no to both.

My understanding of the underlying existence of the right comes from the natural right of self protection.

handgun=self protection

military weapons =protection from tyranny

It is the same right, it belongs to the people, and it preceded and was the foundation for the Militia Act of 1792 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Militia_Act_of_1792).


Gun ownership was granted to the people...
For the last time; gun ownership was not granted by anything. It was and is a right that is guaranteed protection from government infringement by the Constitution.

[Ninjahedge]

For the last time; gun ownership was not granted by anything. It was and is a right that is guaranteed protection from government infringement by the Constitution.

Good, then you will stop beating a dead horse.

It was NOT granted unilaterally without other stipulations.

It was in relation to militias and local forces to try to balance the power in the new nation.

It was NOT A GOD OR GOVERNMENTAL GIVEN RIGHT IN AND OF ITSELF.

You keep taking it out of context. You can make just about anything say anything you want if you only chose to read what you want of it.

[ablarc]

Here you go, Ninj: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural_rights

[Ninjahedge]

Amendment II
A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.

Why the HELL would they bother saying anything about the militia if that was not one of the main points to allowing this?

Also, like I have said, times have changed. The context in which this was written no longer exists. Pistol ownership does not constitute the support of a militia, and no longer secures a "Free State".

This was either to protect against national imperialism OR another potential attack from outside forces, NOT just to give every man a pistol to sleep with.

[Ninjahedge]

Here you go, Ninj: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural_rights

Heh:


We are all at a table together, deciding which rules to adopt, free from any vague constraints, half-remembered myths, anonymous patriarchal texts and murky concepts of nature. If I propose something you do not like, tell me why it is not practical, or harms somebody, or is counter to some other useful rule; but don't tell me it offends the universe


Natural rights is simple nonsense: natural and imprescriptible rights, rhetorical nonsense -- nonsense upon stilts.

Similar... ;)

[Jasonik]

Sometimes edjumication don't stick.

[Ninjahedge]

Sometimes edjumication don't stick.

I did not realize you thought poo was "edjumication"...

Don't get me wrong J. There may be an argument for ownership, but not along the line that is most commonly plugged.

I think it is more important that we secure other freedoms first, and limit the power of the federal government to the point where we are sure that our own volunteering of information to insure a SAFE constituency of gun owners.

Demanding mental health information from potential gun owners is completely viable. Risking the surrender of that information to other interests, including private, is not right.

Simply shouting out the second amendment is not enough to justify all forms of personal firearms and their ownership in todays society.

[Ninjahedge]

This kid had so much trouble doing it too!

http://www.myfoxboston.com/myfox/pages/Home/Detail?contentId=3591711&a...version (http://www.myfoxboston.com/myfox/pages/Home/Detail?contentId=3591711&version=5&locale=EN-US&layoutCode=VSTY&pageId=1.1.1)

[MikeW]

My answer is, is that the relevent question? If you want a functional answer to your second question, it would be no.

But my responding question is, would that squad go into combat without a light portable, secondary/last ditch/backup personal weapon (ie. and handgun). The answer would also be no. So the answer to your first question is a qualified yes. There is no army in the world that would go into battle with a handgun as it's primary weapon. There is also no army in the world that would operate without handguns in its arsenal. This I think we agree on.

The next relevent question being, how does this impact the Second Amendment? That's why I bring up Miller. To date, it's the closest thing we have to a Supreme Court precident on the 2A.


^
I realized that. But Miller ruling notwithstanding, do you think handguns are a viable weapon in modern combat?

Or look at it this way: Would a squad be deployed with only assault rifles vs, a squad deployed with only handguns?

The relevance in this topic is handguns as a deterrent to a tyrannical government.

[Ninjahedge]

But my responding question is, would that squad go into combat without a light portable, secondary/last ditch/backup personal weapon (ie. and handgun). The answer would also be no. So the answer to your first question is a qualified yes. There is no army in the world that would go into battle with a handgun as it's primary weapon. There is also no army in the world that would operate without handguns in its arsenal. This I think we agree on.

That's the whole point Mike. The arguments being used for handgun ownership do not really fit with the constitutional rights argument. They are related, but not enough to make any solid logical connection.

So I guess what i am saying is just that I am not invalidating its use, it is deadly, but it does not fit your validation for right of ownership...

[Jasonik]

More reading for you Ninjahedge:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._Miller

[212]

Jasonik, these numbers sound odd. Can you point us to the original state source here? Your link leads only to a paraphrased argument of the the Gun Owners Action League's president -- and in my web search I can only find stats like these on that local gun group's site.





The Brady laws have had the effect of limiting lawful ownership but doing nothing to combat crimes involving guns.

Quote:
...licensed gun ownership has dropped 85 percent since 1998, when new gun laws were passed in Massachusetts, but gun homicides have still increased 64 percent, and gun-related assaults have increased 500 percent.
source (http://www.goal.org/news/trackinggunowners.htm)

[Jasonik]

Well, no post gun law (1998) statistics are on this site: http://www.stophandgunviolence.com/ unless I can't find them. You'd think they would be happy to show numbers rather than just make claims.

The Boston figures are here, along with a link to a pdf supplied by the Boston police:
http://goal.org/news/victim.htm

Here are firearm deaths aged 0-19 in Massachusetts 1999-2004:
http://www.kidsandguns.org/study/states_deaths.asp?Massachusetts

Massachusetts Crime Rates 1960 - 2005
http://www.disastercenter.com/crime/macrime.htm

There is probably a way to tease the stats out of the National Incident-Based Reporting System (NIBRS):
http://www.icpsr.umich.edu/NACJD/NIBRS/

After searching for data in opposition to the GOAL info stated above, or even corroboration of the Goal figures, I've come up empty too.

It is well known that Boston has been having trouble with increasing gun violence. The gun control lobby is using this to try to leverage the bordering states' laws: http://pressherald.mainetoday.com/news/state/060806guns.shtml

The most recent Massachusetts thinking trying to prevent undocumented guns from coming into the state:http://mass.gov/?pageID=pressreleases&agId=Agov3&prModName=gov3pressrelease&prFile=agov3_pr_070621_anti_crime.xml

[212]

Jasonik, I think the pro-gun group you cite isn't being honest with you.

Your state's stats show a healthy 25 percent decline in overall aggravated assaults from '98 to '05 in Massachusetts. Nowhere do I see even a hint of the pro-gun group's claim of a 500 percent rise in firearm assaults.

http://www.disastercenter.com/crime/macrime.htm

Wherever 500 percent came from, your pro-gun source must be, at best, using his stats very selectively. With assaults on the decline in Massachusetts, his incredible increase could only come from a change in how the crime is defined or from an extremely small sample (like, the days of June 24, 2005 vs. June 24, 1998).

From the much better data you just posted, the actual story out of Massachusetts looks mixed. Almost all crimes are down, but lately -- and here the gun group's number is accurate -- the homicide rate has been rising again, especially among youth. Gang violence, perhaps?

With crime largely still on the decline (property crimes and violent crimes), it's absurd to claim that the 1998 gun control measures have caused a crime wave.

Thanks for posting the better numbers. You're better than your gun group.

[Ninjahedge]

More reading for you Ninjahedge:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._Miller


I will take a look J. Also keeping in mind the credibility of Wiki on controversial issues! ;)

[Jasonik]

Read it yourself:

http://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/historics/USSC_CR_0307_0174_ZO.html

[Ninjahedge]

Read it yourself:

http://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/historics/USSC_CR_0307_0174_ZO.html

Implied sarcasm ignored, thanks!

;)

[MikeW]

I disagree, and my argument is simpler and more direct than yours.

We starting with the assumption that the 2A grants a direct individual right to "keep and bear arms" (we'll need for Parker to hit the SCOTUS to get this resolved once and for all). If this isn't the case the rest of the argument is moot.

The next question becomes, is a handgun a legitimate military weapon (holding to the test from Miller). Since they are inventoried by pretty much every military in the world, their really isn't any argment that they are not. I'm not claiming they are any sort of "primary" weapon. I don't consider that relevent, and I've seen no precedent that would make that relevent.

Based on the two factors above, there's no real question that ownership and, for lack of a better term, deployment, handguns (and really any other legitimate military weapon) by individuals would be protected by the 2A.


That's the whole point Mike. The arguments being used for handgun ownership do not really fit with the constitutional rights argument. They are related, but not enough to make any solid logical connection.

So I guess what i am saying is just that I am not invalidating its use, it is deadly, but it does not fit your validation for right of ownership...

[Ninjahedge]

Fair enough. I just don't see it that way...


/me shrugs.



I disagree, and my argument is simpler and more direct than yours.

We starting with the assumption that the 2A grants a direct individual right to "keep and bear arms" (we'll need for Parker to hit the SCOTUS to get this resolved once and for all). If this isn't the case the rest of the argument is moot.

The next question becomes, is a handgun a legitimate military weapon (holding to the test from Miller). Since they are inventoried by pretty much every military in the world, their really isn't any argment that they are not. I'm not claiming they are any sort of "primary" weapon. I don't consider that relevent, and I've seen no precedent that would make that relevent.

Based on the two factors above, there's no real question that ownership and, for lack of a better term, deployment, handguns (and really any other legitimate military weapon) by individuals would be protected by the 2A.

[ZippyTheChimp]

The next question becomes, is a handgun a legitimate military weapon (holding to the test from Miller). Since they are inventoried by pretty much every military in the world, their really isn't any argment that they are not. I'm not claiming they are any sort of "primary" weapon. I don't consider that relevent, and I've seen no precedent that would make that relevent.You need to back and reread this thread. I introduced that handguns were not viable (post #64), not as a legal argument, but a PRACTICAL response to Jasonik's post:

"The strongest reason for the people to retain the right to keep and bear arms is, as a last resort, to protect themselves against tyranny in government."
-Thomas JeffersonSo what are you trying to prove - that you can stand up to assault rifles with a 9mm and wave the Miller document at them?

[pianoman11686]

No, I am not. I am not turning ANYTHING around.

Fact is, people are more likely to HURT EACH OTHER when guns are provided than they are to stop an invading military force using the same weapons.

How do you even know what people will do with their guns when an invading military force arrives? The comparison doesn't ring realistic.


I spoke of the juggernaut, and why Jason seemed to be so opposed to a state militia. He implied that somehow making the states more powerful would turn them into Juggernaughts and remove the "right" to individual freedoms like gun ownership. At least, that is what it seemed to be.

What I was saying was that a state militia is less likely to attack/oppress members of its own state than a federal one. Tactics like that HAVE been used in the past where units were deliberately chosen from outside the area being used to eliminate ANY POSSIBLE CONFLICTS OF INTEREST.

Well, then I think you just worded it in such a way that you made it sound like you were talking about person-to-person combat, as opposed to person-to-state.


FALSE!!!! You are taking one incident and ignoring all the fatal shootings, accidents that have happened with legal gun ownership. You also ignore the FACT that the kid had psychological problems, but was able to easily buy a gun from a VA shop. You also assume that somehow, if all kids were allowed to bring firearms to class, that someone would have gone Bruce Willis on him and taken him out.

You also fail to see what a potential hazard it would be to have the majority of students, on a COLLEGE CAMPUS, have lethal weapons. Go to a frat party or watch any of the "jackarse" films to get an idea of what people are capable of doing and you will see how this could pose a greater risk than one psycho on a shooting rampage.

I didn't ignore anything. I took one event and that was enough to refute your dubious claim that "we can harm ourselves more than outside forces."

You also continue to assume that a majority of people would not only OWN guns on campuses, but have REAL bullets and keep the gun LOADED. Do you really think this is likely? I don't know who you grew up with, but I repeat: most people are too afraid of the power of guns themselves to ever even consider shooting one off somewhere in a field, let alone going out, buying one, and keeping it loaded in the fridge next to the beer.


But strangely enough they have shown direct correlation between gun ownership and shootings? Come on Piano! All we see when these laws are emplaced is how people will go to other states to get the guns legally. Why would someone bother going to VA to get a gun for NY if it was so readily available, illegally, in NY? Gun control opponents seem to talk all the time about how easy it is for criminals to get guns, but sidestep the fact that they are more likely to just take a drive down south and pick it up no muss, no fuss.

That's not a problem caused by guns themselves, it's a problem due to uneven incentives. You standardize the law for all states, and you get rid of the problem. I also guarantee you the illegal gun trade would significantly diminish.


But the thing that gets me is that you know it would be very hard to isolate this statistically unless we found a way to eliminate the effects of economy, police presence and other factors. Saying that there is no study showing something does not always mean that it does not happen, but that the data concerning it is not able to be isolated enough to provide a direct, viable, link.

Fair enough. Statistics don't always tell the whole story. I'd still claim, though, that people attribute much higher statistical effects to gun control laws than they should. If it was that significant, we'd see it in the data more easily.


You are wrong. It takes a split second of anger to do it, MUCH easier than bludgeoning, stabbing or otherwise harming another individual. You are saying that stabbing someone with a butcher knife is easier than shooting them?

Come on Piano!

Again, I don't know what planet are you coming from. How many people even know how to use a gun? Load, aim, and fire? Take 100 people randomly, and ask them to hit a target a few feet away. I think you'd be surprised how many wouldn't even come close, and are so shocked by the sound of firing that they drop the gun. Guns are serious business, not child's play. It's much easier to take a blunt object and hit someone in the head than it is to fire a bullet into their brain.


We do. Don't be stupid, it is a law in NJ that you have to have a fence around every pool. And also do not bring in things that COULD be lethal, but whose primary purpose is not killing. I am SO tired of people telling me that you can get accidentally killed by a car and that more people die from cars, etc etc.

A gun does not carry groceries. A gun does not get you to work. A gun does not cool you off on a hot summer day. A gun does not give you exercise.

Stop comparing apples to elephants. They aren't even in the same family.

I didn't know that guns don't do any of those things. Things a gun can do, besides kill: deter a potential criminal, make you feel safer, turn a TV on (don't use it on flat-screens though, I hear bullet holes are harder to repair on those).


No, it doesn't. I was not even talking about illegal guns, which is another stanchion of the gun control opponents.

You sidestepped my assertion of death toll through accidental, or purposeful, although unwarranted, owners of legal handguns.

Your statement is disqualified by your own positions statements saying "well criminals will always be able to get guns anyway..."

If that is the case, and we will assume it to be so for this argument, then the crime rates involving them and their shooting would stay about the same. Moderately reduced by threat of potential retaliation from the "new" gun owners.

I never said we'd reduce crime by doing so, and that it was a justification. I do take offense, however, when people attribute a violence-inducing effect of gun ownership as such. And then they start going on about 200 million guns in the US, and that causes all the crime. You can't just lump all the legal and illegal gun owners into one statistical group: they contribte different proportions of total gun crime.


But what happens to the death toll from accidental shootings? You prevent 60 killings at the university, a thing that has happened only once in many years, but in 1 year you have 60 accidental shootings where one kid accidentally kills his brother, or someone cleans the gun without checking, or a drunk guy at a frat party does not know the pistol he is twirling in front of the ladies is loaded.

I'm not going to say it again.


We would be preserving the power of the state. The STATE militia. The 2nd amendment was written as a bulwark against the threat of federal imperialism. As a check and balance against possible domination by a central authority akin to what they rebelled against as a colony of Britain.

If they had the same kind of power play happen, they could just fight to secede.

Now, do you think there is a chance in hell that we could have a viable civil war? You think we would just LET Texas grab Arizona and Colorado and say Adiós?

No.

The right to bear arms was a means to enable resistance against government centralization. That was already lost, as was mentioned, through the back door.

Now all the guys have left is the pistols they kept clinging to while they foolishly lost sight of what they were actually protecting.

If you want to start listing off all the provisions of the Constitution that are out of date today, especially when read very literally, go right ahead. I think you'll find a lot that you can disregard.

[lofter1]

I'm a lot less worried about who will have guns when "an invading military force" comes across the US borders than who will control the distribution system.

What damned good will any kind of gun do you after 3 days when food distribution has been interrupted?

Hope y'all like to eat bullets for breakfast :cool:

btw: How is that garden growing? And how well stocked is your pantry??

Our forefathers were far more self-sustaining than we are.

They'd laugh (or maybe cry) at our inability to fend for ourselves.

[MikeW]

My argument is solely to do with whether, if the 2A really does confer an individual right, would it protect the right to own and carry handguns. That's it.

On a practical basis, I agree with you. The most salient statement I've heard on this subject is that the only reason someone should be carrying a handgun is to allow them to fight their way back to their rifle.


You need to back and reread this thread. I introduced that handguns were not viable (post #64), not as a legal argument, but a PRACTICAL response to Jasonik's post:
So what are you trying to prove - that you can stand up to assault rifles with a 9mm and wave the Miller document at them?

[pianoman11686]

What damned good will any kind of gun do you after 3 days when food distribution has been interrupted?

Um, go hunting for fresh meat, obviously. :D

[Ninjahedge]

...a lot of stuff...

Like I said, I just do not see it that way.

I already know it is very difficult to convince you otherwise of anything once you have set yourself, so there really is no reason to continuine along the same arguments.

You do not agree with me, I do not agree with you. Whatever.

/me shrugs....again.

[MikeW]

It's time (actually, it's a little late) to dredge this thread up.

The Supreme Court has agreed to hear the appeal of the case overturning DC's gun control law. There will finally be a definitive ruling on whether the Second Amendment grants an individual right to keep and bear arms.

Where it goes from there, who knows? But if the SCOTUS rules that such a right exists, it's highly likely that NYS and NYC gun regulation will come under attack.

[eddhead]

^^

Do not be suprised if that proves not to be the case.. i.e. that Supreme Court's ruling proves to be less broad-based than what we might otherwise anticipate. Just a hunch.

[ManhattanKnight]

http://graphics8.nytimes.com/ads/spacer.gif
December 16, 2007
Op-Ed Contributor

Clause and Effect

By ADAM FREEDMAN

LAST month, the Supreme Court agreed to consider District of Columbia v. Heller, which struck down Washington’s strict gun ordinance as a violation of the Second Amendment’s “right to keep and bear arms.”

This will be the first time in nearly 70 years that the court has considered the Second Amendment. The outcome of the case is difficult to handicap, mainly because so little is known about the justices’ views on the lethal device at the center of the controversy: the comma. That’s right, the “small crooked point,” as Richard Mulcaster described this punctuation upstart in 1582. The official version of the Second Amendment has three of the little blighters:

A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.The decision invalidating the district’s gun ban, written by Judge Laurence H. Silberman of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, cites the second comma (the one after “state”) as proof that the Second Amendment does not merely protect the “collective” right of states to maintain their militias, but endows each citizen with an “individual” right to carry a gun, regardless of membership in the local militia.

How does a mere comma do that? According to the court, the second comma divides the amendment into two clauses: one “prefatory” and the other “operative.” On this reading, the bit about a well-regulated militia is just preliminary throat clearing; the framers don’t really get down to business until they start talking about “the right of the people ... shall not be infringed.”

The circuit court’s opinion is only the latest volley in a long-simmering comma war. In a 2001 Fifth Circuit case, a group of anti-gun academics submitted an amicus curiae (friend of the court) brief arguing that the “unusual” commas of the Second Amendment support the collective rights interpretation. According to these amici, the founders’ use of commas reveals that what they really meant to say was “a well-regulated militia ... shall not be infringed.”

Now that the issue is heading to the Supreme Court, the pro-gun American Civil Rights Union is firing back with its own punctuation-packing brief. Nelson Lund, a professor of law at George Mason University, argues that everything before the second comma is an “absolute phrase” and, therefore, does not modify anything in the main clause. Professor Lund states that the Second Amendment “has exactly the same meaning that it would have if the preamble had been omitted.”

Refreshing though it is to see punctuation at the center of a national debate, there could scarcely be a worse place to search for the framers’ original intent than their use of commas. In the 18th century, punctuation marks were as common as medicinal leeches and just about as scientific. Commas and other marks evolved from a variety of symbols meant to denote pauses in speaking. For centuries, punctuation was as chaotic as individual speech patterns.

The situation was even worse in the law, where a long English tradition held that punctuation marks were not actually part of statutes (and, therefore, courts could not consider punctuation when interpreting them). Not surprisingly, lawmakers took a devil-may-care approach to punctuation. Often, the whole business of punctuation was left to the discretion of scriveners, who liked to show their chops by inserting as many varied marks as possible.

Another problem with trying to find meaning in the Second Amendment’s commas is that nobody is certain how many commas it is supposed to have. The version that ended up in the National Archives has three, but that may be a fluke. Legal historians note that some states ratified a two-comma version. At least one recent law journal article refers to a four-comma version.

The best way to make sense of the Second Amendment is to take away all the commas (which, I know, means that only outlaws will have commas). Without the distracting commas, one can focus on the grammar of the sentence. Professor Lund is correct that the clause about a well-regulated militia is “absolute,” but only in the sense that it is grammatically independent of the main clause, not that it is logically unrelated. To the contrary, absolute clauses typically provide a causal or temporal context for the main clause.

The founders — most of whom were classically educated — would have recognized this rhetorical device as the “ablative absolute” of Latin prose. To take an example from Horace likely to have been familiar to them: “Caesar, being in command of the earth, I fear neither civil war nor death by violence” (ego nec tumultum nec mori per vim metuam, tenente Caesare terras). The main clause flows logically from the absolute clause: “Because Caesar commands the earth, I fear neither civil war nor death by violence.”

Likewise, when the justices finish diagramming the Second Amendment, they should end up with something that expresses a causal link, like: “Because a well regulated militia is necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms shall not be infringed.” In other words, the amendment is really about protecting militias, notwithstanding the originalist arguments to the contrary.

Advocates of both gun rights and gun control are making a tactical mistake by focusing on the commas of the Second Amendment. After all, couldn’t one just as easily obsess about the founders’ odd use of capitalization? Perhaps the next amicus brief will find the true intent of the amendment by pointing out that “militia” and “state” are capitalized in the original, whereas “people” is not.

Adam Freedman, the author of “The Party of the First Part: The Curious World of Legalese,” writes the Legal Lingo column for New York Law Journal Magazine.

Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

[lofter1]

Commas and the Second Amendment

guncite.com (http://www.guncite.com/second_amendment_commas.html)

The Claim



Under ordinary usage, the first and third commas in the Amendment are unnecessary. If these commas had not been inserted, it would be possible to understand the Well Regulated Militia Clause as simply explaining the rationale for the Bear Arms Clause (the Amendment would then read: "A well regulated Militia being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms shall not be infringed."). But the commas are in fact in the text proposed by Congress and ratified by the states, and they prevent this reading. The first unusual comma– between "Militia" and "being"– forces the reader to search for a verb for which "Militia" is the subject. That verb does not appear until "shall not be infringed" near the end of the Amendment. The second unusual comma– between "Arms" and "shall"– sets off the verb phrase "shall not be infringed" from the preceding language; it suggests that the subject for this verb phrase is not simply "the right of the people to keep and bear Arms." The grammatical effect of these two unusual commas is to link "A well regulated Militia" to "shall not be infringed" to emphasize, in other words, that the goal of the Amendment is to protect the militia against federal interference. (Yassky brief (http://www.potowmack.org/yass.html) at 12 n.4 for U.S. v. Emerson (http://www.guncite.com/court/fed/99-10331.htm))
In other words the Yasky brief "suggests that the use of commas in the Second Amendment somehow links 'A well regulated Militia' to 'shall not be infringed,' as though the Constitution should be read to say: 'A well regulated Militia shall not be infringed.'" (Lund brief (http://www.saf.org/EMERSONacadsecd.htm) for U.S. v. Emerson)

***

Reality

The Yassky brief continues: "The Constitution was drafted with great care, and (unlike much legal writing from the Founding period) its use of punctuation generally conforms to modern conventions, suggesting that the commas in the Second Amendment are not haphazard but rather deserve scrupulous attention."

Evidence suggests otherwise. The Lund brief counters: "This desperate gambit ignores the Constitution's frequent use of commas that would be considered extraneous in modern usage (e.g., in the First and Third Amendments)."

Here is what three authoritative sources say about punctuation and comma usage during the 18th century:
"The punctuation that emerged in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries was consistent in just two respects: it was prolific and often chaotic."
--- Alphabet to email: How written english evolved and where it's heading. Naomi S. Baron, Routledge, London and New York 2000. P. 185
"Excessive punctuation was common in the 18th century: at its worst it used commas with every subordinate clause and separable phrase."
--- 15 ed. V.29, The New Encyclopaedia Britannica 1997. P. 1051
"In the 18-19c, people tended to punctuate heavily, especially in their use of commas."
--- The Oxford Companion to the English Language. Oxford New York, Oxford University Press 1992. Tom McCarthur ed. P. 824
In the 19th Century the rule, borrowed from English law, was that "[p]unctuation is no part of the statute" (Hammock v. Farmers Loan & Trust Co (http://supreme.justia.com/us/105/77/case.html), 105 U.S. 77 [1881]) (citing references from the late 18th and early 19th century).

Not that it matters, but...

The Second Amendment Foundation maintains (http://www.saf.org/default.asp?p=rkba_protections), "The Final (ratified) version had only one comma according to the Library of Congress and Government Printing Office."

This image (http://memory.loc.gov/cgi-bin/ampage?collId=llsl&fileName=001/llsl001.db&recNum=144), from the Library of Congress, also shows the ratified version with one comma.

And this page (http://www.archives.gov/national-archives-experience/charters/bill_of_rights_transcript.html) from the National Archives contains a three comma version.
This Web-page claims:
Every single certified copy of the Second Amendment contained only one comma, after the word "state." The parchment copy (obviously where the three comma version comes from) is not a certified copy, and all twelve of the proposed amendments found therein contain different capitalization and punctuation than those of certified copies.

The certified Second Amendment was used exclusively in every official document I could find until 1876. Also, the Statutes at Large of 1819 and 1845, which are certified as being correct down to the last comma and are the official source of the acts of Congress, show the amendment in this form. (Somewhere along the line, the Statutes must have been changed, and I'm trying to find out exactly when.)
(http://www.freerepublic.com/forum/a39388c210c1b.htm (http://www.freerepublic.com/forum/a39388c210c1b.htm))
This law journal article states:

The second amendment's capitalization and punctuation is not uniformly reported; another version has four commas, after "militia," "state," and "arms." Since documents were at that time copied by hand, variations in punctuation and capitalization are common, and the copy retained by the first Congress, the copies transmitted by it to the state legislatures, and the ratifications returned by them show wide variations in such details. Letter from Marlene McGuirl, Chief, British-American Law Division, Library of Congress (Oct. 29, 1976).(http://www.guncite.com/journals/hardhist.html#fn1 (http://www.guncite.com/journals/hardhist.html#fn1))

And finally:
There are two versions of the Amendment, one with one comma, and one with 2 or 3. No way to determine which is more official, since documents were hand-copied then, the scribes sometimes punctuated as they pleased, and most of the real originals were lost when the Capitol was burned during the War of 1812. (http://armsandthelaw.com/archives/2005/04/a_complete_unde.php (http://armsandthelaw.com/archives/2005/04/a_complete_unde.php)) In other words, regardless of which version is "official," it appears the states ratified different versions of the Bill of Rights. However, these slight variations in puncuation and capitalization should not have any bearing on the document's interpretation.

[lofter1]

Clause and Effect

Another problem with trying to find meaning in the Second Amendment’s commas is that nobody is certain how many commas it is supposed to have. The version that ended up in the National Archives has three, but that may be a fluke. Legal historians note that some states ratified a two-comma version. At least one recent law journal article refers to a four-comma version.

I've googled and cannot find the mysterious "four-comma version".

Anyone know how that one ^ reads?

[krulltime]

Supreme Court to rule on gun ownership rights




Court set to rule on whether District of Columbia handgun ban constitutional
At issue: Does Second Amendment concern collective or individual gun ownership?
Oral arguments are expected in February or March, a ruling by June
Decision likely will come in middle of 2008 presidential campaign



http://i.l.cnn.net/cnn/2007/US/law/11/20/scotus.handguns/art.scotus.gi.jpg


By Bill Mears
CNN Washington Bureau

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The U.S. Supreme Court agreed Tuesday to decide whether the District of Columbia's sweeping ban on handgun ownership violates the Constitution's fundamental right to "keep and bear arms."

The justices accepted the case for review, with oral arguments likely next February or March. A ruling could come by late June, smack in the middle of the 2008 presidential election campaign.

At issue is one that has polarized judges and politicians for decades: Do the Second Amendment's 27 words bestow gun ownership as an individual right, or do they bestow a collective one -- aimed at the civic responsibilities of state militias -- making it therefore subject to strict government regulation.

City leaders had urged the high court to intervene, saying refusal to do so could prove dire.

"The District of Columbia -- a densely populated urban locality where the violence caused by handguns is well documented -- will be unable to enforce a law that its elected officials have sensibly concluded saves lives," wrote attorneys for the city.

Washington Mayor Adrian Fenty and other officials held a public rally in September, with the message that more handguns will only mean more serious crime.

"I see the results of gun violence every day," said Washington Police Chief Cathy Lanier. "The weakening of the district's gun law will inevitably lead to an increase in injury, and worse, death."

A federal appeals court in March ruled the handgun ban to be unconstitutional as well as a provision that rifles and shotguns -- which are legal to own in the city -- be kept in the home unloaded and fitted with trigger locks or disassembled. The rifle regulations are not at issue before the Supreme Court.

The city's 31-year-old law has prevented most private citizens from owning and keeping handguns in their homes.

Only Chicago, Illinois, and Washington among major U.S. cities have such sweeping handgun bans. Courts have generally upheld bans in other cities of semiautomatic weapons and sawed-off shotguns.

Several Washingtonians first challenged the law, some saying they wanted to do something about being constant victims of crime.

"I want for myself the right to protect my home and my family in the event of a violent attack," plaintiff George Lyon said in March after winning a lower court victory. "The District of Columbia is not what I call the safest jurisdiction in the world."

The city reported 137 gun-related murders last year.

The Supreme Court's conservative majority has been supportive of local jurisdictions crafting gun-control laws. But the high court in 2003 refused to accept an appeal challenging California's ban on assault rifles.

Similar weapon control laws in other cities also could be in jeopardy, and Maryland, Massachusetts, Chicago and San Francisco, California, have filed briefs supporting Washington.

The National Rifle Association and other groups support the gun owners, but both sides have privately expressed concern over how the justices will decide the issue, because the legal and political implications could be sweeping in scope.

Recent polling finds gun control remains an important political issue with voters. An NRA convention in September attracted seven Republican presidential candidates.

In June, the Democratic-controlled House of Representatives passed legislation to strengthen the national system that checks backgrounds of gun buyers. It followed the April shooting at Virginia Tech in which a gunman killed 32 students and faculty on campus.

Legal experts said that given the unanswered constitutional questions, it was little surprise the justices decided to tackle the case.

"This issue is so monumental and so sweeping, and such a change from prior rulings on gun control that it was basically on a freight train to the U.S. Supreme Court for the justices to finally decide," said Thomas Goldstein, an appellate lawyer and founder of the popular scotusblog.com Web site.

A separate petition by five city residents asked to be included in the case. A federal court earlier had rejected that appeal on standing grounds.


http://www.cnn.com/2007/US/law/11/20/scotus.handguns/index.html

[krulltime]

Majority in U.S. poll support gun ownership rights




Men and people living in rural areas were most likely to say yes
73 percent of rural, 64 percent of suburban, and half of city dwellers said yes
Some say 2nd Amendment means everyone has right to own a gun
Others say 2nd Amendment protects right to form a militia



WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Nearly two-thirds of Americans say they believe the Constitution guarantees each person the right to own a gun, according to a poll released Sunday.

In all, 65 percent said they thought the Constitution ensures that right, and 31 percent said it did not. The question had a sampling error of plus-or-minus 3 points.

Men and people living in rural areas were most likely to say the Constitution guarantees the right to own a gun.

Nearly three quarters of men (72 percent) said they believed so, versus 26 percent who did not. More than half (58 percent) of women said they believed so, versus slightly more than a third (35 percent) who did not.

That question had a sampling error of plus-or-minus 4.5 points.

Among rural dwellers, 73 percent said they agreed, versus 64 percent and only half (50 percent) of city dwellers who thought the same.

That question had a sampling error of plus-or-minus 7 points.

The Second Amendment to the Constitution says: "A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed upon."

Some have interpreted those words to mean that everyone has a right to own a gun; others say the amendment protects only the right of citizens to form a militia.

The CNN/Opinion Research Corporation telephone poll of 1,002 U.S. adults was carried out December 6 - 9.


http://www.cnn.com/2007/US/12/16/guns.poll/index.html

[MikeW]

The crux of the challenged ruling is that the 2A grants an individual right to keep and bear arms. I can't see how they can make a finding on the ciruit court's ruling without issuing a finding on that.

I'm not expecting a hugely broad based ruling (ie, something like all gun regulation nationwide is now null and void). They don't do that. They rule on narrow issues, then let the lower courts apply them.

But if, however narrowly they apply it, they rule that the 2A does confer an individual right, that ruling can be used whenever someone wants to challenge a gun control law, and it would put the onus on the government body being challenged to prove that the law being challenged doesn't impinge on that right.

For instance, in NY State, and NYC in particular, unless you have a very direct need for for a handgun for protection (ie. your in a business that where carring large amounts of cash, jewlery, etc, is the niorm), the police just won't issue you a carry permit.

If the SCOTUS issues the a ruling affirming that the 2A confirs an individual right. I could file the paperwork for a carry permit in NYC, without specifying a special need to carry, just for general protection. This would almost certaily be rejected. I could then sue the NYPD, asking for an injuction forcing the them to issue a permit. The police would then have to show how their actions didn't constitute a violation of my second amendment rights, in light of the fact that the SCOTUS ruled that I, as an individual American citizen, do have a right to keep and bear arms. I don't think they could justify the denial.

There would be a lot of cases like this, especially in the states and cities with very restrictive gun control laws. And all these cases would pivot on the ruling the SCOTUS will issue in Heller.


^^0

Do not be suprised if that proves not to be the case.. i.e. that Supreme Court's ruling proves to be less broad-based than what we might otherwise anticipate. Just a hunch.

[Jasonik]

Good breakdown. I might add that; it's not a right if you have to ask permission.

Permits themselves would be unconstitutional with a pure individual right reading.

[MikeW]

Requiring a criminal background check would probably pass muster. Some rights can be restricted because of a felony conviction, and I bet this one would qualifiy.

I don't have a problem with this, as long as it isn't used as a back door ban on private aquisition of guns for people without criminal histories. It needs to be done quickly, cheaply, and accurately. There's no reason NYS/NYCs process takes so long, other then they actively use it as a way of detering people from trying to acquire guns.

[Jasonik]

Amendment 5 - Trial and Punishment, Compensation for Takings.
No person shall be... deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law...

The State must charge and bear the burden of proof to deny the individual right. With violent felons etc., I agree, they can be justly deprived.

I just bristle at the suggestion that I have to prove myself innocent to exercise a right.

Ultimately it's always the gun sellers doing their due diligence because they are charged with keeping guns out of the hands of the restricted. FFL (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federal_Firearms_License) GCA68 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_Control_Act) FOPA (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Firearm_Owners_Protection_Act)

Massachusetts requirements (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_laws_in_the_United_States_%28by_state%29#Massa chusetts) are extreme. If the right is conclusively ruled individual, they'll be turned on their head.

[MikeW]

I think, if Heller comes down the right way, the burden of proof would be on the agency charged with doing the background check.


Amendment 5 - Trial and Punishment, Compensation for Takings.
No person shall be... deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law...

The State must charge and bear the burden of proof to deny the individual right. With violent felons etc., I agree, they can be justly deprived.

I just bristle at the suggestion that I have to prove myself innocent to exercise a right.

Ultimately it's always the gun sellers doing their due diligence because they are charged with keeping guns out of the hands of the restricted. FFL (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federal_Firearms_License) GCA68 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_Control_Act) FOPA (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Firearm_Owners_Protection_Act)

Massachusetts requirements (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_laws_in_the_United_States_%28by_state%29#Massa chusetts) are extreme. If the right is conclusively ruled individual, they'll be turned on their head.

[Jasonik]

^ We're trying to cut down on gratuitous quoting (http://wirednewyork.com/forum/showthread.php?t=6707) like this here at WNY.

[Jasonik]

Gun Owners Get Stabbed In The Back
-- Veterans Disarmament Act on its way to the President (http://www.gunowners.org/a122007.htm)


Gun Owners of America
8001 Forbes Place, Suite 102
Springfield, VA 22151

(703)321-8585


"To me, this is the best Christmas present I could ever receive" -- Rep. Carolyn McCarthy (D-NY), CBS News, December 20, 2007

Thursday, December 20, 2007

Gun Owners of America and its supporters took a knife in the back yesterday, as Senator Chuck Schumer (D-NY) out-smarted his congressional opposition into agreeing on a so-called "compromise" on HR 2640 -- a bill which now goes to the President's desk.

The bill -- known as the Veterans Disarmament Act to its opponents -- is being praised by the National Rifle Association and the Brady Campaign.

The Brady Bunch crowed "Victory! U.S. Congress Strengthens Brady Background Check System." The NRA stated that last minute changes to the McCarthy bill made a "good bill even better [and that] the end product is a win for American gun owners."

But Gun Owners of America has issued public statements decrying this legislation.

The core of the bill's problems is section 101(c)(1)(C), which makes you a "prohibited person" on the basis of a "medical finding of disability," so long as a veteran had an "opportunity" for some sort of "hearing" before some "lawful authority" (other than a court). Presumably, this "lawful authority" could even be the psychiatrist himself.

Note that unlike with an accused murderer, the hearing doesn't have to occur. The "lawful authority" doesn't have to be unbiased. The veteran is not necessarily entitled to an attorney -- much less an attorney financed by the government.

So what do the proponents have to say about this?

ARGUMENT: The Veterans Disarmament Act creates new avenues for prohibited persons to seek restoration of their gun rights.

ANSWER: What the bill does is to lock in -- statutorily -- huge numbers of additional law-abiding Americans who will now be denied the right to own a firearm.

And then it "graciously" allows these newly disarmed Americans to spend tens of thousands of dollars for a long-shot chance to regain the gun rights this very bill takes away from them.

More to the point, what minimal gains were granted by the "right hand" are taken away by the "left." Section 105 provides a process for some Americans diagnosed with so-called mental disabilities to get their rights restored in the state where they live. But then, in subsection (a)(2), the bill stipulates that such relief may occur only if "the person will not be likely to act in a manner dangerous to public safety and that the GRANTING OF THE RELIEF WOULD NOT BE CONTRARY TO THE PUBLIC INTEREST." (Emphasis added.)

Um, doesn't this language sound similar to those state codes (like California's) that have "may issue" concealed carry laws -- where citizens "technically" have the right to carry, but state law only says that sheriffs MAY ISSUE them a permit to carry? When given such leeway, those sheriffs usually don't grant the permits!

Prediction: liberal states -- the same states that took these people's rights away -- will treat almost every person who has been illegitimately denied as a danger to society and claim that granting relief would be "contrary to the public interest."

Let's make one thing clear: the efforts begun during the Clinton Presidency to disarm battle-scarred veterans -- promoted by the Brady Anti-Gun Campaign -- is illegal and morally reprehensible.

But section 101(c)(1)(C) of HR 2640 would rubber-stamp those illegal actions. Over 140,000 law-abiding veterans would be statutorily barred from possessing firearms.

True, they can hire a lawyer and beg the agency that took their rights away to voluntarily give them back. But the agency doesn't have to do anything but sit on its hands. And, after 365 days of inaction, guess what happens? The newly disarmed veteran can spend thousands of additional dollars to sue. And, as the plaintiff, the wrongly disarmed veteran has the burden of proof.

Language proposed by GOA would have automatically restored a veteran's gun rights if the agency sat on its hands for a year. Unfortunately, the GOA amendment was not included.

The Veterans Disarmament Act passed the Senate and the House yesterday -- both times WITHOUT A RECORDED VOTE. That is, the bill passed by Unanimous Consent, and was then transmitted to the White House.

Long-time GOA activists will remember that a similar "compromise" deal helped the original Brady Law get passed. In 1993, there were only two or three senators on the floor of that chamber who used a Unanimous Consent agreement (with no recorded vote) to send the Brady bill to President Clinton -- at a time when most legislators had already left town for their Thanksgiving Break.

Gun owners can go to http://www.gunowners.org/news/nws9402.htm to read about how this betrayal occurred 14 years ago.

*****


Gun Bill Not Anti-Veteran

Larry Scott | October 02, 2007 (http://www.military.com/opinion/0,15202,151321_1,00.html?wh=wh)

There is no such thing as the “Veterans Disarmament Act.” There is no pending legislation that would take firearms away from veterans. There is no pending legislation that would prevent a person with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD (http://www.military.com/benefits/resources/ptsd-overview)), veteran or not, from purchasing a firearm or ammo.

But, there is a huge campaign of misinformation and scare tactics being forwarded by a small gun owners group who view themselves to be in competition with the National Rifle Association (NRA).

Let’s use some common sense instead of nonsense. If veterans were to lose the right to own firearms, you’d have a lot of unemployed cops. If those who have PTSD were to lose that right, there’d be even more unemployed cops and other first responders, as well. The arguments about a “Veterans Disarmament Act” are, quite simply, ridiculous and illogical.

The piece of legislation is question is H.R. 2640 (http://capwiz.com/military/issues/bills/?bill=10377731), the NICS Improvement Amendments Act of 2007. H.R. 2640 was carefully-crafted by the NRA and Members of Congress to protect the rights of gun owners, especially those who may have mental health issues such as PTSD.

The NICS is the National Instant Criminal Background Check System, the database that contains the names of those not allowed to buy firearms and ammo. There are nine specific groups of persons who are included in the database.

Included is anyone "has been adjudicated as a mental defective or has been committed to any mental institution." "Any mental institution" would, obviously, include a VA hospital mental ward. And, the government's definition of a "mental defective" is: “A determination by a court, board, commission, or other lawful authority that a person, as a result of marked subnormal intelligence, or mental illness, incompetency, condition, or disease: (1) Is a danger to himself or to others; or (2) Lacks the mental capacity to contract or manage his own affairs. The term shall include a finding of insanity by a court in a criminal case.”

The confusion over H.R. 2640 and veterans, especially veterans with PTSD, began in 2000 when the VA gave the names of between 83,000 and 89,000 veterans to the NICS database. The names were of veterans who had been committed to VA psychiatric wards or who had been adjudicated as a “mental defective.” This was required of all government agencies.

Some thought that any veteran with a mental health issue ended up on the NICS list. That is an absurd assumption. If a veteran tries to quit smoking and goes to VA smoking cessation classes, they are in a mental health program because nicotine is considered an addictive substance. The same applies for those seeking treatment for alcohol or drug abuse. And, we know, these veterans did not end up in the NICS database.

Neither current law nor H.R. 2640 would put any person, including veterans, who have sought psychiatric treatment or voluntarily checked themselves into a psychiatric unit on the NICS list. This includes those with PTSD, those seeking treatment for alcohol or drug abuse and those who have voluntarily sought help and been admitted for observation, sometimes termed a “voluntary commitment.”

So, why all the noise about H.R. 2640? Some feel the small gun owners group is just looking for members. Others feel they have some kind of beef with the NRA. Whatever the reason, the misinformation and scare tactics should be considered for exactly what they are.

The NRA, in the wake of the Virginia Tech shootings that killed over 30 students, realized that current firearms legislation had some real problems. People who should be in the NICS database, like the Virginia Tech shooter, were left out. And, just as important, the NRA knew that some people who shouldn’t be in the database had been included and there was no way for them to get their names of the NICS list. Also, some believe there is wiggle-room in the current regulations that can allow government agencies to “interpret” them incorrectly. The NRA set out to solve those problems, and they did.

The NRA fully supports H.R. 2640 (http://www.nraila.org/Issues/FactSheets/Read.aspx?id=219&issue=018). According to the NRA: “Some pro-gun groups have claimed that H.R. 2640 would ‘prohibit’ thousands of people from owning guns. This is not true…In fact, H.R. 2640 would allow some people now unfairly prohibited from owning guns to have their rights restored, and to have their names removed from the instant check system.”

H.R. 2640 would require states to provide quarterly information to the NICS database. This information would have to include those who no longer fall into one of the nine categories of “no buy” persons. There would be penalties for states that do not comply. And, the protections, especially for those with mental health issues, assure that a “medical finding of disability” would not put someone in the NICS database. That would include veterans with a diagnosis of PTSD. Here are the protections as stated in H.R. 2640:

(1) IN GENERAL- No department or agency of the Federal Government may provide to the Attorney General any record of an adjudication or determination related to the mental health of a person, or any commitment of a person to a mental institution if--

(A) the adjudication, determination, or commitment, respectively, has been set aside or expunged, or the person has otherwise been fully released or discharged from all mandatory treatment, supervision, or monitoring;

(B) the person has been found by a court, board, commission, or other lawful authority to no longer suffer from the mental health condition that was the basis of the adjudication, determination, or commitment, respectively, or has otherwise been found to be rehabilitated through any procedure available under law; or

(C) the adjudication, determination, or commitment, respectively, is based solely on a medical finding of disability, without a finding that the person is a danger to himself or to others or that the person lacks the mental capacity to manage his own affairs.

