anything else would simply get me in trouble... 8^)
Posted on 04/12/2014 9:15:49 AM PDT by lilyramone
John Paul Stevens served as an associate justice of the Supreme Court from 1975 to 2010. This essay is excerpted from his new book, “Six Amendments: How and Why We Should Change the Constitution.”
Following the massacre of grammar-school children in Newtown, Conn., in December 2012, high-powered weapons have been used to kill innocent victims in more senseless public incidents. Those killings, however, are only a fragment of the total harm caused by the misuse of firearms. Each year, more than 30,000 people die in the United States in firearm-related incidents. Many of those deaths involve handguns.
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
Scouts Out! Cavalry Ho!
So this senile old commie thinks guns should only be posessed by the “militia”? And that’s considered an original idea?
There are words that could fix the Constitution in the other direction.
For example, you could take out the reference to a militia completely.
Or you could amend the 2nd Amendment to read that the right to bear arms will be regulated by the President.
But what we have is what we have and I’m satisfied that a US citizen has the right to bear arms (whatever ‘bear’ means)as an individual.
The amendment, as Stevens alters it, makes no sense.
Has any government (or anyone else) ever questioned the right of citizens to bear arms in a government sponsored militia? Why would anyone bother to declare such a right?
The only reason it makes any sense at all for the amendment to be included in the BOR is if it is a declaration that free people possess the right to bear arms in spite of their government’s wishes.
Take any right and filter it through the necessity of a government-run organization and it ceases to have any meaning whatsoever, nor then in that form is it a “right” that has ever been in dispute.
Get involved with your state group. This is how to keep the a$$clowns in check. Just ask the BLM.
This kind of caca would be nipped in the bud if EVERY session of the SC would be televised.
IMO it is a disgrace that the people of the US can not watch the ultimate court in the land while they go about the people’s business.
God’s laws and naturally endowed rights never change. Hard concept for idiots to grasp.
Idiotic. It would change the meaning of the law so that only people in the service of the government could have guns. The point of all amendments to the Constitution is to limit, not strengthen, the power of the government.
The audio is already on C-Span. Having the video would simply drive the judges and lawyers to make it even more of a political show than it already is. It makes me want to puke when I hear the lies and deception and flawed logic.
Having it on C-Span doesn’t stop the flow of lies, deception, corruption that spews out of SCOTUS.
Our legal system needs an enormous housecleaning, it’s chock full of unrepentant criminal, vile, immoral people.
It is telling that this senile fool cites Miller as justification, but of course fails to point out that only the government provided briefs and argument. Miller, a bootlegger, was unrepresented, as he had died. Imagine the pro abortion crowds reaction if the court ruled on abortion “rights” after hearing only the pro life arguments.
I think someone dropped that old bastard on his head at birth.
First he argues that only weapons used by the military are protected by the 2nd amendment, then he says that only the military can own them.
Somewhere in his babbling contortions of the 2nd amendment he completely removed ‘the people.’
LOL.
You would think that a SCOTUS justice might know just how difficult a process it is to amend the Constitution or repeal an Amendment (happened only once).
Getting three fourths of state legislatures or state constitutional conventions to vote to ratify an amendment requires more than just a judicial opinion signed with a flourish.
If Justice Stevens wants to get the ball rolling, the U.S. Congress is just down the street. Good luck finding a Senate or House sponsor, J.P.
Anyone who is actively attempting to remove or alter the 2nd Amendment want’s to abolish “a free state”.
This is the line in the sand, and they have approached it and are getting ready to cross it.
It’s coming, get ready.
Yes. A little under two-thirds of US firearms related deaths are suicides. Anti gunners include them in the figures to mislead and inflate the numbers.
Gang-bangers are indeed a large portion of murders.
