Posted on 12/04/2006 2:04:25 PM PST by neverdem
You are making the same irrelevant arguement over and over and over again.
Are you going to contend that the 1st Amendment means you can say whatever you want, whenever you want, at any volume, at any time of day, to anybody you want?
That's the sort of absurdist textual arguement you are making. By your definition, perverts could talk to 5 year olds about their weird sexual desires all day long and they wouldn't be doing anything illegal. People could walk down the street at 2AM with a bullhorn shouting obcenities for no apparent reason, and nobody could stop them. After all, both are 'speech' and are included.
That's an absured arguement, and clearly doesn't resemble the will of the founders. Words exist in context, and mean things in context. The answer is to examine the context, not assume they mean every possible thing that could possibly be meant if there was no context.
The mark of intelligence is to make meaningful distinctions, not mindless generalizations.
You are making the same irrelevant arguement over and over and over again.
Are you going to contend that the 1st Amendment means you can say whatever you want, whenever you want, at any volume, at any time of day, to anybody you want?
That's the sort of absurdist textual arguement you are making. By your definition, perverts could talk to 5 year olds about their weird sexual desires all day long and they wouldn't be doing anything illegal. People could walk down the street at 2AM with a bullhorn shouting obcenities for no apparent reason, and nobody could stop them. After all, both are 'speech' and are included.
That's an absured arguement, and clearly doesn't resemble the will of the founders. Words exist in context, and mean things in context. The answer is to examine the context, not assume they mean every possible thing that could possibly be meant if there was no context.
The mark of intelligence is to make meaningful distinctions, not mindless generalizations.
You are correct. But the second amendment protects a well regulated Militia from federal infringement, not an unorganized militia.
50 years, and only some of them.
A weapon carried by the average soldier/militia member.
As far as Congress is concerned, pretty much yup. Stuff like child enticement and theater-fire yelling were matters for states to deal with, not Congress.
No, it is willful ignorance to insist that the Second Amendment was intended to apply only to small arms. The intent was to enable a militia, composed of non-government citizen soldiers, to defend their communities, state and nation from the imposition of tyranny by military force. To accomplish that mission requires that the individuals and the militia which they form will have parity in arms -- all arms -- with any conceivable military enemy. That may very well require large state level militias which can not be federalized against a State.
During our War for Independence such defensive capability included muskets, rifles, pistols, cannon, explosives, and warships. Today that means everything available to an infantry fire team, company or coastal defense force. It would include full-auto battle rifles, shotguns, pistols, artillery, anti-tank rockets, anti-aircraft guns and missiles (against helicopters, fighters, bombers, etc.), explosives of any sort, torpedoes, mines, warships, tanks and other mobile armor, helicopter gunships, ground support fighters, air superiority fighters, cruise missiles, bombers, AWAC's, beam weapons, etc., etc., etc. Yes, it would include tactical nukes of under one kiloton yield (useful against point targets such as hardened assets, massed troops, or naval warships) and perhaps larger yield weapons. It includes any weapons, any arms, needed for a militia to defend itself against a military force (which would have all of the above weapons and arms. Yes it would include chemical weapons as applied to massed troops or hardened assets. Again it would include anything that would enable militia to successfully defend its community, state and nation from enemies foreign and domestic.
No? Some would object to all this?
What would be effective defense against heavily armed and armored helicopter gunships deployed by AWAC's? What would be effective against an invading naval and marine force? What would be effective against fighters and bombers? Think of a militia trying to defend against anything the Russians could bring to bear against them. At the very least think of what a small besieged town would need to defend itself against tanks and helicopters. This is not hypothetical -- remember Waco. Remember how badly the Afghani resistance needed Stingers against helicopter gunships. For a not-so hypothetical scenario, read AGAINST ALL ENEMIES by Harold Coyle and the turkey shoot the US military enjoyed against an Idaho militia/guard who also had some M1 Abrams and Apache gunships -- but not AWAC's.
Still No?
Then how successfully could a bunch of inadequately trained militia with some hunting rifles and some semi-auto AK's and AR's (woefully short on ammo*) do against everything the US or Russian military could throw at them? Yes, it could be a stalemate as in Iraq, but it would be an extremely costly stalemate for the defenders -- especially if nobody helped them from outside, if they were on their own.
*How much ammo does the average potential militia person (any adult) now have in their "arsenal" or how much might the anti-gun bunch allow us to have in our "arsenal" -- 250 rounds? 1000 rounds? Remember during the last year when AK or AR ammo was simply not available in case lots in the US. That can happen again. A few 20-round boxes may not go far enough.
By stating that the right shall not be infringed the feds took ownership of it and forbade anyone from restricting that right.
Dude, the 1st Amendment is incorporated to the states a long time ago.
