Posted on 09/08/2013 11:51:33 AM PDT by Innovative
An odd comment.
Felons are considered to have lost their right to bear arms by reason of being convicted of a felony.
At present, adult homosexuality is not considered a crime at all, much less a felony. In fact, it’s pretty obvious it’s considered the preferred form of sexual expression by our society, or at least by its elite.
15th Amendment. Also 19th.
Ellis needs to take “Constitution 101.”
The U.S. Constitution neither creates nor conveys rights on the People. It exists to form a federal government possessed of only those powers enumerated in the Constitution. The primary duty of the federal government is to protect the rights of the People, which pre-exist government itself. Conversely, the rights of the People are not limited by the Constitution. The Bill of Rights does not set forth ALL rights of the People, and the 10th Amendment clearly reserves all rights not prohibited by the Constitution to the People and the States. Even if you accept Ellis’ perverse reading of the 2nd Amendment, so what? Where does the Constitution deny the People the right to keep and bear arms? Or empower the federal government to pass and enforce gun-control legislation?
Patriots, beware of the word "absolute" where constitutionally protected rights are concerned. You will not be able to argue against that word. But while I agree with the referenced statement in principle, I have been unable to confirm where the Supreme Court has indicated that there is no absolute right to gun ownership, insights welcome.
Otherwise, as evidenced by the history of the Bill of Rights (BoR), note that the Founding nanny States had decided that the states were not required to respect the priviliges and imunities protected by the BoR, including the 2nd Amendment. Only the federal government was required to honor BoR protections.
John Barron learned this hard way when he took his eminent domain land grab case by the City of Baltimore to the Supreme Court, the justices clarifying that the BoR protections protected citizens only from the federal government, not the states or cities.
"These amendments contain no expression indicating an intention to apply them to the State governments. This court cannot so apply them." --Barron v. Baltimore, 1833.
But also note that the states later ratified the 14th Amendment to apply the constitution's privileges and immunities to themselves, state power to regulate guns now limited by the 2nd Amendment through the 14th Amendment.
Sadly, since parents are not making sure that their children are being taught the Constution and its history, history is repeating itself in the USA. For example, consider that the same confusion over the scope of the eminent domain aspect of the 5th Amendment in the 180 year old Barron case mentioned above still exists as evidenced by the Supreme Court's relatively recent decision in Kelo v. New London.
Regardless that patriots cried foul when the Supremes decided the case in the favor of New London taking private property for commercial purposes instead of public use, the public use requirement rumored to be required by the Constitution, even now patriots do not understand that the public use aspect of 5A applies only to the feds and not the states.
The bottom line is that epidemic ignorance of the Constitution is what is fostering unconstitutionally big federal government, imo, as evidenced by gun control issues. Patriots need to stop blaming DC for everything and learn the Constitution and its history so that they stop sending clown lawmakers to DC.
Second of all, the people are the militia. The original militia law designated men from the age of 21 to 55 as the unorganized militia, which the State in need can be called upon to defend the State against enemies foreign and doemestic.
And finally, what are the author's qualifications of opine on the meaning, history and law of the Second Amendment? It's the same old cr*p about the 2nd Amendment applying only to the States. BS then, BS now.
I think the Constitution was drafted and written too fast for the slow of thought and lip moving readers of the Progressive persuasion.
You big meanie you. Every time you use logic a liberal dies.
sez Joseph J. Ellis, an idiot who clearly can’t read the words, “the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.”
Thanks Innovative.
First, God said I can protect myself and mine with any means I can come up with against anything or anyone that would threaten us. There is nothing anyone can say that changes that.
I will find a weapon.
The “Regulars” were the professional armies that were armed and equipped by govenrments. The Founders were nervous about those kinds of armies.
So, they didn’t want a standing army of “regulars”.
So, they decided a citizen body (militia) that was made up of, not regulars, but of the well-armed (well-regulated) was the protection against evil foreign or domestic enemies.
To ensure that, the people’s right to arms would not be infringed.
Thank you for pointing out those amendments. I'm not up to speed on pre-Constitution common law protections for voting, but there is no constitutionally enumerated right to vote. What the 15th, 19th, 24th and 26th Amendments do is to prohibit the states from not allowing people to exercise their privilege (common law right?) to vote on the basis of the specific criteria protected by those amendments.
The Supreme Court case of Minor v. Happersett helps to explain voting "rights."
What is obvious is the fact that the right to keep and bear arms, as enumerated, is an unalienable right...
It is a right granted by a moral authority greater than ANY government instituted among men...
So since the majority of the left around the world does not recognize that kind of authority, they do not see the need to stop their desire to disarm and make everyone equally vulnerable in their world...
At the end of the day, it is really a simple concept...
We will keep our guns, in sufficient numbers to resist these attempts to take our means to defend our freedoms so many have sacrificed all for us...Therefore we owe it to them to resist, and never relinquish these instruments...
The militia being the people, and regulated meaning trained, it is necessary to not infringe upon people’s right to possess firearms to train with, should they choose. I will be keeping mine no matter what totalitarian leftists think or do.
15th essentially bars voting discrimination on account of race, 19th on sex.
I suppose in theory a state could still impose property or some other qualification as needed to vote, but of course nothing like that will ever happen.
Honest interpretation requires good reading comprehension.
Intellectual honesty is necessary to rightly argue.
Until the 2nd Amendment is repealed, EVERY law regarding U.S. citizens’ natural right to carry _ANY_ weapon to defend themselves against government tyranny is illegal according to the U.S. Constitution, despite what the Supreme Court and case law say.
Lawless people and lawless governments couldn’t care less about the U.S. Constitution, much less any other law intended to ‘keep us safe’ - they will acquire and use any kind of weapon they are able to whenever it meets their “need”, governments in particular when they become politicized and militarized.
When defending ourselves from the lawless, it is our natural, God-given right to use whatever means we have to defend ourselves, our family, our neighbors, our town ... agains them.
To good people, life is precious.
Stopping those who do not consider it so is a righteous act.
“Excellent point. The key distinction to remember here is that the 2nd Amendment does not grant us unlimited right to bear arms. It doesn't grant us any right(s) whatsoever. What it does do is specifically prohibit the government from infringing upon what is taken as an inalienable right - to have the means to defend yourself.”
The right to bear arms must never be infringed. PERIOD. It is an inalienable right, one guaranteed not by the Constitution, but the SUPREME LAW OF THE LAND: The Declaration of Independence. It falls under the category of “Liberty” in the phrase “Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness”.
We have become an idiot society of “compromise for safety”. Felons are allowed to carry arms. Children are allowed to carry arms. ANYONE who lives under the laws of this nation are allowed to carry arms. Like food or water, we are entitled to own these protectors of life and liberty.
But once you infringe on others’ rights by endangering life, liberty, or the pursuit of happiness, you break the SUPREME LAW. When you break the law, your guns are taken away. When you break the law, you may also go to prison, or be forced to return to your home country.
This is not a “what MIGHT happen because we're scared” bravo sierra thing. This is a cause and effect thing. Break the law, suffer the consequence.
Dead on right.
this from the people who believe abortion on demand IS in the constitution.
In reality, States can select Presidential electors via the state legislature, no voters needed.
Never say never, it could have easily happened in Florida in response to 2000 Presidential political game playing by Florida Supremes
True. Was recently doing some research on the 1860 election.
SC had no popular vote for President. The legislature selected its electors.
As far as the 2000 election, the question was not whether the legislature could refuse to hold a popular vote election, it’s whether they could override the procedure they’d set up after the fact.
I don’t think they should be able to, but then I don’t think the Court should have been able to do what it tried.
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