Please note again that a person cannot be put on the NICS list solely for a "medical finding of disability,” and that would include PTSD.

Also, H.R. 2640 will provide a means for a person to take their name off the NICS list if they should not be on it, something they cannot do at this time. That provision reads:

(A) PROGRAM FOR RELIEF FROM DISABILITIES- Each department or agency of the United States that makes any adjudication or determination related to the mental health of a person or imposes any commitment to a mental institution, as described in subsection (d)(4) and (g)(4) of section 922 of title 18, United States Code, shall establish a program that permits such a person to apply for relief from the disabilities imposed by such subsections. Relief and judicial review shall be available according to the standards prescribed in section 925(c) of title 18, United States Code.

The bottom line for veterans concerned about H.R. 2640 is to just use some common sense. Read the legislation. You may not agree with it. But, if you’re a veteran or you have been diagnosed with PTSD, don’t worry, they aren’t coming for your firearms. The NRA put it correctly when they said, “H.R. 2640 is NOT gun control legislation.” It is legislation designed to end inequities in the current laws that have unfairly prevented many from purchasing firearms and ammo.

[Landwatch.com]

Does anyone out here with GOA? Can anyone brief me on them?

[lofter1]

GOA (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_Owners_of_America) at Wikipedia ...

Gun Owners of America (GOA) is the second largest Second Amendment gun rights organization in America. They make efforts to differentiate themselves from the far larger National Rifle Association (NRA), and have publicly criticized the NRA on multiple occasions for what the GOA considers to be the selling out of the gun rights movement ...

... In 2004, GOA spent over $1.75 million lobbying the U.S. Congress. Between 1998-2004, GOA has spent over $18 million lobbying Congress. GOA's Federal Political Action Committee is "Gun Owners of America Inc. Political Victory Fund" (C00278101).

[Ninjahedge]

Prediction: liberal states --

Had me reading until that line.

It's the famous dipolarism and schism that plays us against each other and ignores the full issue.

"Liberal" is a descriptive term, not a definition.

[Jasonik]

Bad Brief
The Bush DOJ shoots at the Second Amendment.

January 14, 2008 10:56 AM
By John R. Lott Jr.
(http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=ZmIyM2ZlMDhkOTFkMTc5ZGZhMjU0ZDE4N2QzN2U2YzM=)
A lot of Americans who believe in the right to own guns were very disappointed this weekend. On Friday, the Bush administration’s Justice Department entered into the fray over the District of Columbia’s 1976 handgun ban by filing a brief to the Supreme Court that effectively supports the ban. The administration pays lip service to the notion that the Second Amendment protects gun ownership as an “individual right,” but their brief leaves the term essentially meaningless.

Quotes (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/01/12/AR2008011200030.html) by the two sides’ lawyers say it all. The District’s acting attorney general, Peter Nickles, happily noted that the Justice Department’s brief was a “somewhat surprising and very favorable development.” Alan Gura, the attorney who will be representing those challenging the ban before the Supreme Court, accused the Bush administration of “basically siding with the District of Columbia” and said (http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/politics/la-na-guns13jan13,1,5918084.story?coll=la-news-politics-national) that “This is definitely hostile to our position.” As the lead to an article in the Los Angeles Times said Sunday, “gun-control advocates never expected to get a boost from the Bush administration.”

As probably the most prominent Second Amendment law professor in the country privately confided in me, “If the Supreme Court accepts the solicitor general’s interpretation, the chances of getting the D.C. gun ban struck down are bleak.”

The Department of Justice argument (http://armsandthelaw.com/archives/07-290tsacUnitedStates.pdf) can be boiled down pretty easily. Its lawyers claim that since the government bans machine guns, it should also be able to ban handguns. After all, they reason, people can still own rifles and shotguns for protection, even if they have to be stored locked up. The Justice Department even seems to accept that trigger locks are not really that much of a burden, and that the locks “can properly be interpreted” as not interfering with using guns for self-protection. Yet, even if gun locks do interfere with self-defense, DOJ believes the regulations should be allowed, as long as the District of Columbia government thinks it has a good reason.

Factually, there are many mistakes in the DOJ’s reasoning: As soon as a rifle or shotgun is unlocked, it becomes illegal in D.C., and there has never been a federal ban on machine guns. But these are relatively minor points. Nor does it really matter that the only academic research (http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=228534) on the impact of trigger locks on crime finds that states that require guns be locked up and unloaded face a five-percent increase in murder and a 12-percent increase in rape. Criminals are more likely to attack people in their homes, and those attacks are more likely to be successful. Since the potential of armed victims deters criminals, storing a gun locked and unloaded actually encourages crime.

The biggest problem is the standard used for evaluating the constitutionality of regulations. The DOJ is asking that a different, much weaker standard be used for the Second Amendment than the courts demands for other “individual rights” such as speech, unreasonable searches and seizures, imprisonment without trial, and drawing and quartering people.

If one accepts the notion that gun ownership is an individual right, what does “the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed” mean? What would the drafters of the Bill of Rights have had to write if they really meant the right “shall not be infringed”? Does the phrase “the right of the people” provide a different level of protection in the Second Amendment than in the First and Fourth (http://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution/constitution.billofrights.html)?

But the total elimination of gun control is not under consideration by the Supreme Court. The question is what constitutes “reasonable” regulation. The DOJ brief argues that if the DC government says gun control is important for public safety, it should be allowed by the courts. What the appeals court argued is that gun regulations not only need to be reasonable, they need to withstand “strict scrutiny” – a test that ensures the regulations are narrowly tailored to achieve the desired goal.

Perhaps the Justice Department’s position isn’t too surprising. Like any other government agency, it has a hard time giving up its authority. The Justice Department’s bias can been seen in that it finds it necessary to raise the specter of machine guns 10 times when evaluating a law that bans handguns. Nor does the brief even acknowledge that after the ban, D.C.’s murder rate only once fell below what it was in 1976.

Worried about the possibility that a Supreme Court decision supporting the Second Amendment as an individual right could “cast doubt on the constitutionality of existing federal legislation,” the Department of Justice felt it necessary to head off any restrictions on government power right at the beginning.

But all is not lost. The Supreme Court can of course ignore the Bush administration’s advice, but the brief does carry significant weight. President Bush has the power to fix this by ordering that the solicitor general brief be withdrawn or significantly amended. Unfortunately, it may take an uprising by voters to rein in the Justice Department.

— John Lott (http://johnrlott.blogspot.com/) is the author of “Freedomnomics (http://www.amazon.com/dp/1596985062/ref=nosim/?tag=johnrlotttrip-20), upon which part of this article is based, and a senior research scientist at the University of Maryland.

[MikeW]

The Supreme Court heard Heller today, and seemed very receptive to the individual rights philosophy underlying the lower court ruling. From the Times:

March 18, 2008

High Court Considers Right to Bear Arms

By LINDA GREENHOUSE (http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/g/linda_greenhouse/index.html?inline=nyt-per)
WASHINGTON — A majority of the Supreme Court (http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/organizations/s/supreme_court/index.html?inline=nyt-org) appeared ready on Tuesday to embrace, for the first time in the country’s history, an interpretation of the Second Amendment that protects the right to own a gun for personal use.
That may be the easy part.
The harder question in the case challenging the District of Columbia’s handgun ban is determining what kind of restrictions the government could constitutionally place, in the name of public safety, on the newly recognized right. The answer to that question, on which the outcome of the case will turn, was less clear.
The argument was lively and intense, running 22 minutes over its allotted hour and 15 minutes. Despite “starting afresh,” as Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. (http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/r/john_g_jr_roberts/index.html?inline=nyt-per) put it, on a subject the court had not addressed since 1939, the justices appeared at least as well informed as the lawyers on minute details of English and American legal history.
The relevance of that history, on which both sides have their distinguished experts, remains to be seen. There was also a good deal of linguistic dissection of the Second Amendment’s text: “A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.”
“The amendment’s first clause confirms that the right is militia-related,” Walter Dellinger, arguing for the District of Columbia, told the court near the beginning of his argument.
The district is appealing a ruling by the federal appeals court here last year that adopted the individual-rights view of the Second Amendment and declared the handgun ban unconstitutional.
Mr. Dellinger asserted that at the time the Second Amendment was drafted, “the people” and “the militia” were essentially synonymous; therefore, he said, the amendment, its two clauses properly interpreted, gave people the right to own weapons only in connection with their militia service. This assertion promptly ran into objections.
Doesn’t the argument that the people and the militia were one and the same “cut against you,” Chief Justice Roberts asked. If the militia included everyone, he continued, “doesn’t the preamble that you rely on not really restrict the right much at all?”
Tacking slightly, Mr. Dellinger, a former acting solicitor general, replied that the focus should be on “the scope and nature of the right that the people have.” He added, “It is a right to participate in the common defense.”
Justice Anthony M. Kennedy (http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/k/anthony_m_kennedy/index.html?inline=nyt-per), whose vote may well be crucial to the outcome of the case, District of Columbia v. Heller, No. 07-290, disagreed. The purpose of the first clause, with its militia reference, was simply to “reaffirm the right to have a militia,” he said, while the second made clear that individuals had the right to own guns.
In his questions throughout the argument, Justice Kennedy insisted that the amendment’s framers wanted to assure the ability of “the remote settler to defend himself and his family against hostile Indian tribes and outlaws, wolves and bears and grizzlies and things like that,” as he phrased his concern with self-defense at one point.
And Justice Antonin Scalia (http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/s/antonin_scalia/index.html?inline=nyt-per) told Mr. Dellinger that “the two clauses go together beautifully” if the Second Amendment was understood as an effort to guarantee that militias would not be “destroyed by tyrants.” The proper reading, Justice Scalia said, was: “Since we need a militia, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.”
There was broad agreement during the argument that even if an individual right was recognized, some kinds of limitations on gun ownership would still be in order. But there was no clear consensus on whether those restrictions could sweep as broadly as the District of Columbia’s law, or even how the law should be interpreted when it came to a right of self-defense.
Alan Gura, representing Dick Anthony Heller, a security guard who challenged the statute after his request for a license to keep his gun at home was turned down, said that bans on the shipment of machine guns and sawed-off shotguns would be acceptable. Perhaps guns could be banned from schools, Mr. Gura said in answer to questions.
“The legislature has a great deal of leeway in regulating firearms,” Mr. Gura said. “There is no dispute about that.” But he said the District’s ban on “functional firearms” in the home was “extreme” and should fail by any measure of constitutional scrutiny. “A fundamental right is at stake,” he said.
The lawyer in the middle, both literally and figuratively, was Solicitor General Paul D. Clement, whose argument slot fell between those of the two principal advocates. In accordance with the brief he filed for the government, Mr. Clement supported the individual-rights view and took no position on the statute’s constitutionality. But he criticized the lower court for having approached the issue too categorically. And he cautioned the court against writing an opinion so broad as to jeopardize federal gun regulations.
“The Second Amendment talks about the right to bear arms, not just a right to bear arms,” Mr. Clement said. “And that pre-existing right always coexisted with reasonable regulations of firearms.”
As in his brief, which angered some members of the Bush administration for not supporting the appeals court’s approach, Mr. Clement said the government was particularly concerned not to undermine federal restrictions on machine guns.
Under the lower court’s analysis, he noted, categories of weapons that would have been considered “arms” by the Second Amendment’s drafters could not be banned today. He added that it would be hard to argue that machine guns did not fall into such a category, “given that they are the standard issue weapon for today’s armed forces and the state-organized militia.”
Consequently, Mr. Clement said, the Supreme Court should use a standard more relaxed than the “strict scrutiny” that the lower court applied in evaluating restrictions on gun ownership. Selecting a standard to accommodate sufficient regulation was important, he said, adding: “In our view it makes a world of difference.”
Chief Justice Roberts expressed considerable impatience with this line of argument. “I wonder why in this case we have to articulate an all-encompassing standard,” the chief justice said. “I don’t know why, when we are starting afresh, we would try to articulate a whole standard that would apply in every case.”
Justice Scalia tried to deflect Mr. Clement’s argument by noting that machine guns were not used by militias at the time the Second Amendment was drafted. “I don’t see why you have a problem,” Justice Scalia told the solicitor general.
Mr. Clement, who was once Justice Scalia’s law clerk, offered a rejoinder that dared to suggest that the justice was being inconsistent with one of his own opinions. In 2001, Justice Scalia wrote a majority opinion holding that the police need a warrant before training a heat-detecting device — which did not exist when the framers drafted the Fourth Amendment’s warrant requirement — on a private home.
“It does seem to me that just as this court would apply the Fourth Amendment to something like heat imagery,” Mr. Clement said, “I don’t see why this court wouldn’t allow the Second Amendment to have the same kind of scope.” He added: “And then I do think that, reasonably, machine guns come within the term ‘arms.’ ”
Justice Stephen G. Breyer (http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/b/stephen_g_breyer/index.html?inline=nyt-per), late in the argument, made an effort to save the statute by a similar historical analogy. Firearms were regulated in the country’s early years for the sake of safety, he noted, describing a Massachusetts law that prohibited keeping loaded weapons in the home because of the risk of fire. “So today, roughly, you can say no handguns in the city because of the risk of crime,” Justice Breyer said. “Things change.”
Justice Kennedy, the member of the court at whom Justice Breyer was most likely aiming his overture, did not take up the invitation.

[MikeW]

And so it has come to pass. Americans do in fact have an individual right to own and carry guns

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/27/washington/27scotuscnd.html?hp=&pagewanted=print

This won't effect NY immediately, but it will put sigificant pressure relax NY's (and especially NYC's) overly restrictive rules on gun ownership. Chicago and SF seem to be the first targets of the followup lawsuits.

[Ninjahedge]

Pointless.

If the main reason behind the "right"was to defend against the government becoming imperialistic, it becomes moot when they can have you arrested, for no reason, on suspicion of being a terrorist.

At LEAST now you can get a trial, but if you listen to the SC judges that voted against THAT, you would think we were letting madmen out into a nursery unattended.

[lofter1]

But now you've got a clear right to shoot them when they come to get you in your house ...




... it becomes moot when they can have you arrested, for no reason, on suspicion of being a terrorist.

[Jasonik]

Syllabus

NOTE: Where it is feasible, a syllabus (headnote) will be released, as is
being done in connection with this case, at the time the opinion is issued.
The syllabus constitutes no part of the opinion of the Court but has been
prepared by the Reporter of Decisions for the convenience of the reader.
See United States v. Detroit Timber & Lumber Co., 200 U. S. 321, 337.

SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES

Syllabus

DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA ET AL. v. HELLER

CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA CIRCUIT

No. 07–290. Argued March 18, 2008—Decided June 26, 2008
District of Columbia law bans handgun possession by making it a crime to carry an unregistered firearm and prohibiting the registration of handguns; provides separately that no person may carry an unlicensed handgun, but authorizes the police chief to issue 1-year licenses; and requires residents to keep lawfully owned firearms unloaded and dissembled or bound by a trigger lock or similar device. Respondent Heller, a D. C. special policeman, applied to register a handgun he wished to keep at home, but the District refused. He filed this suit seeking, on Second Amendment grounds, to enjoin the city from enforcing the bar on handgun registration, the licensing requirement insofar as it prohibits carrying an unlicensed firearm in the home, and the trigger-lock requirement insofar as it prohibits the use of functional firearms in the home. The District Court dismissed the suit, but the D. C. Circuit reversed, holding that the Second Amendment protects an individual’s right to possess firearms and that the city’s total ban on handguns, as well as its requirement that firearms in the home be kept nonfunctional even when necessary for self-defense, violated that right.

Held:

1. The Second Amendment protects an individual right to possess a firearm unconnected with service in a militia, and to use that arm for traditionally lawful purposes, such as self-defense within the home. Pp. 2–53.

(a) The Amendment’s prefatory clause announces a purpose, but does not limit or expand the scope of the second part, the operative clause. The operative clause’s text and history demonstrate that it connotes an individual right to keep and bear arms. Pp. 2–22.

(b) The prefatory clause comports with the Court’s interpretation of the operative clause. The “militia” comprised all males physically capable of acting in concert for the common defense. The Antifederalists feared that the Federal Government would disarm the people in order to disable this citizens’ militia, enabling a politicized standing army or a select militia to rule. The response was to deny Congress power to abridge the ancient right of individuals to keep and bear arms, so that the ideal of a citizens’ militia would be preserved. Pp. 22–28.

(c) The Court’s interpretation is confirmed by analogous arms-bearing rights in state constitutions that preceded and immediately followed the Second Amendment. Pp. 28–30.

(d) The Second Amendment’s drafting history, while of dubious interpretive worth, reveals three state Second Amendment proposals that unequivocally referred to an individual right to bear arms. Pp. 30–32.

(e) Interpretation of the Second Amendment by scholars, courts and legislators, from immediately after its ratification through the late 19th century also supports the Court’s conclusion. Pp. 32–47.

(f) None of the Court’s precedents forecloses the Court’s interpretation. Neither United States v. Cruikshank, 92 U. S. 542, 553, nor Presser v. Illinois, 116 U. S. 252, 264–265, refutes the individual-rights interpretation. United States v. Miller, 307 U. S. 174, does not limit the right to keep and bear arms to militia purposes, but rather limits the type of weapon to which the right applies to those used by the militia, i.e., those in common use for lawful purposes. Pp. 47–54.
2. Like most rights, the Second Amendment right is not unlimited. It is not a right to keep and carry any weapon whatsoever in any manner whatsoever and for whatever purpose: For example, concealed weapons prohibitions have been upheld under the Amendment or state analogues. The Court’s opinion should not be taken to cast doubt on longstanding prohibitions on the possession of firearms by felons and the mentally ill, or laws forbidding the carrying of firearms in sensitive places such as schools and government buildings, or laws imposing conditions and qualifications on the commercial sale of arms. Miller’s holding that the sorts of weapons protected are those “in common use at the time” finds support in the historical tradition of prohibiting the carrying of dangerous and unusual weapons. Pp. 54–56.

3. The handgun ban and the trigger-lock requirement (as applied to self-defense) violate the Second Amendment. The District’s total ban on handgun possession in the home amounts to a prohibition on an entire class of “arms” that Americans overwhelmingly choose for the lawful purpose of self-defense. Under any of the standards of scrutiny the Court has applied to enumerated constitutional rights, this prohibition—in the place where the importance of the lawful defense of self, family, and property is most acute—would fail constitutional muster. Similarly, the requirement that any lawful firearm in the home be disassembled or bound by a trigger lock makes it impossible for citizens to use arms for the core lawful purpose of self-defense and is hence unconstitutional. Because Heller conceded at oral argument that the D. C. licensing law is permissible if it is not enforced arbitrarily and capriciously, the Court assumes that a license will satisfy his prayer for relief and does not address the licensing requirement. Assuming he is not disqualified from exercising Second Amendment rights, the District must permit Heller to register his handgun and must issue him a license to carry it in the home. Pp. 56–64.
478 F. 3d 370, affirmed.

SCALIA, J., delivered the opinion of the Court, in which ROBERTS, C. J., and KENNEDY, THOMAS, and ALITO, JJ., joined.
STEVENS, J., filed a dissenting opinion, in which SOUTER, GINSBURG, and BREYER, JJ., joined.
BREYER, J., filed a dissenting opinion, in which STEVENS, SOUTER, and GINSBURG, JJ., joined.

The full decision and opinon (44 page pdf) (http://www.scotusblog.com/wp/wp-content/uploads/2008/06/07-290.pdf).

[Jasonik]

Thomas DiLorenzo (http://books.google.com/books?as_auth=Thomas+J+DiLorenzo) writes:

Today's Supreme Court decision that we have individual rights to arm ourselves highlights more than any other recent decision the absurdity of allowing the federal government, through its courts, to determine the limits of its own powers. This came about in the post-1865 era, once states' rights/federalism was destroyed. (Yes, judicial review existed for a long time before that, but presidents, state legislatures, and citizens viewed it as merely the Supreme Court's opinion, not THE FINAL WORD, ONCE AND FOR ALL on constitutional issues).

The shocking thing about today's decision is that if one man -- Anthony Kennedy -- voted the other way, then what -- we would all be forcefully disarmed?

A judicial dictatorship is what nationalists like Alexander Hamilton and his disciple, Justice John Marshall, wanted, and that of course is what we've ended up with. But imagine if the Court declared in 1805 that Americans do not have individual rights to own firearms. Do you think Jefferson, Patrick Henry, and George Washington would have given up their firearms and genuflected to the black-robed deities of the Court? Hell no; they would have reached for them and commenced another revolution.

For Constitution-geeks Stephen Kinsella (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephan_Kinsella) shows why (http://www.lewrockwell.com/blog/lewrw/archives/021701.html) the above is so.

[pianoman11686]

Interesting reading, Jasonik. I've read similar literature on Constitutional limits of power in the past, but this particular example was especially enlightening about how much things have changed in the past 200 years or so.

It's a pity that no one really cares about the issues raised by such decisions, because everyone pretty much assumes temporality was implicit in many parts of the Constitution. And given some of the recent backlash to strict, Constitutionalist judges, one wonders where we go from here (and where we end up).

[Ninjahedge]

But now you've got a clear right to shoot them when they come to get you in your house ...


I am sure you would last a long time held up with your semi-automatic pistol while the ATF/FBI/CIA/Exxon... oops, that is not public yet.... come breaking in your door at 3AM with M16's and riot gear.....


Meanwhile Bubba over in Tennessee can feel safe that he has the power to protect himself from those Koreans that moved in across the street... :cool:

[lofter1]

I never said you'd be safe. Just that you had a right to aim and shoot.

[ZippyTheChimp]

What a joke.

Libertarianism - the ultimate thought-experiment. In the real world, ultimate chaos.

I was reminded of that scuzzball Bob Barr's comment:

"Inside every American beats the heart of a Libertarian"

Well, not really. Inside every American beats the heart of a homo-sapien. And we all know what they can be like.

[eddhead]

5-4 vote. I wonder what the result would have been had O'Connor still been on the bench.

Highlights the importance of this election cycle. The next president may get to appoint as many as 2 or even more justices.

[MikeW]

^
Yes, but likely liberal replacements (Stevens being the first to go).

[Jasonik]

Hobbes: justifying (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leviathan_%28book%29) tyranny since 1651.