If you want to argue that you should be able to shout fire in a crowded theater, fine, but don't use this obvious copout.
You make a gigantic logical leap here that I'm not even going to attempt to bridge.
it is willful ignorance to insist that the Second Amendment was intended to apply only to small arms.
Show me where I said that. I didn't. I said that there clearly is a limit, however, and that things that cannot possibly have been considered by the founders at the time, such as nukes, are clearly not a guarenteed right in the Constitution.
And frankly, anybody who thinks nukes are a guarenteed Constitutional right, is an idiot.
Regulated didn't mean regulated the way we use the word nowadays. Regulated meant armed.
That leap from muskets and ship-mounted cannon to modern fully-armed fire teams or coastal defense forces is embodied in the Second Amendment.
I would argue that all those would be protected and that the Founding Fathers would agree. The difference is that the people at their time would have had respect for others not to go down the street at 2AM and use a bullhorn to shout obsenities. Nor would they be perverted either, due to their heavy religious beliefs (there were none if very few that were not religious).
Based on what? There certainly isn't any part of the federalist papers or any other founding documents that would suggest this.
So all those SALT talks with the Russians, as in "Strategic Arms Limitation Treaty" were just about things that a soldier could carry. I didn't know that.
Perhaps it would be helpful if you could tell us when was the earliest that the word "arms" was used to include something that a soldier couldn't carry. It might be helpful also to explain how this meaning of "arms" didn't result in disarmament laws prior to 1934.
Wrong, the founding fathers (and others) even have stated otherwise:
"What, Sir, is the use of a militia? It is to prevent the establishment of a standing army, the bane of liberty...Whenever Governments mean to invade the rights and liberties of the people, they always attempt to destroy the militia, in order to raise an army upon their ruins." - Eldridge Gerry
"Are we at last brought to such a humiliating and debasing degradation, that we cannot be trusted with arms for our own defense? Where is the difference between having our arms in 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?" - Patrick Henry June 9, 1788, in the Virginia Convention on the ratification of the Constitution, in Debates in the Several State Conventions on the Adoption of the Federal Constitution
"The great object is, that every man be armed. [. . .] Everyone who is able may have a gun." - Patrick Henry June 14, 1788, in the Virginia Convention on the ratification of the Constitution, in Debates in the Several State Conventions on the Adoption of the Federal Constitution
"A strong body makes the mind strong. As to the species of exercises, I advise the gun. While this gives moderate exercise to the body, it gives boldness, enterprise, and independence to the mind. Games played with the ball and others of that nature, are too violent for the body and stamp no character on the mind. Let your gun therefore be the constant companion of your walks." - Thomas Jefferson
"No freeman shall [ever] be debarred the use of arms" - Thomas Jefferson June 1776, proposed Virginia Constitution
"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....Such laws make things worse for the assaulted and better for the assailants; they serve rather to encourage than to prevent homicides, for an unarmed man may be attacked with greater confidence than an armed man." - Thomas Jefferson "Commonplace Book" 1774-1776, quoting 18th century criminologist Cesare Beccaria in "On Crimes and Punishment"
"No man shall ever be debarred the use of arms. The strongest reason for the people to retain the right to keep and bear arms is, as a last resort, to protect themselves against the tyranny in government." - Thomas Jefferson
""The Constitution of most of our states (and of the United States) assert that all power is inherent in the people; that they may exercise it by themselves; that it is their right and duty to be at all times armed." - Thomas Jefferson
"The highest number to which a standing army can be carried in any country does not exceed one hundredth part of the souls, or one twenty-fifth part of the number able to bear arms. This portion 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 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. Besides the advantage of being armed, it forms a barrier against the enterprises of ambition, more insurmountable than any which a simple government of any form can admit of. The governments of Europe are afraid to trust the people with arms. If they did, the people would surely shake off the yoke of tyranny, as America did. 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." - James Madison
"Americans have the right and advantage of being armed -- unlike the citizens of other countries whose governments are afraid to trust the people with arms." - James Madison
"A government that does not trust it's law abiding citizens to keep and bear arms is itself unworthy of trust." - James Madison
"To disarm the people... was the best and most effectual way to enslave them." - George Mason June 14, 1788, in the Virginia Convention on the ratification of the Constitution, in Debates in the Several State Conventions on the Adoption of the Federal Constitution
"I ask, Who are the militia? They consist now of the whole people, except for a few public officers." - George Mason June 16, 1788, in Debates in the Several State Conventions on the Adoption of the Federal Constitution