Other details: of murders with firearms, most are in areas heavily controlled by Democrats, with very high rates in some areas that are 90+% Democrat.
http://www.americanthinker.com/2014/01/guns_dont_kill_people_democrats_kill_people.html
It is telling that this senile fool cites Miller as justification, but of course fails to point out that only the government provided briefs and argument. Miller, a bootlegger, was unrepresented, as he had died.
http://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/307/174/case.html
Summary: “...With Justice James Clark McReynolds writing for the majority, the Court reasoned that because the possession of a sawed-off double barrel shotgun does not have a reasonable relationship to the preservation or efficiency of a well-regulated militia, the Second Amendment does not protect the possession of such an instrument.”
“The Court cannot take judicial notice that a shotgun having a barrel less than 18 inches long has today any reasonable relation to the preservation or efficiency of a well regulated militia, and therefore cannot say that the Second Amendment guarantees to the citizen the right to keep and bear such a weapon.”
“In the absence of any evidence tending to show that possession or use of a “shotgun having a barrel of less than eighteen inches in length” at this time has some reasonable relationship to the preservation or efficiency of a well regulated militia, we cannot say that the Second Amendment guarantees the right to keep and bear such an instrument. Certainly it is not within judicial notice that this weapon is any part of the ordinary military equipment, or that its use could contribute to the common defense. Aymette v. State, 2 Humphreys (Tenn.) 154, 158.”
In regards weapons deemed suitable for a militia use, the ruling had quite different things to say:
“The signification attributed to the term Militia appears from the debates in the Convention, the history and legislation of Colonies and States, and the writings of approved commentators. These show plainly enough that the Militia comprised all males physically capable of acting in concert for the common defense. “A body of citizens enrolled for military discipline.” And further, that ordinarily, when called for service these men were expected to appear bearing arms supplied by themselves and of the kind in common use at the time.”
...and citing such as the following:
“The American Colonies In The 17th Century,” Osgood, Vol. 1, ch. XIII, affirms in reference to the early system of defense in New England —
“In all the colonies, as in England, the militia system was based on the principle of the assize of arms. This implied the general obligation of all adult male inhabitants to possess arms, and, with certain exceptions, to
cooperate in the work of defence.”
“The possession of arms also implied the possession of ammunition, and the authorities paid quite as much attention to the latter as to the former.”
“A year later [1632] it was ordered that any single man who had not furnished himself with arms might be put out to service, and this became a permanent part of the legislation of the colony [Massachusetts].”
Also,
“Clauses intended to insure the possession of arms and ammunition by all who were subject to military service appear in all the important enactments concerning military affairs. Fines were the penalty for delinquency, whether of towns or individuals. According to the usage of the times, the infantry of Massachusetts consisted of pikemen and musketeers. The law, as enacted in 1649 and thereafter, provided that each of the former should be armed with a pike, corselet, head-piece, sword, and knapsack. The musketeer should carry a ‘good fixed musket,’ not under bastard musket bore, not less than three feet, nine inches, nor more than four feet three inches in length, a priming wire, scourer, and mould, a sword, rest, bandoleers, one pound of powder, twenty bullets, and two fathoms of match. The law also required that two-thirds of each company should be musketeers.”
The General Court of Massachusetts, January Session 1784, provided for the organization and government of the Militia. It directed that the Train Band should “contain all able bodied men, from sixteen to forty years of age, and the Alarm List, all other men under sixty years of age, . . .” Also,
“That every noncommissioned officer and private soldier of the said militia not under the controul of parents, masters or guardians, and being of sufficient ability therefor in the judgment of the Selectmen of the town in which he shall dwell, shall equip himself, and be constantly provided with a good fire arm,”
Justice Stevens knows what is necessary to change the Bill of Rights. He can offer his opinions all he wants, but I haven’t seen him do one thing to amend the 2nd Amendment. If he were for real, he would be trying to get the number of states to go along with the change he proposes.
He knows it is futile. He also realizes that to try something like that would waste millions of dollars and several years of his time of which there isn’t much left.
Thanks.
And we know the Japanese manage a suicide rate much higher than ours with very few firearms in circulation. The point being, if the Left managed gun control/confiscation and thereby significantly reduced suicides by firearms, it might not have much of an effect on our suicide rate.
anything else would simply get me in trouble... 8^)
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