Weber: opposing (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Politics_as_a_Vocation) self defense since 1919.

Barr: scumbagging (http://www.economist.com/world/na/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11455827) up the (laughable) Libertarian Party since 2006.

[pianoman11686]

What a joke.

Libertarianism - the ultimate thought-experiment. In the real world, ultimate chaos.

I was reminded of that scuzzball Bob Barr's comment:

"Inside every American beats the heart of a Libertarian"

Well, not really. Inside every American beats the heart of a homo-sapien. And we all know what they can be like.

Isn't this sort of a grand exaggeration? Libertarianism isn't anarchism.

[Jasonik]

Rule of law restraining government seems like a rather archaic idea these days -- government rule restraining the people seems all the rage.

[ZippyTheChimp]

Isn't this sort of a grand exaggeration? Libertarianism isn't anarchism.And the word chaos isn't a political philosophy. Don't put words in my mouth.

In regard to the Supreme Court decision, Libertarians may see it as a victory for the restraint of government; but the biggest impact of the ruling is the empowerment of a group that, in all cases but gun-control, is happy to slide down the slippery-slope of government intervention and give us this. (http://www.wirednewyork.com/forum/showthread.php?t=5214&page=30)

The real world.

[Gregory Tenenbaum]

Orwell himself said the greatest guarantee of human freedom is the laborers firearm hanging above his fireplace.

My own impression from reading the reasons is that Scalia was right in this decision.

Take yourself back to the 1780s when the English government were exploiting anyone they could, Indians, Aborigines, natives of just about every nation they could - including Ireland.

The founding fathers were of the view that when the government starts acting like the English did in the 1770s, it then loses the right to resolve disputes by non violent means.

Hence the right to bear arms.

The USA today would never regress to the standards of government of the colonial powers of those times, which were marginally better than the death penalty without trial that exists today in China.

The rules of evidence have evolved dramatically even in the last 100 years - for the better. Its harder for the governors to be as oppressive as the English were.

[lofter1]

The founding fathers were of the view that when the government starts acting like the English did in the 1770s, it then loses the right to resolve disputes by non violent means.

How naive those guys were, eh?

Just look at what we all allow to be done to us -- and in our names.

[eddhead]

^
Yes, but likely liberal replacements (Stevens being the first to go).

True but for my part I would rather have a liberal replace a liberal than have a conservative replace a liberal. Besides, Scalia and Kennedy are getting up there as well.

[MikeW]

Scalia is 71. Last I looked, Stevens is 85 (and he may have gotten older since then). Even if Obama is elected, and reelected, Scalia could probably wait him out.

[eddhead]

yes, I know all their ages. Kennedy and Scalia will both be 72 this year which is not young either. Of course I understand Stevens is likely the first to go, and bader-ginsberg is up there too.

Still my sense is that both will make an attempt to hang on if McCain is elected at least for a first term. Or at least I hope they do.

[MikeW]

The question now is how will this effect NYS and NYC gun laws. It looks like the first to be challenged after DC will be Chicago and San Francisco. But I think NY is ripe for a challenge also, if not so much in language as in implementation.

[eddhead]

I think it will impact all the state and municipal laws to a very large degree but only after the individual laws are challenged. NYC will go kicking and screaming into the night.

New strategy for anti-gun municipalities will begin to increase focus on waiting periods, licenses, gun show restrictions, maybe even interstate commerce restrictions and most especially on due diligence around applicants, i.e. making sure they are not felons etc... They will also on focus attention on assault rifles. Automatic handguns are a non-starter though, they cannot win that one.

That is about all they can do at this point.

As you know, I an pretty anti-gun (as I know from previous posts that you are pro) but this is a landmark ruling. The deed is done.

[Ninjahedge]

Outlaw ammunition.

A technicality, to be sure, but whatever.

I think this is teh same BS that we always get into, thinking that rules that were made on the situation and place we were in 200 years ago DIRECTLY applies to today. We don't write down the "why" in a law, just "because".

So later, we get a bunch of people arguing on what these men intended or thought when they were making these laws.

It is like tradition, when most of them had a reason way-back-when, but where they bear little meaning in todays society (such as the "one-month chicken soup" thing for recent Chinese mothers). When we lose track of the "why", the "what" just doesn't do what it was intended to do.

Maybe we should focus on reducing our government forces so that maybe a group of people with "firearms on their mantles" would have more of an impact on our country than simply a bunch of people who are so insecure they feel like a pistol is their God-given right of Manhood.

[Jasonik]

Gun Rights, the Militia, and Community

Posted by Christopher Roach on June 29, 2008 (http://www.takimag.com/blogs/article/gun_rights_the_militia_and_community/)

During the Cold War, conservatives rightly pointed out that the collectivist materialism of the Soviet Union was anti-human in the worst ways. It elevated the state to mythic proportions. It denied the value of individual human beings. It suppressed the human spirit and focused on minimal material comfort to the exclusion of other values. The state could undo social injustices, we were told, but conservatives reminded us that life always would involve certain unavoidable inconveniences and inequalities. No law could completely eliminate evil, and the attempt to do so would lead to other evils that have been the constant fellow traveler of the leftist program.

Every state that has sought heaven-on-earth has imposed crushing burdens on qualities such as initiative, enterprise, idiosyncrasy, self-reliance, law-abidingness, trust, and regard for one’s own. During the post-war period, conservatives made common cause with libertarian critics of “The State.” Individualism (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intercollegiate_Studies_Institute#History) was the watchword of the day. But the emphasis on individualism was always a bit out of tune with the conservative ethos. As other disorders worked their way through society since the 50s, including nihilistic disregard for family and social obligations in general, conservatives expressed their concerns about the breakdown of civil society and community (http://www.amazon.com/Quest-Community-Ethics-Freedom-Self-Governance/dp/1558150587), trends rooted in an “atomistic” individualism.

Conservative political philosophy is concerned above all with balance. Excessive individualism and excessive collectivism both exhibit genuine evils in political life. We are skeptical of change not least because the happy balance of traditional Anglo-American liberties avoided the evils of both. It has been difficult to preserve these liberties under the American Constitution (http://home.eol.ca/~dord/waco_raid01b.jpg) and even harder for others to replicate. The uniquely American balance of our historical liberties is expressed perfectly in the Second Amendment:

A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.
The Second Amendment has always flummoxed modern observers. For starters, it has a preamble. In the law, there is always an issue of interpretation--whether in contract law, property deeds, or statutes--about whether a preamble limits the meaning of the words to follow. Is it surplusage, an exhortation, or a restriction on the specification that follows? In this instance, it is what it appears to be: an expression of purpose. The right remains “one of the people,” but that right is in the service of a broader objective: “the security of a free State.” The Founders rightly worried that the federal government’s power to “provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining, the militia, and for governing such part of them as may be employed in the service of the United States” would be abused to create a federal “select militia” (http://uchicagolaw.typepad.com/faculty/2007/12/the-second-amen.html#comment-92810512) to the exclusion of states’ and individuals’ right to create militias and bear individual arms respectively.

The Second Amendment is also confusing today because of the degradation of the militia over the last 100 years. A true militia may be thought of as a cooperative arrangement of the people and the state. Like the jury system, it injects the sensibility of ordinary people into the state’s exertion of power. The formalized National Guard appeared in 1903 taking over the role of the formerly more numerous and less uniform state militias. The routine use of the posse comitatus has also gone by the wayside in the age of professional policing, though it still persists in various locales. (http://www.mcsoposse.org/)

The right to bear arms at the time of the founding, while an individual right, was not conceived completely individualistically. In this sense, Scalia’s recent opinion in Heller (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/District_of_Columbia_v._Heller), with its focus on self-defense, downplays unfairly the “classical republicanism” (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Republicanism_in_the_United_States#Virtue_vs._Comm erce) of the Founders. The right to keep and bear arms undoubtedly allows arms as a means of self-defense from ordinary criminals, as well as the predators of nature. But the Heller decision’s dicta--including its gratuitous dig at the M-16 (http://www.scotusblog.com/wp/heller-quotes-from-the-majority/)--paves the way for eliminating weapons chiefly useful for a broader and more political concept of self defense: resistance to military enemies of the Constitution, whether foreign or domestic, through the actions of the citizen-militia.

The Founders knew that a community was a fragile thing. It can be harmed from moral disorder within, a foreign conquest, and, most insidiously, the evil of “faction." (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federalist_No._10#The_question_of_faction) A purely individualistic focus on the right to bear arms--typical in the rhetoric of libertarians (http://www.lewrockwell.com/gregory/gregory11.html) and the Founding era’s left-wing (http://www.ushistory.org/paine/rights/c1-010.htm)--does not take into account that the Founding generation, soon after enacting the Second Amendment, imposed certain duties that relate to this right. The federal Militia Act of 1792 provided as follows:

That every citizen so enrolled and notified, shall, within six months thereafter, provide himself with a good musket or firelock, a sufficient bayonet and belt, two spare flints, and a knapsack, a pouch with a box therein to contain not less than twenty-four cartridges, suited to the bore of his musket or firelock, each cartridge to contain a proper quantity of powder and ball: or with a good rifle, knapsack, shot-pouch and powder-horn, twenty balls suited to the bore of his rifle, and a quarter of a pound of powder; and shall appear, so armed, accoutered and provided, when called out to exercise, or into service, except, that when called out on company days to exercise only, he may appear without a knapsack.
Would that the United States mandated such training today! Gun control would have an entirely different meaning involving shot groups and tactical reloads. The founding era’s rhetoric was more than a recitation of rights. Even among the more liberal elements, a right was rarely disembodied from some sense of community obligation. The right to bear arms existed alongside a duty to bear arms. While the counterbalancing action of the different branches of government figures prominently in the Federalist Papers, the authors of that hoary workl emphasized the need for a virtuous citizenry to preserve republican government. They knew that the political liberty of all depended upon the widespread inculcation of individual virtues--such as self-reliance--but also political virtues, such as watchfulness over the state and the willingness to forego private advantage when the common good was at stake. After all, the term republic comes from the Latin “res publica,” literally public things but better translated as the common good. The limitations on majority control contained in the Constitution could work at most to stop a temporary majority in the grip of some passion or mania. The Constitution could not, in Rube-Goldberg fashion (http://www.vedicsciences.net/intelligent/rube-goldberg.jpg), forever channel any sort of collection of people, however devoid of virtue and public spiritedness, away from the natural results of their collective character. The Founders knew that character and liberty were mutually reinforcing and necessary (http://mansizedtarget.wordpress.com/2004/08/05/enlightened-self-interest/) for republican government to serve the individual and common good.

As Patrick Henry put the matter:

Are we at last brought to such an humiliating and debasing degradation that we cannot be trusted with arms for our own defense? Where is the difference between having our arms under our own possession and under our own direction, and having them under the management of Congress? If our defense be the real object of having those arms, in whose hands can they be trusted with more propriety, or equal safety to us, as in our own hands?
A robust militia serves to improve the virtue of the people and ties their fortunes with those of the state. Military drill instills characteristics of physical courage and discipline, while also giving the people the necessary skills to resist any threats to their liberties. It is worth remembering that that the Founders were not only concerned with preventing tyranny; another important intervening event preceded the Constitutional Convention of 1787. That event is Shay’s Rebellion, a lawless veteran’s movement that threatened the fragile order that prevailed under the Articles of Confederation. In other words, the Second Amendment in particular evinces the U.S. Constitution’s dual aims: liberty and order. The liberties the Constitution recognizes are historical in nature, and certain seeming inconsistencies--in truth, necessary limitations--flow from their historical contours, which are by necessity more circumscribed that the abstract liberty one might imagine from a purely theoretical point of view.

The Founders’ Solomon-like solution to the problem of creating a government energetic enough to discharge its duties, but not so powerful to oppress the people, finds itself most emphatically in the concept of the militia. The militia is simply ordinary male citizens assembled to perform some necessary government task such as preventing a riot, responding to a foreign invader, pursuing a fugitive, or, if need be, breaking off from de jure control and responding to some emergency from within the apparatus of the government itself. For those who find this institution an anachronism in the age of nuclear weapons, consider the relative inability of modern militaries to suppress insurrections with small arms in such varied locales as Iraq, Vietnam, Algeria, and New Orleans. How much happier would the events in New Orleans have been if some reasonable percentage of the citizenry were routinely accustomed to assisting law enforcement and the National Guard in preserving order and responding to disasters.

Like a strong military in foreign relations, a well-organized militia has a deterrent to would-be tyrants both at home and abroad. While some standing military is necessary today, how much less of a threat such a military would pose to our liberties if it were counter-balanced by tens of millions of American men armed, trained and organized at the county and state level, enforcing laws that they have chosen to live under as a free, self-governing people.

As it stands, the American people are disorganized and increasingly servile. Partly because of the proliferation of meddlesome laws, their relationship to law enforcement and the military is typically one of indifference or hostility. The increasing professionalization of law enforcement and military functions has reinforced this gap between the State and the People. A robust militia working hand-in-hand with full-time government officials would do much to restore civic pride, reduce tension between the government and the community, and deter the worst government excesses. The common extreme individualist notion of gun rights is problematic. Without some sense of common destiny and moral courage (http://rkba.org/comment/cowards.html), an armed but selfish population would be of little use against either foreign or domestic threats. Why? Because it would always be in one’s individual interest to let some other guy do the fighting. To paraphrase General Patton, without teamwork you can’t fight your way out of a “piss-soaked paper bag.” This criticism of the disorganized militia was commonly levied during the War for American Independence. Consider the account of George Washington in a letter to the Continental Congress dated September 1776:

To place any dependence upon Militia, is, assuredly, resting upon a broken staff. Men just dragged from the tender Scenes of domestick life; unaccustomed to the din of Arms; totally unacquainted with every kind of Military skill, which being followed by a want of confidence in themselves, when opposed to Troops regularly train’d, disciplined, and appointed, superior in knowledge, and superior in Arms, makes them timid, and ready to fly from their own shadows.
Does this line of criticism mean we should not have a militia? Hardly. But it does mean that a disorganized militia is not nearly so useful in securing a free state as an organized and well-armed one. Without some subordination to law and public purpose, armed Americans acting as lone wolves or in some other disorganized groupings would more likely become a rabble like the Quantrill gang (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantrill's_Raiders). Without some concern beyond the self and without some coordination with self-governing and local political life, the right to keep and bear arms is nearly useless as a bulwark of liberty.

Constitutional and republican government aims to preserve liberty and government without extinguishing either. As Burke put the matter:

To make a government requires no great prudence. Settle the seat of power, teach obedience, and the work is done. To give freedom is still more easy. It is not necessary to guide; it only requires to let go the rein. But to form a free government, that is, to temper together these opposite elements of liberty and restraint in one consistent work, requires much thought, deep reflection, a sagacious, powerful, and combining mind.
The historical right to keep and bear arms is the product of such minds. But conservatives should consider the Founders’ solution in all of its detail. They preserved an uncompromising individual right to keep and bear arms. But that right existed in a larger tableau of duties and institutions that balanced the individual good with the need for cooperation in social life. In an age of out-of-control crime, rampant illegal immigration, natural disaster, and threats of terrorism and urban disorder, a revitalized militia movement to assist local law enforcement and the National Guard, something like a well-armed variation on the Cold War Civil Defense programs (http://www.civildefensemuseum.com/), would be a worthy conservative endeavor that would secure a great number of the benefits of our historical right to keep and bear arms.

[Jasonik]

The Heller Misdirection

June 30, 2008 | by William Norman Grigg (http://www.lewrockwell.com/grigg/grigg-w32.html)


"A nation of slaves is always prepared to applaud the clemency of their master, who, in the abuse of absolute power, does not proceed to the last extremes of injustice and oppression.

~ Edward Gibbon, Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/gibbon-decline28.html).
Like the inhabitants of other formerly free societies, Americans are content to define "freedom" in terms of those liberties we are permitted to exercise. Yesterday's Supreme Court ruling in District of Columbia v. Heller (http://www.scotusblog.com/wp/wp-content/uploads/2008/06/07-290.pdf) (.pdf) is perfectly in harmony with this self-defeating concept of "freedom."

It is entirely appropriate that the decision was written by Antonin Scalia, the most reliably authoritarian (http://www.cato-at-liberty.org/2006/06/16/scalias-alternate-universe/) and consistently liberty-aversive (http://freedominourtime.blogspot.com/2008/06/habeas-corpus-and-bush-bot-bulimics.html) member of the Court. With an air of regal condescension, Scalia allows that the Second Amendment acknowledges and protects an individual right to armed self-defense. He then explicitly limits the extent to which that "right" can be exercised, thereby redefining it as a State-conferred privilege.

We can't really expect a statist creature like Antonin Scalia to embrace the view that the right to keep and bear arms includes the right of citizens, acting either individually or collectively, to kill agents of the state when such action is necessary and morally justified. Any other view of the Second Amendment is worse than useless; this is certainly true of the view that emerges in Scalia's Heller opinion.

"The Second Amendment protects an individual right to possess a firearm unconnected with service in a militia, and to use that arm for traditionally lawful purposes, such as self-defense within the home," summarizes Scalia at the beginning of his opinion (emphasis added).

A few paragraphs later Scalia elaborates a bit on the implied limitations of the "right" he describes. Insisting that previous Court rulings effectively limit "the type of weapon to which the right applies to those used by the militia, i.e., those in common use for lawful purposes," he asserts: "Like most rights, the Second Amendment right is not unlimited. It is not a right to keep and carry any weapon whatsoever in any manner whatsoever and for whatever purpose.... Miller's holding that the sorts of weapons protected are those 'in common use at the time' finds support in the historical tradition of prohibiting the carrying of dangerous and unusual weapons." (Emphasis added.)

When government grants a liberty and then restricts the manner in which it can be used, the result is not a right, but a limited, conditional license. Scalia's passage cited above will inevitably be seen as a license from the court for legislative bodies to enact, or fortify, laws against "dangerous and unusual" weapons – such as the scary-looking guns ritually denounced as "assault weapons, for example. And other even more troubling portions of his opinion will abet further restrictions on the purposes for which firearms can be used.

At various points in his opinion, Scalia brushes up against the radical origins of the Second Amendment. For example: "The Antifederalists feared that the Federal Government would disarm the people in order to disable [the] citizens' militia, enabling a politicized standing army or a select militia to rule. The response was to deny Congress power to abridge the ancient right of individuals to keep and bear arms, so that the ideal of a citizens' militia would be preserved." (Pg. 2; see also 22–28)

The clear implication here is that the "ancient right of individuals" to armed self-defense includes the right to organize for the purpose of insurrection against a tyrannical government. Scalia revisits that theme in reviewing efforts by George III's government to disarm American colonists (pg. 21). Discussing the ancient origins of the right, Scalia notes that "the Stuart Kings Charles II and James II succeeded in using select militias loyal to them to suppress political dissidents, in part by disarming their opponents" (pg. 19). He quite usefully admits that "when able-bodied men of a nation are trained in arms and organized, they are better able to resist tyranny" (pp. 24–25), without teasing any specific application from that provocative observation.

Although he draws only scantily from the vast corpus of insurrectionary writings by the Founders that deal with the right to armed self-defense (the most notable being Madison's endorsement, in Federalist essay 45 (http://www.constitution.org/fed/federa46.htm), of direct military action against a tyrannical central government), Scalia does cite some interesting literature of that sort from the mid-19th century.

For instance, he quotes John Norton Pomeroy's 1868 book An Introduction to the Constitutional Law of the United States (http://books.google.com/books?hl=en&id=MeQ9AAAAIAAJ&dq=%22Pomeroy%22+%22An+Introduction+to+the+Constit utional+Law+of+the+United+States%22&printsec=frontcover&source=web&ots=hpSkTqYDBe&sig=D_6HYRFU9zbB4Q3448l2sUIoYak&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=1&ct=result), which stated (http://books.google.com/books?hl=en&id=MeQ9AAAAIAAJ&dq=%22Pomeroy%22+%22An+Introduction+to+the+Constit utional+Law+of+the+United+States%22&printsec=frontcover&source=web&ots=hpSkTqYDBe&sig=D_6HYRFU9zbB4Q3448l2sUIoYak&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=1&ct=result#PPA157,M1) that the Second Amendment would make no sense unless it enables citizens "to exercise themselves in the use of warlike weapons. To preserve this privilege, and to secure to the people the ability to oppose themselves in military force against the usurpations of government, as well as against enemies from without, that government is forbidden by any law or proceeding to invade or destroy the right to keep and bear arms...." (emphasis added).

From the foregoing it's clear that Scalia is aware of the insurrectionary origins and purpose of the Second Amendment. Passages of that sort are scattered through the 67-page opinion and left without significant elaboration.

What's even odder is the fact that Scalia, drawing on Joseph Story's immensely influential Commentaries (http://www.constitution.org/js/js_001.htm), that the "free state" to be defended by the people under arms is not the individual state they inhabit – as the Founders would have understood – but rather the unitary nation created as a result of the Union victory in the War Between the States (pg. 24).

Scalia appears to be saying that while the right to bear arms was associated with the colonial and state militias, that right does not exist exclusively to carry out that function. But he also seems to assert that since the modern "militia" is an institution controlled by the central government and devoted to its protection, there's no longer a legitimate right to armed self-defense against the government.

On this point, Scalia's analysis is difficult to distinguish from that offered by the dissenting judges, who would simply dispense with the right to bear arms entirely, rather than paying lip-service to it while denying its chief purpose and encouraging various encumbrances on it, as Scalia does.

"Undoubtedly some think that the Second Amendment is outmoded in a society where our standing army is the pride of our Nation, where well-trained police forces provide personal security, and where gun violence is a serious problem," Scalia concludes. "That is perhaps debatable, but what is not debatable is that it is not the role of this Court to pronounce the Second Amendment extinct."

Indeed not: Scalia's opinion suggests that the role of the Court is to placate key elements of the Republican coalition while suggesting alternative routes to those who seek the eventual abolition of the right that was once protected by the Second Amendment. While Scalia's ruling reinforces one of the few effective rallying points for the demoralized Republican Party ("This year's election is all about the judges!"), it does nothing of substance to defer the day when some judge or president will be able to pronounce the Second Amendment extinct.

This point simply can't be emphasized too often: The innate right of armed self-defense exists whether any government chooses to recognize it. What made the Second Amendment unique was its recognition of the fact that in the constitutional scheme, the government does not have a monopoly on the legitimate use of force. Scalia, like many statist jurists before him, insists that the permissible civilian uses of firearms are all defined within that government-exercised monopoly on force; they are temporary concessions that can be redefined by our rulers at whim.