"And that the said Constitution be never construed to authorize Congress to infringe the just liberty of the press, or the rights of conscience; or to prevent the people of the United States, who are peaceable citizens, from keeping their own arms; or to raise standing armies, unless necessary for the defense of the United States, or of some one or more of them; or to prevent the people from petitioning, in a peaceable and orderly manner, the federal legislature, for a redress of grievances; or to subject the people to unreasonable searches and seizures of their persons, papers or possessions" - Sam Adams August 20, 1789, in Debates and Proceedings in the Convention of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts
"Before a standing army can rule, the people must be disarmed; as they are in almost every kingdom in Europe. The supreme power in America cannot enforce unjust laws by the sword; because the whole body of the people are armed, and constitute a force superior to any band of regular troops that can be, on any pretense, raised in the United States. A military force, at the command of Congress, can execute no laws, but such as the people perceive to be just and constitutional; for they will possess the power, and jealousy will instantly inspire the inclination, to resist the execution of a law which appears to them unjust and oppressive." - Noah Webster
"As civil rulers, not having their duty to the people duly before them, may attempt to tyrannize, and as the military forces which might be occasionally raised to defend our country, might pervert their power to the injury of their fellow-citizens, the people are confirmed by the next article in their right to keep and bear their private arms." - Tench Coxe
"No kingdom can be secured otherwise than by arming the people. The possession of arms is the distinction between a freeman and a slave. He, who has nothing, and who himself belongs to another, must be defended by him, whose property he is, and needs no arms. But he, who thinks he is his own master, and has what he can call his own, ought to have arms to defend himself and what he possesses; else he lives precariously, and at discretion." - Andrew Fletcher, quoted by James Burgh, in "Political Disquisitions: Or, an Enquiry into Public Errors, Defects, and Abuses"
"The people are not to be disarmed of their weapons. They are left in full possession of them."
- June 25, 1788, Zachariah Johnson, in the Virginia Convention on the ratification of the Constitution, in Debates in the Several State Conventions on the Adoption of the Federal Constitution
"A militia, when properly formed, are in fact the people themselves. ...To preserve liberty, it is essential that the whole body of the people always possess arms, and be taught alike, especially when young, how to use them." - Richard Henry Lee
"The right of the citizens to keep and bear arms has justly been considered as the palladium of the liberties of a republic; since it offers a strong moral check against the usurpation and arbitrary power of rulers; and will generally, even if these are successful in the first instance, enable the people to resist and triumph over them." - Justice Joseph Story
"Gun control laws increase the power of government and the criminal element over the average citizen and serve no other purpose." - Robert E. Lee
"I declare to you that woman must not depend upon the protection of man, but must be taught to protect herself, and there I take my stand." - Susan B. Anthony, July 1871 speech in San Franscisco
"But to prohibit the citizen from wearing or carrying a war arm, except upon his own premises or when on a journey traveling through the country with baggage, or when acting as or in aid of an officer, is an unwarranted restriction upon his constitutional right to keep and bear arms....If cowardly and dishonorable men sometimes shoot unarmed men with army pistols or guns, the evil must be prevented by the penitentiary and gallows, and not by a general deprivation of a constitutional privilege." - Wilson v. State
As you can see they repeatedly say that it is the individual citizens not a military right.
A final quote "How strangely will the Tools of a Tyrant pervert the plain Meaning of Words!" - Sam Adams January 21, 1776, letter to John Pitts. You and others like you need to stop perverting the meaning of words in the Constitution/Bill of Rights.
"I said that there clearly is a limit"
Where is your proof?
"things that cannot possibly have been considered by the founders at the time, such as nukes, are clearly not a guarenteed right in the Constitution."
Again, they did not consider full auto firearms, the internet, radio, television, etc. are they not also covered by the constitution?
To paraphrase you "anybody who thinks items not considered by the founders at the time are not a guarenteed Constitutional right, is an idiot."
The cannons used by the rebels to evict the Navy from occupied Boston during the Revolutionary War were stolen by the rebels from Fort Ticonderoga. Our Founders were motivated by a desire to ensure that future generations would not have to begin the struggle against a tyrannical government by stealing weapons. Unfortunately, it would be necessary for the people to steal weapons from the government if revolution became necessary today.
If rebels wish to obtain a machinegun, they can't just buy a new one, because the government has outlawed manufacture for civilian use. Except, of course, for the "police" which is the modern word denoting a "standing army".
The rebels would be forced to attack a sargeant's patrol car in L.A. and take the machine gun from the trunk. I just hope that there are enough to go around if the need ever arises. If the police are ever denied machine guns, then such guns will be much more difficult to obtain. One might have to import them from Mexico.
Where is you proof that they would not say that they would not be protected?
That's brilliant. The Supreme Court in US vs. Miller makes it clear that demanding a tax stamp on arms which are useful to a militia is not permitted. The lower courts, the Congress, and the executive branch purposely misread this case to justify outlawing machineguns.
And you are just fine with this?
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