In a genuinely free society, citizens would enjoy the unqualified liberty to acquire weapons of any sort, in any quantity they pleased, for the specific purpose of being able to out-gun the government and its agents when such action would be justified.

Most Americans, as ignorant of our heritage of principled insurrection as they are well-versed in the ephemera of degenerate pop culture, would find such sentiments abhorrent. In that fact we see that – whatever may be the status of our current "right" to keep and bear arms – the intellectual and psychological disarmament of our population is nearly complete.


William Norman Grigg [send him mail (WNGrigg@msn.com)] writes the Pro Libertate blog (http://freedominourtime.blogspot.com/).

[MikeW]

With Heller now in place, it think that would get shot down also. Face it, we're not in an era where guns (and ammo) will be more universally available to law abiding citizens (they've always been universally available to criminals).


Outlaw ammunition.

A technicality, to be sure, but whatever.

I think this is teh same BS that we always get into, thinking that rules that were made on the situation and place we were in 200 years ago DIRECTLY applies to today. We don't write down the "why" in a law, just "because".

So later, we get a bunch of people arguing on what these men intended or thought when they were making these laws.

It is like tradition, when most of them had a reason way-back-when, but where they bear little meaning in todays society (such as the "one-month chicken soup" thing for recent Chinese mothers). When we lose track of the "why", the "what" just doesn't do what it was intended to do.

Maybe we should focus on reducing our government forces so that maybe a group of people with "firearms on their mantles" would have more of an impact on our country than simply a bunch of people who are so insecure they feel like a pistol is their God-given right of Manhood.

[Alonzo-ny]

Guns in America

Controlling the trade in guns

Feb 18th 2009

From Economist.com

The source of guns seized in crimes in America

SOME 141,500 guns were collected at crime scenes in America in 2007. Over 42,000 of them had been transported across state lines. A report by Mayors Against Illegal Guns, a group of 300 city mayors, considers which states are the source of most weapons used in crime. The group found that Georgia was the biggest single supplier, with 2,631 weapons traced back to the state. Florida, Texas, Virgina and Califorina each supplied over 2,000. Take population of the source state into account, however, and West Virginia, which exported over 40 such guns for every 100,000 of its people, tops the league. The rate of “export” of such weapons is 11.7, on average, for all states. But for states that require background checks on those buying handguns at shows, it is roughly halved, at 5.7.

http://media.economist.com/images/na/2009w08/US-Guns.jpg

[Jasonik]

MT House measure would change gun rules

Posted: Feb 16, 2009 08:58 AM
Updated: Feb 17, 2009 02:22 PM (http://www.montanasnewsstation.com/Global/story.asp?S=9851068&nav=menu227_2)

Firearms manufactured and used in Montana would become exempt from federal regulation under a bill being considered in the Montana House.

The State House voted in favor of House Bill 246 in second reading on Saturday, and the bill could have the effect of releasing Montana gun owners from federal registration requirements.

The measure applies to firearms, firearm accessories and ammunition that are made and sold in the state.

The bill's sponsor says his proposal is more about states' rights than about gun rights.

You can read the full text of the bill here (http://data.opi.mt.gov/bills/2009/billhtml/HB0246.htm).

Here is some of the relevant language in the bill:


NEW SECTION. Section 2. Legislative declarations of authority. The legislature declares that the authority for [sections 1 through 7] is the following:

(1) The 10th amendment to the United States constitution guarantees to the states and their people all powers not granted to the federal government elsewhere in the constitution and reserves to the state and people of Montana certain powers as they were understood at the time that Montana was admitted to statehood in 1889. The guaranty of those powers is a matter of contract between the state and people of Montana and the United States as of the time that the compact with the United States was agreed upon and adopted by Montana and the United States in 1889.

(2) The ninth amendment to the United States constitution guarantees to the people rights not granted in the constitution and reserves to the people of Montana certain rights as they were understood at the time that Montana was admitted to statehood in 1889. The guaranty of those rights is a matter of contract between the state and people of Montana and the United States as of the time that the compact with the United States was agreed upon and adopted by Montana and the United States in 1889.

(3) The regulation of intrastate commerce is vested in the states under the 9th and 10th amendments to the United States constitution, particularly if not expressly preempted by federal law. Congress has not expressly preempted state regulation of intrastate commerce pertaining to the manufacture on an intrastate basis of firearms, firearms accessories, and ammunition.

(4) The second amendment to the United States constitution reserves to the people the right to keep and bear arms as that right was understood at the time that Montana was admitted to statehood in 1889, and the guaranty of the right is a matter of contract between the state and people of Montana and the United States as of the time that the compact with the United States was agreed upon and adopted by Montana and the United States in 1889.

(5) Article II, section 12, of the Montana constitution clearly secures to Montana citizens, and prohibits government interference with, the right of individual Montana citizens to keep and bear arms. This constitutional protection is unchanged from the 1889 Montana constitution, which was approved by congress and the people of Montana, and the right exists as it was understood at the time that the compact with the United States was agreed upon and adopted by Montana and the United States in 1889.

*****

Good luck to Montanans trying to escape the clutches of the Nazi-derived U.S. Gun Control Act of 1968 (http://www.jpfo.org/filegen-a-m/GCA_68.htm) (the German National Socialist pedigree of that measure has been capably documented by Jews for the Preservation of Firearms Ownership (http://www.jpfo.org/)).

[Ninjahedge]

The bill's sponsor says his proposal is more about states' rights than about gun rights.


Then why couldn't he find something else BESIDES guns to express that position?

[eddhead]

^^
2 guesses ... ;)

[Jasonik]

Well Montana has already gone a great distance in exerting states' rights over industrial hemp cultivation (http://law.justia.com/montana/codes/80/80_18_1.html). See also - www.montanahemp.org (http://www.montanahemp.org/)

Additionally in response to the Real ID Act, according to Tim Sparapani, an ACLU Legislative Counsel: "Montana has taken that rebellion to an entirely new level (http://blog.wired.com/27bstroke6/2007/04/montana_rejects.html) by issuing what amounts to a 'Declaration of Independence' from the act."

More regarding the gun measure (http://www.missoulian.com/articles/2009/02/15/bnews/br26.txt):

“What we need here is for Montana to be able to handle Montana’s business and affairs,” Republican Rep. Joel Boniek told fellow lawmakers Saturday. The wilderness guide from Livingston defeated Republican incumbent Bruce Malcolm in last spring’s election.

Boniek’s measure aims to circumvent federal authority over interstate commerce, which is the legal basis for most gun regulation in the United States. The bill potentially could release Montanans from both federal gun registration requirements and dealership licensing rules. Since the state has no background-check laws on its own books, the legislation also could free gun purchasers from that requirement.

“Firearms are inextricably linked to the history and culture of Montana, and I’d like to support that,” Boniek said. “But I want to point out that the issue here is not about firearms. It’s about state rights.”
.....

“I would hope that our U.S. Supreme Court would begin to retreat from what I think is an abusive interpretation of our interstate commerce clause,” said Rep. Deborah Kottel, a Democrat from Great Falls who supports the measure.

That clause in the U.S. Constitution grants Congress authority to regulate commerce with foreign nations, and among the states. The Supreme Court has handled cases seeking to limit the clause’s application in recent years. In 2005, the court upheld federal authority to regulate marijuana under the clause, even when its use is limited to noncommercial purposes such as medical reasons and it is grown and used within a state’s borders.

How else could a state exert autonomy?

Perhaps disavow legal tender laws [pdf] (http://mises.org/journals/jls/18_3/18_3_3.pdf) and abide by the 10th Amendment:

U.S. Constitution, Art. I Sec. 10 Cl. 1
No State shall... make any Thing but gold and silver Coin a Tender in Payment of Debts.

See also HR 2779 THE HONEST MONEY ACT (http://www.fame.org/HTM/Ron%20Paul%20Introduces%20HR2779%20The%20Honest%20 Money%20Act%20-%20REPEAL%20OF%20LEGAL%20TENDER%20LAWS.htm)
Repeal of Legal Tender Laws - (Section 5103 of title 31, United States Code)

Also how to develop a local currency. (http://www.treehugger.com/files/2009/01/print-your-own-money-build-community.php)

[Jasonik]

State considers return to gold, silver dollars
Proposed bill slams Fed, allows payments in precious metals (http://www.worldnetdaily.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=92000)

[ZippyTheChimp]

Beer companies used to be recession-proof, but that's out the window. The Second Amendment may be the latest hedge against a recession.


http://static.guim.co.uk/static/72404/zones/news/images/logo.gif


Americans stick to their guns
as firearms sales surge


Amid fears that President Obama is planning a clampdown on guns,
Chris McGreal reports from Culpeper, Virginia, on a new US arms race

Chris McGreal
The Guardian, Monday 13 April 2009

At the Guns and Ammo Warehouse they are reluctant to admit Barack Obama is right about very much. But customers enjoy the thought that his controversial campaign comment, that "bitter" small-town Americans are clinging to their guns, has proved more true than the president could have imagined.

Firearms sales have surged in the six months since Obama's election as millions of Americans have gone on a buying spree that has stripped gun shops in some parts of the country almost bare of assault weapons and led to a national ammunition shortage.

The FBI says that since November more than seven million people applied for criminal background checks in order to buy weapons, a figure excluding the many more buying at thousands of gun shows in states such as Virginia, without facing any checks.

Gun-shop owners and the National Rifle Association say the surge is driven by worries that Obama is planning to ban many types of firearms and that the deepening economic crisis will fuel a crime wave, as witnessed by the string of mass shootings in the past few weeks.

But control groups pressing for greater control on firearms accuse the NRA of funding a massive scare campaign to portray Obama as a gun owner's worst nightmare and to argue that tighter restrictions on weapons ownership are a threat to broader liberties and a step toward tyranny.

That extreme position apparently prompted a man, who told friends he was afraid the government would take his guns away, to shoot three police officers in Pittsburgh last week. But more commonly such views are boosting gun sales, from Ohio to Texas and from Wyoming to Virginia.

Chris Howley, manager of the Guns and Ammo Warehouse, in Manassas, Virginia, says sales are up by at least 50% since Obama won the election - particularly of assault rifles after the president indicated he would revive a ban on the sale of semi-automatic weapons that had been allowed to lapse under George Bush. "It went through the roof since the election. Initially they were after the semi-automatics because they thought they would be banned again. They just flew out at a phenomenal rate. But now they're buying up all the hand guns too. Look at the hand guns case. It's only half full," he said.

A year ago, the Guns and Ammo Warehouse was selling, each month for $1,000 each, about 10 of their AR-15s, a semi-automatic civilian version of the army's M-16 assault rifle. Howley says he can now sell 45 a week, when he has them. There is less demand for the Tommy gun on the wall because, Howley notes drily, it meets California specifications and is restricted to hold just 10 bullets in its distinctive round cylinder, instead of the 100 permitted in Virginia where guns can be carried openly on the streets.

Neither are hunting rifles in much demand (including the one in shocking pink for small girls). But almost everything else is being snapped up.

Brett Ross, owner of Grayghost Tactical, in Culpeper, Virginia, a shop named after a Confederate army unit in the civil war, says his business is booming despite the economic climate. He is unable to replace his more popular lines. "All the hand guns are selling and I can't get more in. I'm wearing a $3,000 hand gun. That's expensive and even they are sold out," he says. "When the guns come in I sell in a day or two what used to sit on the wall for weeks."

There is a consensus on all sides that the run on weapons began with a belief that Obama would tighten the US gun laws. During the election campaign Obama said he supported the constitution's second amendment on the right to bear arms and welcomed a supreme court decision last year that struck down a ban on hand guns in Washington DC. "I will not take your shotgun away. I will not take your rifle away. I won't take your handgun away," he said.

But David Adams, president of the Virginia Shooting Sports Association, an NRA affiliate, says gun owners believe Obama really wants much greater controls on weapons. "When he ran for Congress in 2000 he proposed an increase in the excise tax of 500% on the sale of firearms and ammunition. He has said in the past he is against concealed carrying of hand guns for self defence."

Howley agrees. "Barack Obama's history of voting in Illinois was 100% against gun ownership. If it was up to him he would make all guns disappear."

Among other things, the NRA is funding a website - GunBanObama.com - that describes Obama as the "most anti-gun president in history" and accuses him of plotting to close every gun shop in the country.

The Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, founded in the name of James Brady, Ronald Reagan's press secretary, who was shot in an assassination attempt against the president, accuses the NRA of whipping up a hysteria that has driven up gun sales.

Chad Ramsey, the Brady Campaign's senior associate director, says that the NRA has spent $6.67m campaigning against Obama, a sum more than 30 times what it put in to the election campaign against Al Gore in the 2000 election. He adds: "The gun lobby, particularly the NRA, throughout the election has fomented this paranoia that the Obama administration and the Democrats were going to come and take your guns. I think folks responded to that. We're seeing people who are stockpiling weapons because they believed it. It's very problematic and scary. The gun lobby and the NRA have a real interest in spreading this fear. They get a lot of their funding from gun manufacturers and gun dealers. They're feeding their own coffers by doing this."

The campaign also feeds more extreme views voiced by popular, right-wing, radio stations and TV commentators, saying Obama is plotting a "socialist state" that will strip citizens of many of their other rights.

But that was not why David Medhurst, a middle-aged customer in a grey suit, is looking for guns at the Virginia Arms Co. He says he owns a mix of hand guns for self defence, and assault weapons. "I enjoy shooting. It's a sport. It's a lot of fun when you pull that trigger. It's not illegal and it's not criminal. I grew up with it. I think this president will try to ban semi-automatics. He will find it difficult but it's happened before, so why take a chance? When I own it he won't be able to touch it. But I don't think this president wants to destroy my liberties."

Howley says the political fears have been compounded by the economic crisis. "A lot of our sales are to people who didn't own guns before. Now they're buying because of fear of rising crime. Many of these people wouldn't know an AR from an AK. They just weren't gun people. There are some people you do get a little concerned at the fact they don't seem to understand what you are trying to tell them. We usually tell them to go take a class."

With the surge in gun sales has come a sharp increase in demand for ammunition, on top of the military's call for bullets for Iraq and Afghanistan, that has created a nationwide shortage of the most popular bullets used in semi-automatic pistols and military-style rifles.

Even big department stores, such as Wal-Mart, are complaining that daily shipments of ammunition have all but dried up and that when stock does come in it sells out the same day.

"The largest gun show in Virginia was two weeks after the election," says Howley. "It sold out of ammo on the first day. People were just wheeling it out by the cart load. It's partly fuelled by all these rumours on the internet that there's going to be a $5m tax on a box of ammo. People go nuts saying, 'look what they're going to do'. Before they would buy two or three boxes of ammo, now they buy a whole case and it just compounds the problem."

Gun-shop owners are reluctant to question the thinking driving their profits, but Ross, at Grayghost Tactical, doubts Obama poses a serious threat to gun ownership. "A lot of this is rumours on the internet. I don't think there's the political will in Congress for a ban on semi-automatics, and certainly not for more than that. But people believe what they want to believe."

Deadly month: Over 50 killed in shootings*

A string of shootings in the US in a little over a month has claimed the lives of more than 50 people.

March

10 Samson, Alabama A gunman shoots dead 10 people and then himself in a rampage across the southern Alabama countryside

22 Oakland, California A man pulled over in a routine traffic stop fatally shoots two officers and then kills two more in a gunfight in which the suspect is also killed

29 Santa Clara, California A man shoots and kills his two children and three other relatives, then kills himself at a family housewarming party

29 Carthage, North Carolina A man opens fire in a nursing home and kills seven elderly residents and a nurse

April

3 Binghamton, New York A gunman bursts into an immigrant centre and shoots dead 13 people before killing himself

4 Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania A gunman wearing a bullet-proof vest opens fire on officers responding to a call about a domestic disturbance, killing three

4 Graham, Washington A man whose wife was leaving him fatally shoots his five children in their mobile home and then takes his own life in his car

guardian.co.uk © Guardian News and Media Limited 2009



*Fifty in a month? We only wish.





Cynicism has killed the gun-control debate

Dan Rodricks
April 12, 2009

Americans have been killing each other for a long time - thousands upon thousands of men, women and children lying in the cold, cold ground from decades of homicidal violence, the bulk of it inflicted with guns. There are street killings here, bedroom killings there - single victims scattered across the daily news. (I saw my first victim 33 years ago this month, a woman shot to death by her estranged husband as she walked across a parking lot.) And then there are the mass killings, a squall of them this spring, with 57 dead within the last month or so, in a handful of incidents from California to New York.

I hear hardly anyone, anywhere expressing much more than a shrug about it.

This is what Scott Simon of National Public Radio wrote on Twitter the day a gunman in Binghamton, N.Y., fired 98 shots in less than a minute, killing 13 people at an immigration center: "Story like NY shootings is soft spot of jrnlsm. We can & should cover hell out of it. But in the end, what does it mean? What is there to say?"

I can almost understand Mr. Simon's shrug. After the assassinations of Robert F. Kennedy and the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., and again after the attempted assassination of Ronald Reagan in 1981, many of us believed the country would turn against guns - assault-style weapons and handguns in particular. But all these years later, we now recognize 280 million as the estimated number of firearms among the 300-plus million inhabitants of the United States. What is there to say? That is a mountain of guns, and it's growing.

Gun sales have been rising again since last fall.

Some say it's because President Barack Obama wants to renew the expired federal ban against military-style assault weapons - the gunman who killed three police officers in Pittsburgh last weekend said as much - so people are stocking up.

But there's more to it. There's a pessimism and cynicism about the kind of society we've become and the uncertain future we face, and that was evident before Mr. Obama took office.

People are stressed about the economy and worried that recovery might be a long way off, and that there may be shortages of food and gasoline, or an increase in crime as the jobless become desperate. So they've purchased guns and ammo, just in case the apocalypse comes before Mr. Obama's economic stimulus package takes effect.

Here's another reason why gun sales are on the rise: Americans are convinced that politicians aren't going to do anything about gun violence. Sixty-five members of his own party in the House of Representatives have urged the president not to resurrect the assault weapons ban that expired under George W. Bush. (One bright spot this year for gun control was in Maryland; the General Assembly authorized the confiscation of firearms from suspected domestic abusers.)

Most of us are also convinced that there are too many angry, ill and violent people in our midst, and that they have easy access to guns. Absent leadership that would promulgate greater control of guns, we fear mass killings will continue. So, the thinking goes, maybe it's best to be prepared - have a gun handy, just in case the madman comes to your office or your kid's school.

It's an epidemic of resignation, and it helps the National Rifle Association.

Once upon a time, the gun lobby would hide from the media after a mass killing at a school or in a workplace. But the guns-at-all-costs crowd claims that mass killings prove we need more Americans trained in the use of firearms and adequately armed. If more people were armed, we'd greatly reduce mass killings, the suggestion being that potential killers could be stopped before they cause much carnage.

We have in our midst millions of one-man militias - trusting no one, cynical about life in a changing society, convinced of the likelihood of more dysfunction and gun violence, and convinced, above all, that few in elected office have the guts to do anything about it.


Copyright © 2009, The Baltimore Sun

[Jasonik]

Most of us are also convinced that there are too many angry, ill and violent people in our midst, and that they have easy access to guns. Absent leadership that would promulgate greater control of guns, we fear mass killings will continue. So, the thinking goes, maybe it's best to be prepared - have a gun handy, just in case the madman comes to your office or your kid's school.
It's a tragedy when sensible law abiding people who have been taught to be terrified of guns and gunowners decide to become dangerous and suspicious by training themselves to safely store, maintain, and fire a gun -- espescially if they have children. Then the cycle of safe responsible gun ownership is perpetuated. :eek:

[Ninjahedge]

The more gun owners you have, the more chance even a "trained" individual will kill the neighbors dog, the Neighbor, or a Jehovahs Witness.


All by accident, of course.

[ZippyTheChimp]

Empirical evidence be damned.

[lofter1]

The remark about some folks "clinging to guns and religion" now seems to have been right on spot.

[Ninjahedge]

Even if a person is fat, you still can't say they are.

The uglier the kid, the less you are allowed to say anything.

The more derisively divisive, the less a politican can say it without being criticized by one side or another (unless you are running for office and know "your side" is larger, then to hell with the other side!).

[Jasonik]

Court: 2nd Amendment trumps local gun limits
Described as 'protection against government degenerating into tyranny'

Posted: April 22, 2009
11:50 pm Eastern
By Bob Unruh
© 2009 WorldNetDaily (http://www.worldnetdaily.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=95767)

The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in California has ruled that the 2nd Amendment right to keep and bear arms is "deeply rooted in this nation's history and tradition" and long has been regarded as the "true palladium of liberty," so it therefore must be applied against state and local government weapon restrictions as well as federal gun limits.

The ruling came in a decade-old dispute over a private operation's request to hold a gun show at a county fairground, even though the county prohibited gun possession at its facilities.

The new ruling from the usually liberal 9th Circuit said Alameda County in California was allowed to ban guns at its facilities, but in general the 2nd Amendment provision for Americans to keep and bear arms applies not to just federal gun limits but local rules as well.

"This could be big, folks," wrote Kurt Hofmann at the St. Louis Gun Rights Examiner. (http://www.examiner.com/x-2581-St-Louis-Gun-Rights-Examiner~y2009m4d21-Incorporation-of-Second-Amendment-within-sight)

"In Nordyke v. King … we may very well be seeing the beginning of the end of that very unsatisfactory set of circumstances, wherein state and local governments need not so much as pay lip service to the 2nd Amendment," he continued. "In the 9th Circuit, in fact, that end has indeed arrived.

"This development is very significant, because the 9th is the largest, and thus one of the most important, federal circuit courts. It is also considered the most 'liberal,' and thus perhaps the most resistant to protecting the right to keep and bear arms," he continued.

Hofmann cited a concurring opinion by Judge Ronald M. Gould, who wrote that nothing less than the security of the nation – a defense against both external and internal threats – rests on the provision.

"The right to bear arms is a bulwark against external invasion. We should not be overconfident that oceans on our east and west coasts alone can preserve security," Gould wrote. "We recently saw in the case of the terrorist attack on Mumbai that terrorists may enter a country covertly by ocean routes, landing in small craft and then assembling to wreak havoc. That we have a lawfully armed populace adds a measure of security for all of us and makes it less likely that a band of terrorists could make headway in an attack on any community before more professional forces arrived. Second, the right to bear arms is a protection against the possibility that even our own government could degenerate into tyranny, and though this may seem unlikely, this possibility should be guarded against with individual diligence."

The court opinion this week said, "We therefore conclude that the right to keep and bear arms is 'deeply rooted in this nation's history and tradition.'

"Colonial revolutionaries, the Founders, and a host of commentators and lawmakers living during the first one hundred years of the Republic all insisted on the fundamental nature of the right. It has long been regarded as the 'true palladium of liberty.' Colonists relied on it to assert and to win their independence, and the victorious Union sought to prevent a recalcitrant South from abridging it less than a century later," the court continued.

"The crucial role this deeply rooted right has played in our birth and history compels us to recognize that it is indeed fundamental, that it is necessary to the Anglo-American conception of ordered liberty that we have inherited. We are therefore persuaded that the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment incorporates the Second Amendment and applies it against the states and local governments," the opinion said.

The court previously had ruled exactly the opposite way, but it said the U.S. Supreme Court's Heller decision, which confirmed that the 2nd Amendment right is personal as well as collective, prompted the reversal.

At Poligazette (http://www.poligazette.com/2009/04/21/expanding-the-second-amendment/comment-page-1/), a commentator noted it is a major victory for the pro-gun position.

And another Gun Rights Examiner writer, David Codrea (http://www.examiner.com/x-1417-Gun-Rights-Examiner~y2009m4d20-Ninth-Circuit-incorporates-Second-Amendment), said, "This is big – especially coming from the 9th Circuit, notorious for its hostility to gun rights. Look for an appeal. And then look to see if the Supreme Court agrees to hear it."

Technically the county cannot appeal, since its policy to restrict guns on county property was upheld. But the plaintiffs, Russell and Sallie Nordyke, could appeal on behalf of their gun show operation.

The 2nd Amendment states: "A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed."

"This necessary 'right of the people' existed before the Second Amendment as 'one of the fundamental rights of Englishmen,'" the ruling said. "Heller identified several reasons why the militia was considered 'necessary to the security of a free state.' First, 'it is useful in repelling invasions and suppressing insurrections. Second, it renders large standing armies unnecessary . . . . Third, when the able-bodied men of a nation are trained in arms and organized, they are better able to resist tyranny."

The decision appears to run counter to the general direction sought by the administration of President Obama three months into his tenure. (http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=95733)

He's already advocated for a treaty that would require a federal license for hunters to reload their ammunition, has expressed a desire to ban "assault" weapons, has seen a plan to require handgun owners to submit to mental health evaluations and sparked a rush on ammunition purchases with his history of anti-gun positions.

*****

Is this going to cause murmurs of secession from virulently gun controlling states?

[Ninjahedge]

Let's just eliminate ALL restrictions on guns and ownership and see what happens.

I am SURE that nothing bad will happen from this whatsoever!

[lofter1]

I want my own Nuke. It's my right, eh? Arm Me Now.

Don't even try to start Infringing upon me ...

[Jasonik]

Your local armory probably has one -- or should -- if NY wishes to keep it's "state's rights" from the "liberating" central authority of DC.

[NYatKNIGHT]

Is this going to cause murmurs of secession from virulently gun controlling states?Let them murmur.

[lofter1]

Individual Autonomy + Property Rights + Right to Bear Arms =

Stay Away. Don't Screw With Me. Or Else.

And don't even think about getting near my vehicle.

"Your Honor, I could tell just by looking at him he was gonna take my truck and use it
to destroy our way of life. I was simply protecting our God given right to pursue happiness."

Some people just deserve a killin'

Texas Law For All

[Jasonik]

Preemption isn't part of self defense unless the "clear and present danger" requirement is met.

[Ninjahedge]

What if they were dressed badly?

[lofter1]

Preemption isn't part of self defense unless the "clear and present danger" requirement is met.

You ever been to Texas (http://tlo2.tlc.state.tx.us/statutes/docs/PE/content/htm/pe.002.00.000009.00.htm)?

The simple "The Guy Deserved a Killn'" type of defense (http://books.google.com/books?id=nB8vptNbW38C&pg=PA99&lpg=PA99&dq=texas+deserves+killing+defense+jury&source=bl&ots=a1aMFFp1j_&sig=-Eg0-m_-KyUPOzWIyNScizZuA9Y&hl=en&ei=sJ7wSYvkEKOclAfa4oS7DA&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=2) seems to work (http://blogs.bet.com/news/newsyoushouldknow/texas-man-is-exonerated-in-the-killing-of-two-burglars/) with some folks down that aways.

And maybe up north in Ottawa (http://www.alliancemartialarts.com/deathmatch.htm), too.

[Ninjahedge]

There's an Ottowa in Texas? :confused:

[Jasonik]

Lofter, I was speaking of the Anglo-American common law tradition (from whence the right to keep and bear arms originates).


Withdrawal of the Right to Self-Defense

The right to self-defense runs deep in the Anglo-American tradition. William Blackstone, whose Commentaries on the Laws of England was published 10 years before the American Revolution and was an immediate bestseller on both sides of the Atlantic, identified three “great and primary rights” of individuals: personal security, personal liberty, and private property. He put personal security first. For Blackstone and generations of common lawyers, the right to personal security was not the expectation that government would protect everyone— that was then, and remains today, impracticable. It was the right of the individual to protect himself, with force if necessary:

[I]f the party himself, or any of these his relations, be forcibly attacked in his person or property, it is lawful for him to repel force by force. . . . For the law, in this case, respects the passions of the human mind; and . . . makes it lawful in him to do himself that immediate justice, to which he is prompted by nature. . . . It considers that the future process of law is by no means an adequate remedy for injuries accompanied with force; since it is impossible to say to what wanton lengths of rapine or cruelty outrages of this sort might be carried, unless it were permitted a man immediately to oppose one violence with another.
Self-defense was universally regarded as the primary law of nature, so fundamental that England’s great jurist insisted, “It is not, neither can it be in fact, taken away by the law of society.” On that point Blackstone was wrong, as we have seen.

The practical elimination of the right to self defense was not the work of a day. As we review the steps by which this result was achieved, two basic questions spring to mind: why did the British people permit it to happen, and why did British governments insist upon it? Starting in 1920 British governments reversed centuries of common law with the first serious limits on privately owned firearms. The motive was not crime control but fear of revolution. The statute required anyone wanting to keep a firearm to get a certificate from his local police chief certifying that he was a suitable person to own a weapon and had a good reason to have it. This certificate had to be renewed every three years. Unfortunately, the definition of “good reason” was left to the police, and the Home Office, through guides to police classified until 1989, systematically narrowed it. First, police were instructed that it would be a good reason to have a revolver if a person lived in an isolated house “where protection against thieves and burglars is essential, or has been exposed to definite threats to life on account of his performance of some public duty.” (Note that the only threat to life that was deemed a sufficient reason to own a handgun was one related to “some public duty.”) By 1937 police were to discourage applications to possess any firearm for house or personal protection. In 1964 they were advised that “it should hardly ever be necessary to anyone to possess a firearm for the protection of his house or person” and that “this principle should hold good even in the case of banks and firms who desire to protect valuables or large quantities of money.” Finally, in 1969 the Home Office announced that “it should never be necessary for anyone to possess a firearm for the protection of his house or person.” Since those changes were secret, there was no opportunity for public debate.

Stage two came in 1953 when the government introduced the Prevention of Crime Act that made it illegal to carry in a public place any article “made, adapted, or intended” for an “offensive purpose” without lawful authority or “reasonable excuse.” An item carried for defense was, by definition, an “offensive” weapon. Police were given broad power to stop and search everyone. Individuals found with offensive weapons were guilty until proven innocent. In Parliament the government admitted the act was “drastic” but insisted the public should be discouraged “from going about with offensive weapons in their pockets; it is the duty of society to protect them.” Objections raised during the debate echoed Blackstone and traditional common law practice. One MP reminded government ministers that “there are many places where society cannot get, or cannot get there in time. On those occasions a man has to defend himself and those whom he is escorting. It is not very much consolation that society will come forward a great deal later, pick up the bits, and punish the violent offender.” Lord Saltoun pointed out: “The object of a weapon was to assist weakness to cope with strength and it is this ability that the bill was framed to destroy. I do not think any government has the right, though they may very well have the power, to deprive people for whom they are responsible of the right to defend themselves.” However, he added, “Unless there is not only a right but also a fundamental willingness amongst the people to defend themselves, no police force, however large, can do it.”

Under common law there was an obligation to help someone being attacked. In keeping with their reversal of common law practice, the government began to warn the public not to go to the aid of anyone in distress. It was best to “walk on by” and leave the problem to the professionals. The 1953 act, which the government claimed it needed to protect the public against juvenile delinquents, has been rigorously enforced against law-abiding people. And the scope of the law is so broad that a legal textbook explains, “Any article is capable of being an offensive weapon,” although the authors add, if the article is unlikely to cause an injury, the onus of proving intent to do so would be “very heavy.”

The third stage in the suppression of the right to self-defense came in 1967 when a broad revision of criminal law was passed. Tucked within the complex statute was a section that altered the traditional standards for self-defense. Everything was now to depend on what seemed “reasonable” force after the fact. If the victim of an attack harmed or killed his assailant, he could be charged with assault or murder. And it was never reasonable to defend property with force. According to the Textbook of Criminal Law, the requirement of reasonableness is “now stated in such mitigated terms as to cast doubt on whether it [self-defense] still forms part of the law.” The author adds, “For some reason that is not clear, the courts occasionally seem to regard the scandal of the killing of a robber as of greater moment than the safety of the robber’s victim in respect of his person and property.”

source [pdf] (http://www.cato.org/pubs/policy_report/v26n2/cpr-26n2-1.pdf)

Texas is actually quite true to the common law tradition (though admittedly erring in the wild west direction).

It appears we will be spared what befell the British -- though defining some guns as "assault weapons" presents an ominous parallel.

[lofter1]

Texas (like many western states) has law based in Spanish law, rather than English common law (or a bastardized combination thereof).

As long as there's nothing to keep me from owning my very own nuke.

Wanna spend down some accounts before they vaporize.

[Jasonik]

http://62.15.226.148/tc/2009/03/27/12618562.jpg (http://maxaue.wordpress.com/2008/04/16/manuel-casal-gomez/)

[Kris]

April 25, 2009
OP-ED COLUMNIST
A Culture Soaked in Blood
By BOB HERBERT

Guns.

Philip Markoff, a medical student, supposedly carried his semiautomatic in a hollowed-out volume of “Gray’s Anatomy.” Police believe he used it in a hotel room in Boston last week to murder Julissa Brisman, a 26-year-old woman who had advertised her services as a masseuse on Craigslist.

In Palm Harbor, Fla., a 12-year-old boy named Jacob Larson came across a gun in the family home that, according to police, his parents had forgotten they had. Jacob shot himself in the head and is in a coma, police said. Authorities believe the shooting was accidental.

There is no way to overstate the horror of gun violence in America. Roughly 16,000 to 17,000 Americans are murdered every year, and more than 12,000 of them, on average, are shot to death. This is an insanely violent society, and the worst of that violence is made insanely easy by the widespread availability of guns.

When the music producer Phil Spector decided, for whatever reason, to kill the actress, Lana Clarkson, all he had to do was reach for his gun — one of the 283 million privately owned firearms that are out there. When John Muhammad and his teenage accomplice, Lee Malvo, went on a killing spree that took 10 lives in the Washington area, the absolute least of their worries was how to get a semiautomatic rifle that fit their deadly mission.

We’re confiscating shampoo from carry-on luggage at airports while at the same time handing out high-powered weaponry to criminals and psychotics at gun shows.

There were ceremonies marking the recent 10th anniversary of the shootings at Columbine High School, but very few people remember a mass murder just five months after Columbine, when a man with a semiautomatic handgun opened fire on congregants praying in a Baptist church in Fort Worth. Eight people died, including the gunman, who shot himself.

A little more than a year before the Columbine killings, two boys with high-powered rifles killed a teacher and four little girls at a school in Jonesboro, Ark. That’s not widely remembered either. When something is as pervasive as gun violence in the U.S., which is as common as baseball in the summertime, it’s very hard for individual cases to remain in the public mind.

Homicides are only a part of the story.

While more than 12,000 people are murdered with guns annually, the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence (using the latest available data) tells us that more than 30,000 people are killed over the course of one typical year by guns. That includes 17,000 who commit suicide, nearly 800 who are killed in accidental shootings and more than 300 killed by the police. (In many of the law enforcement shootings, the police officers are reacting to people armed with guns).

And then there are the people who are shot but don’t die. Nearly 70,000 fall into that category in a typical year, including 48,000 who are criminally attacked, 4,200 who survive a suicide attempt, more than 15,000 who are shot accidentally, and more than 1,000 — many with a gun in possession — who are shot by the police.

The medical cost of treating gunshot wounds in the U.S. is estimated to be well more than $2 billion annually. And the Violence Policy Center, a gun control advocacy group, has noted that nonfatal gunshot wounds are the leading cause of uninsured hospital stays.

The toll on children and teenagers is particularly heartbreaking. According to the Brady Campaign, more than 3,000 kids are shot to death in a typical year. More than 1,900 are murdered, more than 800 commit suicide, about 170 are killed accidentally and 20 or so are killed by the police.

Another 17,000 are shot but survive.

I remember writing from Chicago two years ago about the nearly three dozen public school youngsters who were shot to death in a variety of circumstances around the city over the course of just one school year. Arne Duncan, who was then the chief of the Chicago schools and is now the U.S. secretary of education, said to me at the time: “That’s more than a kid every two weeks. Think about that.”

Actually, that’s our problem. We don’t really think about it. If the crime is horrible enough, we’ll go through the motions of public anguish but we never really do anything about it. Americans are as blasé as can be about this relentless slaughter that keeps the culture soaked in blood.

This blasé attitude, this willful refusal to acknowledge the scope of the horror, leaves the gun nuts free to press their crazy case for more and more guns in ever more hands. They’re committed to keeping the killing easy, and we should be committed for not stopping them.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/25/opinion/25herbert.html

[Jasonik]

Obama Positioning For Backdoor Gun Control

by Chuck Baldwin
April 24, 2009 (http://www.chuckbaldwinlive.com/c2009/cbarchive_20090424.html)

On his recent trip to Central America, President Barack Obama did more than cozy up to Marxist dictators; he also signed onto an international treaty that could, in effect, be used as backdoor gun control. It appears that Obama wants to use international treaties to do what congressional legislation is not able to do: further restrict the right of the American people to keep and bear arms.

Obama is using the oft-disproved contention that "90% of the guns recovered in Mexico come from the United States" as the stated basis of his support for the international treaty he is promoting. The treaty is formally known as the Inter-American Convention Against the Illicit Manufacturing of and Trafficking in Firearms, Ammunition, Explosives and Other Related Materials (CIFTA) treaty. The Bill Clinton administration signed the treaty back in 1997, but the U.S. Senate has never ratified the treaty. Obama intends to change that.

To date, 33 nations in the western hemisphere have signed the treaty. The U.S. is one of four nations that have yet to ratify it. According to one senior Obama administration official, passing the treaty is a "high priority" for the President.

If ratified, the treaty would require the United States to adopt "strict licensing requirements, mark firearms when they are made and imported to make them easier to trace, and establish a process for sharing information between national law enforcement agencies investigating [gun] smuggling."

Senator John Kerry, chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee promises to "work for its [the CIFTA treaty's] approval by the Senate."

Should the Senate ratify CIFTA, Americans who reload ammunition would be required to get a license from the government, and factory guns and ammunition would be priced almost out of existence due to governmental requirements to "mark" each one manufactured. Even the simple act of adding an after-market piece of equipment to a firearm, such as a scope or bipod, or reassembling a gun after cleaning it could fall into the category of "illicit manufacturing" of firearms and require government license and oversight.

In addition, CIFTA would authorize the U.S. federal government (and open the door to international entities) to supervise and regulate virtually the entire American firearms industry. Making matters worse is the fact that, as a treaty, this Act does not have to be passed by both houses of Congress, nor is it subject to judicial oversight. All Obama needs to do in order to enact this unconstitutional and egregious form of gun control is convince a Democratic-controlled Senate to pass it.

Obviously, the United Nations, from its very inception, has been one of the world's most ardent gun control proponents. As anyone who has ever driven by the U.N. building in New York City knows, a huge statue of an American-made revolver with its barrel twisted in the shape of a pretzel greets every visitor. The CIFTA treaty is one of the U.N.'s pet projects in order to achieve this long-held ambition.

Of course, Obama is a longtime liberal radical when it comes to the Second Amendment. As a senator, he voted against the Second Amendment at every opportunity. He has never seen a piece of gun control legislation that he did not support. And as I have said before in this column, gun control is high on the list of priorities for the newly elected President Barack Obama.

For Obama to intimate that 90% of the firearms used by Mexican drug cartels come from the United States reveals either a truly dishonest and deceptive mind or a totally misinformed and naïve one. Many studies have thoroughly debunked the 90% myth, including one by William La Jeunesse and Maxim Lott in a recent Fox News report. According to these researchers, the real number is closer to 17%.

According to La Jeunesse and Lott, Mexican drug cartels, which control billions of dollars, obtain the overwhelming majority of their guns from the Black Market, Russian crime syndicates, South America, China, Guatemala, and even from the Mexican army.

In fact, Mexico is a virtual arms bazaar: AK-47s from China; fragmentation grenades from South Korea; shoulder-fired rocket launchers from Spain, Israel and former Soviet bloc dealers; assault weapons from China; and explosives from Korea--just to name a few sources.

In addition, according to Mexican Congressman Robert Badillo, more than 150,000 Mexican soldiers have deserted in just the last six years. The vast majority of them took their weapons with them, including the standard issue M-16 assault rifle made in Belgium.

And please do not forget that corruption within the Mexican government is rampant. Many news sources have covered stories of how drug cartels bribe Mexican officials. An article in the New York Times last year reported, "One of Mexico's most notorious drug cartels made huge cash payments to officials in the Mexican attorney general's office in exchange for confidential information on anti-drug operations . . . the cartel might have had an informant inside the American embassy."

The Mexican drug cartels control a multi-billion dollar enterprise that has more than enough resources to obtain planeloads of weapons from all over the world. For Obama to assert that 90% of the Mexican drug cartels' firearms come from the United States is a bald-faced lie! Again, either Obama is stupid and naïve or he is deliberately lying to the American people in order to "sell" the CIFTA treaty to the U.S. Senate. I think we all know that Mr. Obama is anything but stupid and naïve.

Read more about the CIFTA treaty at

http://gunowners.org/a042109.htm

In addition to the CIFTA treaty, liberal Chicago Democrat Congressman Bobby Rush has introduced H.R. 45 in the House of Representatives. This bill is anything but subtle. It is an in-your-face gun control bill that would make "Mr. Gun Control," the late Senator Howard Metzenbaum, shout Hallelujah.

H.R. 45 would require a federal license for all handguns and semiautomatics, including the ones you already possess. It would require handgun and semi-auto owners to be thumbprinted at a police station and sign a certificate that the gun will not be kept in a place where it could be used for the defense of the gun owner's family.

Read more about H.R. 45 at

http://gunowners.org/hr45ana.htm

In all likelihood, H.R. 45 is probably a long shot at passing both houses of Congress, albeit gun owners should never take any proposed gun control bill for granted. The CIFTA treaty, however, is much more dangerous due to its subtlety and subterfuge, the less cumbersome process of passage, and the fact that it makes U.S. gun owners subject to international gun control laws. [Similar to medical marijuana dispensaries machine vending system being against some UN treaty.] (http://wirednewyork.com/forum/showpost.php?p=214265&postcount=7)*jsnk

All in all, freedom in America is on the Obama White House chopping block. And this much is certain: if the American people do not retain the right to keep and bear arms, every other freedom we hold dear will quickly disappear as well. Moreover, if we do retain the right to keep and bear arms, it will only be because enough of us--and our state and federal legislators--resist the tyrannical gun control machinations of Barack Obama. And that means defeating the CIFTA treaty and H.R. 45.

*If you appreciate this column and want to help me distribute these editorial opinions to an ever-growing audience, donations may now be made by credit card, check, or Money Order. Use this link: http://www.chuckbaldwinlive.com/donate.php

© Chuck Baldwin

[lofter1]

At least the writer of that article starts out by letting us know his biases by claiming, as a jumping off point point, that Obama is cozying up "to Marxist dictators." Would they be better guys to cozy up to if they were "Free Market dicatators"?

Licensing, marking, identifying the trade and movement of fire arms! Wow, it'll be the end of civilization. Only haters of liberty would even discuss such a thing.

Amazing to me that anyone thinks that the government could pull off such a big operation, given their track record. And then there would be the organization necessary to act upon that information.

Perhaps the G-Men's ineptitude is just a ruse to make us think they're idiots. Is it all planned as a rat-trap so they can suddenly jump upon the well-armed populace in the dead of night? What kind of plot would it take to ensnare the dissenters & gun-toting protectors of liberty when the Marxist-cozier's ultimate Control the World plan is hatched?

If people are worried about such an endgame then they should quit buying, selling & trading guns and simply build weapons of their own. Can't abridge the right to put 'em together in the tool shed or back office, can they?

[Alonzo-ny]

Why do you need a gun to defend yourself? Thanks to the laws in the UK the chances of having to defend myself against one is minimal and my baseball bat would work just fine.

[ZippyTheChimp]

At least the writer of that article starts out by letting us know his biases by claiming, as a jumping off point point, that Obama is cozying up "to Marxist dictators."It's Chuck Baldwin, what do you expect? He's been known to cozy up with Alex Jones.

As far as I can figure, there are 3 levels of treasonous behavior by Americans:

Palling around with terrorists.

Cozying up to Marxist dictators.

And the absolute worst,

Snuggling up to totalitarian despots.

[Jasonik]

Sotomayor Ruled That States Do Not Have to Obey Second Amendment

Thursday, May 28, 2009
By Matt Cover
(CNSNews.com) (http://www.cnsnews.com/public/content/article.aspx?RsrcID=48718) – Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor ruled in January 2009 that states do not have to obey the Second Amendment’s commandment that the right to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.

In Maloney v. Cuomo, Sotomayor signed an opinion of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit that said the Second Amendment does not protect individuals from having their right to keep and bear arms restricted by state governments.

The opinion said that the Second Amendment only restricted the federal government from infringing on an individual's right to keep and bear arms. As justification for this position, the opinion cited the 1886 Supreme Court case of Presser v. Illinois.

“It is settled law, however, that the Second Amendment applies only to limitations the federal government seeks to impose on this right,” said the opinion. Quoting Presser, the court said, “it is a limitation only upon the power of Congress and the national government, and not upon that of the state.”

The Maloney v. Cuomo case involved James Maloney, who had been arrested for possessing a pair of nunchuks. New York law prohibits the possession of nunchuks, even though they are often used in martial arts training and demonstrations.

The meaning of the Second Amendment has rarely been addressed by the Supreme Court. But in the 2008 case of Heller v. District of Columbia, the high court said that the right to keep and bear arms was a natural right of all Americans and that the Second Amendment guaranteed that right to everyone.

The Second Amendment, the Supreme Court ruled, “guarantee(s) the right of the individual to possess and carry weapons in case of confrontation. The very text of the Second Amendment implicitly recognizes the pre-existence of the right and declares only that it ‘shall not be infringed.’”

“There seems to us no doubt,” the Supreme Court said, “that the Second Amendment conferred an individual right to keep and bear arms.”

Sotomayor, however, said that even though the Heller decision held that the right to keep and bear arms was a natural right--and therefore could not be justly denied to a law-abiding citizen by any government, federal, state or local--the Second Circuit was still bound by the 1886 case, because Heller only dealt indirectly with the issue before her court.

“And to the extent that Heller might be read to question the continuing validity of this principle, we must follow Presser because where, as here, a Supreme Court precedent has direct application in a case, yet appears to rest on reasons rejected in some other line of decisions, the Court of Appeals should follow the case which [it] directly controls.”

In its 2008 case, the Supreme Court’s took a different view of its own 1886 case, saying that Presser had no bearing on anything beyond a state’s ability to outlaw private militia groups.

“Presser said nothing about the Second Amendment’s meaning or scope, beyond the fact that it does not prevent the prohibition of private paramilitary organizations,” the court ruled. “This does not refute the individual-rights interpretation of the Amendment.”

The Second Amendment is the only part of the Bill of Rights that the Supreme Court has not specifically extended to the states through a process known as incorporation, which involves interpreting the Fourteenth Amendment to read that no state can deprive its citizens of federally guaranteed rights.

The Fourteenth Amendment reads, in part: “No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States … nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.”

Sotomayor’s decision rejected the Fourteenth Amendment’s incorporation doctrine as far as Second Amendment was concerned, saying any legislation that could provide a “conceivable” reason would be upheld by her court.

“We will uphold legislation if we can identify some reasonably conceived state of facts that could provide a rational basis for the legislative action. Legislative acts that do not interfere with fundamental rights … carry with them a strong presumption of constitutionality,” the appeals court concluded. “The Fourteenth Amendment,” she wrote, “provides no relief.”

Sotomayor’s ruling ran to the left of even the reliably liberal San Francisco-based U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, which ruled in the April 2009 case Nordyke v. King that the Second Amendment did, in fact, apply to the states via the Fourteenth Amendment, heavily citing the Supreme Court in Heller.

“We therefore conclude that the right to keep and bear arms is deeply rooted in this Nation’s history and tradition,” said the Ninth Circuit court of Appeals. “We are therefore persuaded that the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment incorporates the Second Amendment and applies it against the states and local governments.”

Gun Week Senior Editor Dave Workman told CNSNews.com that the Nordyke and Maloney decisions are at odds and the Supreme Court, possibly with a Justice Sotomayor, may soon sort them out.

“Whenever you have a conflict like this, you’re likely to have it end up before the Supreme Court so they can decide the issue. If the Second Amendment is incorporated into the states, it’s going to jeopardize thousands of local gun laws, and the people who supported those gun laws are just freaked about that.”

*****

Will there eventually be a situation like Little Rock to guarantee Second Amendment rights for residents of recalcitrant states?

http://photos.upi.com/topics-Orval-Faubus/31827bb496c1605b0f85a3c226c5d75d/Orval-Faubus_1.jpg

[lofter1]

Dammit, y'all stop stomping on my Constitutionally protected right to bear a personal nuke NOW. I want one and am entitled to it.

ridunkulous :cool:

Should citizens be allowed to carry and hold any type of "arms" as they personally see fit?

Why not allow a glass jar of acid on the subway? Could be construed as "arms."

Or a vial of anthrax? Same.

This really becomes "Don't Tread on Me" carried to absurd levels.

[Jasonik]

6. Straw Man (http://aboycalledmars.blogspot.com/2007/11/fallacies-of-relevance.html)
It is committed when an arguer distorts an opponents argument for the purpose of more easily attacking it. Twisting someones position or argument so that it sounds ridiculous.

Example:
Mr. Goldberg has argued against the prayer in public schools. Obviously he advocates atheism. But atheism is what they use to have Russia. Atheism leads to the suppression of all religions and the replacement of God by an omnipotent state. Is that what we want for this country? I hardly think so. Clearly My. Goldberg's argument is nonsense.

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_Gz5Pk45VApc/Rztvt5eYdUI/AAAAAAAAAAk/wOkdT_2ObPw/s320/straw-man.jpg

[lofter1]

OK.

Then what 'arms" would you view as beyond the pale and thereby not protected under the 2nd Amenedment?

Or is it simply a free for all / anything goes / if you can get 'em you can bear 'em situation?

[Jasonik]

Why is it incumbent on me to argue for limits?

Isn't it your job to parse "shall not be infringed" or argue against the incorporation doctrine?

How are gun control arguments logically any different from prohibiting unregistered male erections on the premise that rapes are committed with them, STDs are transmitted by them, and they directly lead to teen pregnancies, abortions and other "societal ills" such as adultery, prostitution and pornography?

[195Broadway]

Can one still purchase a proper m-80 in Chinatown these days?
They recently outlawed bottle rockets here in Tx. BOTTLE ROCKETS
What's next? cap pistols?
It's nice to know my little liberties are being protected.

[scumonkey]

not legally

[ZippyTheChimp]

Totally Off Topic (http://www.thelondonpaper.com/thelondonpaper/weird/odd-news/a-russian-woman-used-fireworks-to-blow-up-her-lovers-penis)

[scumonkey]

ouch!

[lofter1]

Why is it incumbent on me to argue for limits?

Isn't it your job to parse "shall not be infringed" or argue against the incorporation doctrine?

So you have no problem whatsoever with me or anyone else who happens to be a US citizen having a personal nuke or whatever "arms" one might choose to keep in their possession?

[Jasonik]

What dystopian science fiction novel are you living in? Nukes won't ever be readily available, nor are they particularly useful for individuals.

"Militia use" being the operative Second Amendment test, ICBMs are beyond the pale. Tanks, aircraft, and anti-aircraft missiles etc. are a necessary component of any militia, and I'm sure the local State Guard (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/State_Defense_Forces) post would gladly take donations (and put up a plaque in your honor). A member of the unorganized militia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Militia_(United_States)#The_reserve_militia.2Funor ganized_militia) hasn't much lawful use for such expensive and maintenance demanding devices, though possession itself doesn't denote hostile intent.

The Second Amendment is an individual right to possess and control the employment of defensive/deterrent force. If the Constitution is so "living and breathing" why am I stuck with a blackpowder long rifle instead of an AA12 (http://www.gizmag.com/aa-12-combat-shotgun-frag-12-automatic/11393/)?

[NYatKNIGHT]

All you can have is a blackpowder long rifle? Now who's exaggerating?

A law not allowing someone to own numchuks doesn't mean they can't bear other arms.

[Ninjahedge]

Jason, if you want a more realistic weapon that is currently outlawed for possible terroristic use, what about the LAW?

Do you think that individuals should be allowed to purchase things like mortars, LAWs and other military ewuipment that would enable them to serve in a local militia during times of strife?

The 2nd amendment is obsolete in that its original intent was to prevent the dominance of the federal agency over the individual states and communities therein. They wanted to make sure they did not have any kind of military law forcing the will of the nation on the wills of the people.

Odd enough, that is just what they do these days and the same people that object to the 2nd amendment being abolished (even though it is truly not being represented in its original intent anymore) are the same that favor these military interventions on US soil.

The whole thing stinks and should be re-tooled to match todays system of government and todays environment.

[Jasonik]

I'm not exaggerating (http://www.goal.org/PDF/primitive.pdf).

The only arms that I am 'permitted' to "keep and bear" uninfringed* are muzzle loading rifles and shotguns (muskets).

*But outlawing carrying them loaded in public doesn't provide for self defense.

[lofter1]

What dystopian science fiction novel are you living in? Nukes won't ever be readily available, nor are they particularly useful for individuals.

I'm not the one playing in a theoretical world. I'm talking about using any danged weapon I so choose in order to portect my Freedom & Liberty from those who would trample upon me.

And who is to judge if the nuke I seek is particularly useful or not? If it's not useful then that's all the more reason not to deny me possession of same.

Why should a nuke / anthrax / ICBM (or a really big + heavy bag of ace marijuana to clobber my foe with) not be included in the "arms" which I supposedly have an unlimited right to bear?

Please define in full: ARMS

[Jasonik]

Please define in full: ARMS

(A) any firearm, rifle or shotgun manufactured in or prior to the year 1899; (B) any replica of any firearm, rifle or shotgun described in clause (A) if such replica: (i) is not designed or redesigned for using rimfire or conventional centerfire fixed ammunition; or (ii) uses rimfire or conventional centerfire fixed ammunition which is no longer manufactured in the United States and which is not readily available in the ordinary channels of commercial trade;
These are the arms to which I have rights that are not infringed. If things other than the above were arms, it follows from the clear language of the Constitution I'd have uninfringed rights to them. This is not the case, therefore the above -- and only the above -- are arms.

[ablarc]

^ ?

[lofter1]

Source?

[Jasonik]

M.G.L - Chapter 140, Section 121 (http://www.mass.gov/legis/laws/mgl/140-121.htm)

Derived from:

The Gun Control Act of 1968, Public Law 90-618

Chapter 44 Firearms

§ 921. Definitions

(3) The term "firearm" ... does not include an antique firearm.
(16) The term "antique firearm" means --

(A) any firearm (including any firearm with a matchlock, flintlock, percussion cap, or similar type of ignition system) manufactured in or before 1898; and
(B) any replica of any firearm described in subparagraph (A) if such replica --

(i) is not designed or redesigned for using rimfire or conventional centerfire fixed ammunition, or
(ii) uses rimfire or conventional centerfire fixed ammunition which is no longer manufactured in the United States and which is not readily available in the ordinary channels of commercial trade.

[lofter1]

Where in the 2nd Amendment does it state "firearms" :confused:

That Nixon / Agnew "Law & Order" era statute diminishes the original language of the Bill of Rights.

These legal types are playing word games and denying me the right laid down by the Founding Fathers to have any and all "arms" as this committed citizen sees fit to bear.

[Jasonik]

What are you bellyaching about?

If it's perfectly reasonable to demand that people pay for and obtain a license and permit, and submit to fingerprinting and background checks, and choose from a list of government approved choices and be restricted by usage limitations when engaging in the practice of religion or speech or publishing -- why is it so onerous when the same applies to firearms?

[195Broadway]

Totally Off Topic (http://www.thelondonpaper.com/thelondonpaper/weird/odd-news/a-russian-woman-used-fireworks-to-blow-up-her-lovers-penis)
Hell hath no fury.....
Info duly noted and uploaded into my personal threat detection radar.

[lofter1]

What are you bellyaching about?

... why is it so onerous when the same applies to firearms?


"Cuz the blessed Constitution makes no mention of your beloved and beleaguered "firearms."

Our Forefathers where not so limited in scope or thought.

The sacred term is the far more general "Arms" -- With no infringement. No limitations. Or clarity of definition.

The only ones who should be controlled are the folks who mis-use them.

History shows that the righteous always make the correct choice and good men need no such senseless boundaries put upon them.

[Alonzo-ny]

Forgive my ignorance but this right to bear arms was to allow the people to over-throw a tyrannical government, right? So the people need to have the same weapons as the government. Including nukes, aircraft carriers, F-18s, etc.

[195Broadway]

If that were so, wouldn't the Russians still be in Afghanistan?

[Jasonik]

When Guns Are Outlawed...Only Government Will Have Guns

by John Bowman | June 1, 2009 (http://www.lewrockwell.com/orig10/bowman3.html)

Author R.J. Rummel has produced a significant body of work including numerous essays and several books that deal with the subject of democide, a term he coined to describe a widely-accepted legal definition of murder that applies when perpetrated by government upon its own people. After examining about 10,000 sources over many years, Rummel estimates that governments of the world have murdered (i.e., committed democide on) approximately 262 million people in the 20th century alone. That shocking figure is no joke and, as Rummel points out, is about 7 times higher than the combat death toll from all wars fought over the same period combined. 20th Century wars were the worst in man's history and killed almost twice as many people as "ordinary" civilian criminal murders across the globe over the same one-hundred-year span. Yet, even though "the 20th century is noted for its absolute and bloody wars," war was not the 20th Century's biggest killer. Democide was. Or rather government was. And the comparison was not even close.

It should come as no surprise that the hallmark of democide according to Rummel is authoritarian government. It should also be no surprise that virtually every monstrous genocide or democide event in modern history was conducted by collectivist or socialist-style dictatorships, with the lion's share of atrocity garnered by the Marxist variety – those great saints who do everything "for the good of the people" and who without any sense or shame hold offices and/or comprise significant political parties in most "civilized" nations today. In fact, the results of various flavors of socialism are what prompted other historians to invent the word "genocide" in the first place.

To put the 262 million murders in more conceptual terms, consider that if one takes a random walk through the entire set of murdered men, women, and children, more than 9 out of 10 murders across all times and all nations, were perpetrated, not by civilian criminals, but by criminal thugs operating under the auspice or directive of government to murder its own people, generally those who oppose the government or who oppose the politically well-connected or who own what the government covets for itself. If deaths due to war – what many currently believe is the greatest threat to life and limb – are included in the set, then still over 4 out of 5 violent deaths (83%) are the result of murder by the host government with the remaining 17% comprised by 11% war casualties and 6% civilian murder*1. Yet, while totalitarianism, foreign invasion, and civilian crime – the primary historic threats to everyone's safety – all arise for a vast array of reasons, there is, fortunately, at least one thing that is proven to prevent or mitigate all of these to a very high degree: widespread gun ownership by the civilian population.

Therefore, if one cares about one's own personal safety or that for one's children, family, and neighbors, then there is no substitute for a well-armed society. This is not rocket surgery. A well-armed society is a civil society. A well-armed society is also a serious deterrent to foreign invaders and modern technology such as satellites, planes, missiles, and tanks has not changed that. And finally, most importantly, a well-armed society has never yet, not once, been the helpless victim of democide to any significant degree, and it takes no great imaginative leap to understand why. When guns are outlawed, only government will have them, and look at their sorry record. The figure would be supremely monstrous and unacceptable if it were a mere 1 out of 100, yet more than 9 out of 10 murders committed on planet Earth were orchestrated by the victim's own government. In fact, major events of democide unilaterally occur to people who are disarmed, usually (ludicrously) within months of disarmament of the population, which of course was promoted and ordered for their own good and safety, and often made possible by government-maintained registration or licensing records.

Today, we are continually bombarded with propaganda relating to the dangers of gun ownership. This propaganda shamelessly claims stiffer and stiffer gun control is necessary to "protect the children" or some other nonsense about personal safety. At the same time, depending on age range, children are more likely to die from drowning in their own toilet or bathtub, from falling off a ladder or heights, or from bee stings than they are from intentional or accidental death from a gun wound. And lest we forget, these same gun control advocates think nothing of putting their children in cars, which kills tens of thousands every year. Why? Because it is clear the great utility of vehicles justify the small yet deadly risks. Yet, wide proliferation of guns (with zero controls) also has great utility, namely prevention of the worst crimes in history as well as the run-o-the-mill variety. Furthermore, guns have a lower risk factor to law abiders than do cars, so where is all the clamoring from the "I-want-my-children-to-be-safe" crowd for bans on automobiles? There ain't any because this brand of stupidity is emotional, not rational.

On the other hand, democide appears to expressly target children. Children whose parents if not unarmed would have long ago overthrown the tyrants who impoverish them to retain or regain their own property and means of feeding and rearing their children. That is why gun control advocates horrify me, especially those who are well-meaning and passionate about the issue. They genuinely believe removing guns from law abiders will solve social ills, while ignoring the consequences. To remove guns from the hands of law abiders is the tyrant's dream, the criminal's dream, the warmonger's dream. And it is the law abider's nightmare. To remove guns from the hands of law abiders unleashes every horror conceivable, and some that are inconceivable. And for what? To prevent some perceived threat that, even if realistic, is 5 or 6 orders of magnitude less likely to cause harm than the nightmare with a long and distinguished pedigree that may ensue if they get their wish?

It is as though gun control advocates seriously believe it is desirable to rip up the parachute, use the material to sew a windbreaker, then proudly proclaim they've prevented the skydiver from catching a cold on his trip down. It would be comical if not so deadly serious. To be fair, yes, many die from gun wounds. Yes, that is tragic and senseless. Without a doubt, guns can be quite dangerous, but the same can be said of cars. Of electricity. And even of love, a major player in crimes of passion and suicide, the latter of which takes more US lives every year than all reported gun violence and is in fact responsible for over 70% (higher in many other countries) of what is included in the gun-related death figures – a component that heavily skews these figures, yet is rarely considered by gun control advocates as if these suicides would not have occurred but for the availability of guns. Are there not consequences to banning any of these things: cars, electricity, love? Or of banning guns? Consequences that apparently go well beyond the narrow horizons and lack of historical knowledge of the typical ban advocate.

On the lighter side, one beauty of widespread gun ownership is that members of the adamant "I'll-never-touch-the-things" crowd do not have to own one. They need only pray that their neighbors do, because those law abiding, gun-toting neighbors will protect them from the true heinous threats to their existence and livelihood, even if they are unwilling or unable to do so themselves or even oblivious to the dangers. And consider further, that the protection afforded by widespread gun ownership by law abiders can extend across national borders as well as neighborhoods. For example, while Canada does have a relatively significant number of guns, many Canadian gun enthusiasts have noted that much of their personal safety can be attributed to the fact that the populace of their closest neighbor maintains so many firearms.

As a final, more mundane thought, basically everyone knows or has heard that there is a correlation between gun control and crime. In fact, areas in the US with virtual gun bans, like DC, have not only the highest crime rates, but also a disproportionately higher amount of violent crime, whereas areas with few gun regulations tend to show much lower crime overall, with most of it of a non-violent nature such as property crime like theft, instead of violent crime like assault, rape, or murder. Gun advocates tout these statistics, while gun-grabbers are completely mystified and so go in search of some rationale to explain it away, or they focus on other issues, usually something like the safety of children.

I earnestly desire that everyone in the world becomes or remains a staunch advocate of widespread, unregulated gun ownership. There are few, if any, paradigms one could adopt to better ensure personal safety and peaceful pursuits. Such a paradigm would mitigate crime, reduce warfare, and, by far the most important, provide the ultimate backstop – when unalienable rights and Constitutions fail – against the most heinous danger all inhabitants of the world face: democide. It is neither a joke nor the subversive tripe you have come to expect from the phrase to say, support gun ownership! If not for yourself, do it for the children.

Note

Please note, I understand this is a contentious subject, and mere statistics or numbers can never sum up these atrocities. Moreover, the figures I use are 35 million casualties of war in the 20th century and 20 million (probably too high) 20th century civilian-perpetrated murders worldwide, which appear to be widely accepted figures. Again, these are estimates, believed to be accurate, so please do not write me to suggest these figures are either too liberal or too conservative or otherwise incorrect unless any are off by one or two orders of magnitude or more because unless that is the case, it does not change in any way the thesis of this note – that widespread gun ownership by a civilian population will significantly improve the safety of said civilian population from every colossal threat, especially the most serious of all: democide.

John Bowman [send him mail (johnwbowman@gmail.com)] lives in Washington State.

Copyright © 2009 by LewRockwell.com. Permission to reprint in whole or in part is gladly granted, provided full credit is given.

[Alonzo-ny]

As a final, more mundane thought, basically everyone knows or has heard that there is a correlation between gun control and crime. In fact, areas in the US with virtual gun bans, like DC, have not only the highest crime rates, but also a disproportionately higher amount of violent crime, whereas areas with few gun regulations tend to show much lower crime overall, with most of it of a non-violent nature such as property crime like theft, instead of violent crime like assault, rape, or murder. Gun advocates tout these statistics, while gun-grabbers are completely mystified and so go in search of some rationale to explain it away, or they focus on other issues, usually something like the safety of children.



Look outside the US. The US has a major problem with guns. There is no way to justify otherwise.

[Ninjahedge]

The problem is that the system we now have in place does not jive with the original intent of the 2nd.

Either we GREATLY scale back out international armed forces and loosen the restriction on firearms (enabling a possible armed resistance to any federally imposed, and locally objected mandates).

The right to bear arms was meant, as Alanzo was saying, to resist any kind of governmental system that imposed unfair taxation and legislation apon us without commesurate representation.

And now, with the advent of modern technology that allows the word to be spread across the globe in seconds, and the sword to follow in a matter of hours or days (depending on which one), it is difficult to bring our country back to its naiscent colonial form and somehow think that that would work in the new global political landscape.

I am not saying what is written in the BOR is wrong, just that it helps to have the right owners manual for the car you are driving.

[Alonzo-ny]

Privately owned guns aren't for people to proactively use against government -- but are to dissuade government from using theirs against the people.

Aren't any arms that the public can buy futile considering the power of the military?

[Jasonik]

4GW, the prospect of which is what an armed citizenry keeps its government leery, doesn't rely on firepower superiority.

Though the US military and Homeland police state apparat are today specifically groomed to wage such a war under the auspices of guarding against rogue extremists from without or within, government fighting forces aren't monolithic, nor are they particularly keen to wage an oppressive offensive against their fellow citizens that would necessitate a 4G resistance.

But let's be clear, the outlawing and confiscating of guns on the part of the government would correctly be seen as a righteous reason to wage such a hostile resistance, so politically and logistically inconvenient for an establishment ostensibly free and democratic.



"That rifle on the wall of the labourer's cottage or working class flat is the symbol of democracy. It is our job to see that it stays there." ~ George Orwell


But why focus all our attention on the antagonism between the citizen and the state when a more practical dichotomy to consider is of the criminal and victim. (A dichotomy by the way, which the state seeks to reframe as a "war" against the laws of the state by an "enemy," rather than a trespass against one individual by another -- i.e., malum prohibitum is construed superior to malum in se.)



"False is the idea of utility that sacrifices a thousand real advantages for one imaginary or trifling inconvenience; that would take fire from men because it burns, and water because one may drown in it; that has no remedy for evils except destruction. The laws that forbid the carrying of arms are laws of such a nature. They disarm only those who are neither inclined nor determined to commit crimes." ~ Cesare Beccaria paraphrased (http://www.constitution.org/cb/crim_pun40.htm) by Thomas Jefferson in his Commonplace Book


The full passage linked above is worth considering.



"Sometimes the first duty of intelligent men is the restatement of the obvious." ~ George Orwell

[Alonzo-ny]

I think Ive said it before but to protect and defend your home why do you need a gun? Do you need to kill a criminal outright to defend your home?

In the UK where there is effective gun control a bat or similar would be sufficient to protect yourself resulting in no loss of life.

[195Broadway]

......unless you are a 120 lb woman trying to fend off the 250lb rapist.

[Alonzo-ny]

So she has to blow his head off?

[londonlawyer]

American gun laws should be a source of embarrasment to this f..ked up country. Americans absurdly look down on Mexicans as inferior, but their gun control laws are so strict that Mexican drug cartels buy their weapons in the US. (On another topic, our "inferior" neighbors to the south also don't have capital punishment like our barbarous "society" does.)

America has the highest rate of incarceration of any developed nation and is among the first-world's most violent societies.

So many people are proud to be American. I am embarrassed.

[Ninjahedge]

......unless you are a 120 lb woman trying to fend off the 250lb rapist.

There are other ways.

You are also saying that this rapist is somehow allowed to be in the neighborhood.

What most people do not admit to is that, at least in todays day and age, most RANDOM violent crime is no longer occuring. It is usually someone you know, or are familiar with.

There are much MUCH feer cases of a guy bashing in a door and raping a woman, than some "friend" forcing themselves on a woman.

So all of these possible "what if"s are presented as if a gun was the only solution to the problem and not having one would mean that it definitely WOULD happen to you.

Fearmongering can get a person to do many things and support many others. What it rarely does is evoke a rational response and reaction.

[ZippyTheChimp]

As a final, more mundane thought, basically everyone knows or has heard that there is a correlation between gun control and crime. In fact, areas in the US with virtual gun bans, like DC, have not only the highest crime rates, but also a disproportionately higher amount of violent crime, whereas areas with few gun regulations tend to show much lower crime overall, with most of it of a non-violent nature such as property crime like theft, instead of violent crime like assault, rape, or murder. Gun advocates tout these statistics, while gun-grabbers are completely mystified and so go in search of some rationale to explain it away, or they focus on other issues, usually something like the safety of children.First of all, any competent statistician would know that you can't draw a conclusion between areas of gun-control and no gun-control because the data is corrupt. Since there are no effective state boundaries, you would have to factor in where and how the firearm was obtained.

What happens when an author tries to make an opinion appear to be a report.

Anyway....

The percentage for type of weapon used in homicides is remarkably similar in various areas of the country.
http://www.fbi.gov/ucr/cius2007/offenses/expanded_information/data/shrtable_06.html

68% of all homicides in the US involve a firearm.
http://www.fbi.gov/ucr/cius2007/offenses/expanded_information/data/shrtable_07.html
The homicide rate in the US is 5.6 per 100,000, at least three times higher than most industrialized countries, but the rates are similar for non-firearm homicides.

State homicide rates:
NY 4.2
NJ 4.4
CN 3.0
MA 2.9
NV 7.5
SC 8.0
NM 8.2
TX 5.9
CA 6.2
MT 1.5
ND 1.9
FL 6.6
IL 5.9

89.9% of all homicides are committed within statistical metro areas. This would somewhat explain very low rates in sparsely populated places such at Montana.

Consistent within the states is the percentage of homicide by firearm (nationally 68%).
http://www.fbi.gov/ucr/cius2007/data/table_20.html

State ranking for violent crime rate
1. SC
http://www.census.gov/statab/ranks/rank21.html#footnote2

[ZippyTheChimp]

......unless you are a 120 lb woman trying to fend off the 250lb rapist.You could use that bare-bones logic to justify anything.

[Jasonik]

68% of all homicides in the US involve a firearm.

89.9% of all homicides are committed within statistical metro areas.

So people who live in or near cities are more likely to be gun toting murderers than their non-metro counterparts.

Doesn't this say more about cities than it does guns?

Let's outlaw cities.

[ZippyTheChimp]

So people who live in or near cities are more likely to be gun toting murderers than their non-metro counterparts.More accurately, they are more likely to be murderers.


Doesn't this say more about cities than it does guns?Of course. Cities are more stressful; there's more interaction among people; more opportunity for a situation to escalate.


Let's outlaw cities.Now, we both know that's faulty logic.

[Jasonik]

There's no constitutional amendment protecting city living.

I say outlaw it.

And ration gasoline (http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2009-02-04-traffic-deaths_N.htm). There's no constitutional protection for unlimited gasoline usage either.

Why not protect lives by banning things not explicitly protected from government intrusion?

Why is there such a fetish for begging the government to break the laws that are meant to bind it?

[ZippyTheChimp]

City living serves a useful purpose.


Why is there such a fetish for begging the government to break the laws that are meant to bind it?Upholding the Constitution is the only rational argument left propping up gun ownership. In a perverse viewpoint, we could be proud of dragging around the 2nd Amendment anchor in principle, despite the societal havoc. It'll never get repealed; we're stuck with it.

It wouldn't be so bad if the majority of those who subscribe to upholding the 2nd Amendment felt the same about the rest of the Constitution.

[Ninjahedge]

It wouldn't be so bad if the majority of those who subscribe to upholding the 2nd Amendment felt the same about the rest of the Constitution.

THAT has to be the best sticking point.

I had not even thought of that (yet) but you are 100% correct. It is the same argument for people like pro-lifers in favor of not only killing doctors and other medical professionals for abortions, but the death penalty as well.

People will only defend what they believe in, but use whatever means there is to do so. If the Bill of Rights is held as reason for keeping such a rule, why do they oppose others? Why did they repeal prohibition? Are they saying that the bill has its flaws?

It can't! After all, if it was flawed, you could argue that some of its terms would not apply in the present day context.




Me, personally, I am against having firearms so readily available. The thing that bothers me MOST about the arguments for them are that they seem to have no direct bearingon their actual function.

Defending things like M16s or AK's or other advanced MAN KILLING weapons on things like "defense" and "hunting" are rediculous. Bringing up the classic 120 pound helpless woman is another (don't we have a Batman?). I LIKE discussing thee topics, but when the arguments in support rely on things that do not fit, it drives me crazy. Gravity does not work because of mass-envy. Guns, the ones that are bought en-masse, have little or no bearing on:

Self defense
Possible Civil Resistance
Hunting
"Freedom"

and even

The Bill of Rights.

The bill of rights was written to give the colonies a way to be able to stand up against any governmental power they objected to, akin to what they did during the revolutionary war, and resist them.

That works fine when you have muskets vs muskets.

Not a handgun versus an Abrahms.


And although I agree that there would be a lot less willingness to turn your gun against a "fellow American", the mere fact that people have been convinced to do so OUT of the military convinces me that demonizing a particular sect or region in the minds of a platoon that is not from that area would be easier than you think.

You think you could not get a bunch of guys from Alabama in tanks to come in and suppress a "protest for freedom" in the Bronx?



I think the key here to preserving the original intent of the 2nd is to make the firearm yours and yours alone. Waiting 3 days, 2 weeks, or even 6 months is nothing. What, you saw a deer in your back yard and need to shoot it with a 357 magnum or 9mm glock RIGHT THIS MINUTE!!!!!!?

As for the criminal aspect, that is a difficult thing to handle...

[Jasonik]

Zippy, is this "societal havoc" of which you speak greater than that caused by speeding drivers? Surely we could reduce societal havoc by installing speed governors in all automobiles that remotely trigger to limit vehicle speed to the safest level. Cameras could even be placed inside vehicles to monitor if a driver's eyes were off the road for more than a few seconds and immediately issue a fine deducted electronically from a driver's bank account. Maybe it's easier if driving by private individuals is outlawed altogether and a government driving force is trained and deployed to operate the vehicles which would naturally be government owned -- this way car services become a right of all citizens regardless of income.

Why single out guns? Surely there's havoc out there that isn't being legislated against.


It wouldn't be so bad if the majority of those who subscribe to upholding the 2nd Amendment felt the same about the rest of the Constitution.

So instead of goading them to respect the rest of the constitution, you'd rather throw the whole thing out as convenience dictates?

You haven't proven that civilian guns serve no "useful purpose."

I maintain that personal ownership is quite a useful deterrent -- if only symbolic in tactical strength -- to the natural tendency of government toward authoritarian rule.

If people can't be trusted with guns then neither should government -- since after all -- government is just people like us right? Either that, or government people with guns are better and more perfect that mere civilians who must be protected from themselves by infallible unchecked government monopolized firepower.

If one favors the latter conclusion, please reconsider the democide (http://wirednewyork.com/forum/showthread.php?p=285992#post285992) outlined previously.

[ZippyTheChimp]

Zippy, is this "societal havoc" of which you speak greater than that caused by speeding drivers?Yes.


Why single out guns? Surely there's havoc out there that isn't being legislated against.I asked somewhere else, "Do I have to oppose everything before I can oppose anything?"


So instead of goading them to respect the rest of the constitution, you'd rather throw the whole thing out as convenience dictates?Been goading them for decades.

I don't know where I indicated that I want to throw the whole thing out. In fact, I acknowledged the legitimacy of the 2nd Amendment, and the difficulty of amending. The Constitution is occasionally amended. Once the populace thought that the 18th was reasonable. Years later, we came to our senses and ratified the 21st.


You haven't proven that civilian guns serve no "useful purpose."

I maintain that personal ownership is quite a useful deterrent -- if only symbolic in tactical strength -- to the natural tendency of government toward authoritarian rule."if only symbolic in tactical strength."


If one favors the latter conclusion, please reconsider the democide (http://wirednewyork.com/forum/showthread.php?p=285992#post285992) outlined previously.Another flawed argument by the author. He introduces valid statistics on democide into a scenario where the alternate universe is one where all countries are disarmed.

This is pie-in-the-sky nonsense.

[Ninjahedge]

I hope it's blackberry pie.

I like blackberries!

[Jasonik]

Zippy, what's your proposed constitutional amendment?


"The security of a free State, so not to be inconvenienced by havoc, is wholly entrusted to the President - so help us God."
Or maybe:

"The privilege of persons to defend their life, family, property, community, and country from criminal and/or tyrannical predation, the usefulness for which being questionable, conditional gun possession is absolutely revocable."
Possibly:

"The right of armed self defense, emanating solely from the democratic process and legitimately exercised in service of an individual by and through government, private possession of arms is ipso facto anti-democratic, anti-government, anti-freedom behavior, and as such, a capital crime against the United States of America and her sacred ideals."

Have something better?

[lofter1]

Would a well armed militia be less likely to shoot at protesting citizens armed with guns or at unarmed citizens acting in protest?

[ZippyTheChimp]

"The security of a free State, so not to be inconvenienced by havoc, is wholly entrusted to the President - so help us God."Non sequitur. I don't accept the premise that the 2nd Amendment secures the security of a Free State.


"The privilege of persons to defend their life, family, property, community, and country from criminal and/or tyrannical predation, the usefulness for which being questionable, conditional gun possession is absolutely revocable."I think it causes more criminal predation than it protects against.


"The right of armed self defense, emanating solely from the democratic process and legitimately exercised in service of an individual by and through government, private possession of arms is ipso facto anti-democratic, anti-government, anti-freedom behavior, and as such, a capital crime against the United States of America and her sacred ideals."You seem to agree that it's all theoretical ["if only symbolic in tactical strength"]. So what's the big deal? Why is universal gun-ownership the bulwark of American freedom? There are far better candidates.


Have something better?I reject the notion that gun ownership is a inalienable right. If you need one, you should show cause.

I think firearms (other than recreational uses) should be sold only within states, and only to residents of those states. If those in states that don't permit handgun sales think their freedom-loving rights are infringed, they can exercise their inalienable right to move around the country to states that do.

[ZippyTheChimp]

Trusting government isn't pie-in-the-sky?!The question isn't relevant, because your solution is a phantom.

You'd be better served by just wearing a T-shirt with "Don't trust the government."

[Jasonik]

Since the empowered free individual is out, what does provide for the security of a Free State? (Obviously not slogan-printed T-shirts.)


I reject the notion that gun ownership is a inalienable right. If you need one, you should show cause.
Your cause criteria? (I presume it would constitute more that being a government employee or being related to one. Being rich maybe?)


I think firearms (other than recreational uses) should be sold only within states, and only to residents of those states. If those in states that don't permit handgun sales think their freedom-loving rights are infringed, they can exercise their inalienable right to move around the country to states that do.
But how does this prevent criminals in prohibitory states from obtaining banned guns illegally by theft or other means from the surrounding states? Or are you merely concerned with restricting peaceful law abiding people? Or perhaps allow for police to shoot on sight anyone possessing a gun - since having one denotes violent threatening criminality?

And why are "recreational uses" acceptable, whereas last resort emergency self defense uses aren't? Not to mention crime and assault prevention by simple brandishing on the part of intended victims.

Do you not see it as axiomatic that the only type of government able to reliably prevent private gun ownership is an authoritarian one?

It's in this way that private gun ownership guards against government tyranny.

[Jasonik]

Would a well armed militia be less likely to shoot at protesting citizens armed with guns or at unarmed citizens acting in protest?

You may have hit upon it here.

Government, by disarming the people, is protecting them from the violent temptation its armed minions would feel to kill peacefully assembled opposition groups armed defensively or in a concealed fashion.


A phalanx of pistol packing police can be peacefully assembled right?

[ZippyTheChimp]

Since the empowered free individual is out, what does provide for the security of a Free State? (Obviously not slogan-printed T-shirts.)It should at least be more difficult than getting a drivers licence.


But how does this prevent criminals in prohibitory states from obtaining banned guns illegally by theft or other means from the surrounding states? Or are you merely concerned with restricting peaceful law abiding people?You need a licence, registration, insurance, and an under the limit blood-alcohol-level to drive a car. Yet this doesn't stop an individual from stealing a car, getting drunk, and running down a pedestrian. Why bother with all these restrictions?

So yes, some criminals are still going to get their hands on firearms, and people are going to be killed. Others are going to be killed by knives, assorted blunt instruments, and bare hands.

Why do you insist that I provide you with a perfect world?


Or perhaps allow for police to shoot on sight anyone possessing a gun - since having one denotes violent threatening criminality?You're drifting toward hyperbole. A blind drunk person pulled out from behind the wheel of a car is arrested, not shot on sight.


Do you not see it as axiomatic that the only type of government able to reliably prevent private gun ownership is an authoritarian one?I'll defer to our foreign members to relate how they live under the oppressive yoke of authoritarianism.

[Fabrizio]

Personally I'm not against gun ownership... but I am against the US gun culture.

And even though, regarding gun control, "Mr. Obama and his party have largely ignored gun-control issues, and the president even signed a measure that will allow firearms in national parks.", these nut-jobs just will not stop.

From today's NYTimes:

Pastor Urges His Flock to Bring Guns to Church

By KATHARINE Q. SEELYE
Published: June 25, 2009

LOUISVILLE, Ky. — Ken Pagano, the pastor of the New Bethel Church here, is passionate about gun rights. He shoots regularly at the local firing range, and his sermon two weeks ago was on “God, Guns, Gospel and Geometry.” And on Saturday night, he is inviting his congregation of 150 and others to wear or carry their firearms into the sanctuary to “celebrate our rights as Americans!” as a promotional flier for the “open carry celebration” puts it.

The bring-your-gun-to-church day, which will include a $1 raffle of a handgun, firearms safety lessons and a picnic, is another sign that the gun culture in the United States is thriving despite, or perhaps because of, President Obama’s election in November.

Last year, the National Rifle Association ran a multimillion-dollar advertising campaign against Mr. Obama, stoking fears that he would be the most antigun president in history and that firearms would be confiscated. One worry was that a Democratic president and Congress would reinstitute the assault-weapons ban, which expired in 2004.

But there is little support for the ban. Mr. Obama and his party have largely ignored gun-control issues, and the president even signed a measure that will allow firearms in national parks.

Still, the fear remains that Mr. Obama, and his attorney general, Eric H. Holder Jr., will crack down on guns sooner or later. That — along with the faltering economy, which gun sellers say has spurred purchases for self-defense — has fueled a record surge in gun sales.

“Every president wants to be re-elected, and gun bans are pretty much a nonstarter for getting re-elected,” said Win Underwood, owner of the Bluegrass Indoor Range here. “What I suspect is going to happen is, Obama’s going to cool his jets until he can get re-elected, and then he’ll start building his legacy in these hot-button areas.”

When Mr. Obama was elected in November, federal instant background checks, the best indicator of gun sales, jumped 42 percent over the previous November. Every month since then, the number of checks has been higher than the year before, although the postelection surge may be tapering off, as all surges eventually do. While the number of checks in April increased 30 percent from the year before, the number of checks in May (1,023,102) was only 15 percent higher than in May 2008.

The National Rifle Association says its membership is up 30 percent since November. And several states have recently passed laws allowing gun owners to carry firearms in more places — bars, restaurants, cars and parks.

“We have a very active agenda in all 50 states,” said Chris W. Cox, legislative director of the N.R.A., widely considered the country’s most powerful lobby. “We have right-to-carry laws in over 40 states; 20 years ago, it was in just six.”

Of the 40 states with right-to-carry laws, 20 allow guns in churches.

Public attitudes also seem to be turning more sympathetic to gun owners. In April, the Pew Research Center found for the first time that almost as many people said it was more important to protect the rights of gun owners (45 percent) than to control gun ownership (49 percent). Just a year ago, Pew said, 58 percent said gun control was more important than the rights of gun owners (37 percent).

Gun-control advocates say they feel increasingly ineffective, especially after a recent spate of high-profile shootings, including last month’s murder, inside a church in Kansas, of a doctor who performed late-term abortions.

“We’ve definitely been marginalized,” said Pam Gersh, a public relations consultant here who helped organize a rally in Louisville in 2000, to coincide with the Million Mom March against guns in Washington.

“The Brady Campaign and other similar organizations who advocate sensible gun responsibility laws don’t have the money and the political power — not even close,” she said. “This pastor is obviously crossing a line here and saying ‘I can even take my guns to church, and there is nothing you can do about it.’ ”

Ms. Gersh said she was not aware that a group of local churches and peace activists were staging a counterpicnic — called “Bring your peaceful heart, leave your gun at home” — at the same time as Mr. Pagano’s event.

The celebration will feature lessons in responsible gun ownership, Mr. Pagano said. Sheriff’s deputies will be at the doors to check that openly carried firearms are unloaded, but they will not check for concealed weapons.

“That’s the whole point of concealed,” Mr. Pagano said, adding that he was not worried because such owners require training.

Mr. Pagano said the church’s insurance company, which he would not identify, had canceled the church’s policy for the day on Saturday and told him that it would cancel the policy for good at the end of the year. If he cannot find insurance for Saturday, people will not be allowed in openly carrying their guns.

Arkansas and Georgia recently rejected efforts to allow people to carry concealed weapons in church. Watching the debate in Arkansas was John Phillips, pastor of the Central Church of Christ in Little Rock. In 1986, Mr. Phillips was preaching in a different church there when a gunman shot him and a parishioner. Both survived, but Mr. Phillips, 51, still has a bullet lodged in his spine.

In a telephone interview, he said he found the idea of “packing in the pew” abhorrent.

“There is a movement afoot across the nation, with the gun lobby pushing the envelope, trying to allow concealed weapons to be carried in places where they used to be prohibited — churches, schools, bars,” Mr. Phillips said.

“I don’t understand how any minister who is familiar with the teachings of the Bible can do this,” he added. “Jesus didn’t say, ‘Go ahead, make my day.’ ”

Mr. Pagano takes such comments as a challenge to his faith and says they make him more determined.

“When someone from within the church tells me that being a Christian and having firearms are contradictions, that they’re incompatible with the Gospel — baloney,” he said. “As soon as you start saying that it’s not something that Christians do, well, guns are just the foil. The issue now is the Gospel. So in a sense, it does become a crusade. Now the Gospel is at stake.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/26/us/26guns.html?hp

[Jasonik]

Personally I'm not against gun ownership... but I am against the US gun culture.
One sure way to strengthen and magnify the onerous culture is to threaten ownership. Surely ownership opponents won't try to use the culture to justify their agenda? :rolleyes:

Of the 40 states with right-to-carry laws, 20 allow guns in churches.
I fail to see how what private persons bring inside a place of worship falls within the jurisdiction of government, but like building codes and zoning restrictions, churches (http://wirednewyork.com/forum/showthread.php?p=265368) apparently aren't considered to be off limits to such dictates. "Public safety" controls access to the Holy of Holies.





...what does provide for the security of a Free State?
It should at least be more difficult than getting a drivers license.

You need a licence, registration, insurance, and an under the limit blood-alcohol-level to drive a car. Yet this doesn't stop an individual from stealing a car, getting drunk, and running down a pedestrian. Why bother with all these restrictions?
To generate revenue for the government, pander to voters, and reward favored industry and labor -- the chief reason for having to "bother with" these restrictions is that they're not infringements expressly prohibited by the constitution. Government hates a regulatory vacuum.

I don't understand what all this has to do with "the security of a Free State" though?

So yes, some criminals are still going to get their hands on firearms, and people are going to be killed. Others are going to be killed by knives, assorted blunt instruments, and bare hands.
I'm not suggesting criminals - even murderous ones - threaten "the security of a Free State" unless they co-opt the state. In which case giving them all the guns makes sense how?


Why do you insist that I provide you with a perfect world?
I do not. Why do you insist on providing a government that can perfectly be trusted with monopoly possession of violent force? We'd have better luck finding a unicorn.


A blind drunk person pulled out from behind the wheel of a car is arrested, not shot on sight.
But driving has a useful everyday use - whereas, according to your arguments, guns have no useful purpose (for non-state actors) and are only tools of havoc in society. Having a gun could conceivably become enough to declare one an unlawful combatant -- and subject one to the attendant legal "benefits" and "special" treatment.

That aside, considering how police are given extreme leeway and routinely absolved of criminality having fired at and even killed unarmed people, how can you be so sure of the benign future of an increasingly militaristic authoritarian police culture?


I'll defer to our foreign members to relate how they live under the oppressive yoke of authoritarianism.
Please be sure to specify the date of your constitution if applicable, the extent to which you rely on NATO for defense, the safeguards taken by your society to guard against police state tendencies, and your willingness to welcome UN occupation in service of any of these ends. Also, as a point of reference it would be helpful to have your general definition of 'liberty' as well as 'Free State'.

*****

As a thought experiment, consider whether a police officer would surrender a service weapon to anyone other than in their chain of command. Why?

Is a free person subject to a chain of command?