Posted on 11/27/2007 2:58:46 PM PST by neverdem
For some 30 years, the District of Columbia has banned handgun ownership for private citizens. It was approved by that city's council in the wake of terrible gun violence and a rising murder rate in the nation's capital.
The ban has stood through this time with other council votes, but without any official review by the U.S. Supreme Court.
Sometime next year, the high court will make a ruling on whether that law is constitutional.
It is surprising to us that it has taken this long for the court to get this case. It would seem that it would have gone to the highest appeal long before now. We do not understand all the legal entanglements that must have kept it off the court's docket, but it is certainly there now.
And now, if the court is acting properly, the D.C. gun ban should be struck down.
This is a clear case of constitutionality, not politics, not conservative or liberal. If Constitution's Bill of Rights clearly allows gun private gun ownership anywhere — and we believe it does — then it allows it in the District of Columbia.
"The right to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed," is what the Second Amendment says, and there seems to be little "wiggle" room in that statement.
In some instances — Washington, D.C. being one of them — we admit we despair of so many guns in the hands of so many people who would use them the wrong way, but the answer is not to abrogate the Constitution.
If one portion of the Bill of Rights can be limited by a local government, why can't another? There is no logic in saying on the Second Amendment is up for local review. To continue to allow this is to invite a city council or state legislature somewhere to decide that the First Amendment is too broad, or that the Fourth Amendment is too restrictive on law enforcement.
We know there are passionate arguments for gun control and that is part of the problem: The passion has blotted out clear thinking. This time the NRA is right. The law should go.
So ... do you mean that, today, "the people" encompasses all adult non-felon citizens?
I think it's fairly clear -- the Founders recognized that the militia (the armed populace generally) was necessary for the security of a free state (against both external threats to the state's existence and internal threats to its freedom). A professional standing army with a monopoly on arms would suffice to protect a state, free or not, against the former.
As for the significance of the militia clause, the Miller case, in which the Supreme Court ruled that possession of a sawed-off shotgun was not protected by the Second Amendment because such weapons were not suited to military use*, indicates that it serves as guidance for what constitutes "arms". There is no such indication that it serves as guidance for what constitutes "the people".
*This finding of fact was faulty (in fact, such weapons were put to effective use in the trenches of WWI), but the Court was limited by the evidence before it.
A distinction without a difference.
Stating this and showing us the decisions and rulings, are two different things.
There is now, but none existed until the reconstruction era.
Yes. But the DC Circuit corrected that with their ruling. If the U.S. Supreme Court would have refused to hear the case, the decision by the DC Circuit would stand, making the DC gun laws unconstitutional.
You won. We won. The DC gun laws are no good. They've been ruled unconstitutional by a federal court.
Now, not content with victory, we cheer when it's put in front of the U.S. Supreme Court so they can thoroughly f&^* it up.
You like what they've done with the Commerce Clause, so what you consider f&^*ed up is probably the best possible outcome.
That's the conclusion that a rational person would reach when looking at who "the people" were in 1792 and comparing them to who were qualified to be in a Militia.
Hey, maybe I'm wrong. Maybe it is an individual right. Now, combine that with the Miller court finding that the second amendment protects only militia-type weapons and we have a much more rational interpretation that civilians may have machine guns and mortars, but not 22's and shotguns.
"But who are the unorganized militia?"
All of us.
Yes. (Less the insane, the feeble-minded, and prisoners.)
Showing it to you the tenth time is different, how, from the first nine times I did so?
Look up Verdugo and Parker yourself. They have this thing called "Google".
Which people? The over 21 white male property owners or the over 18 white male taxpayers? (Actually even by your definition it would the over 18 white male taxpayers, since the House of Commons was likely the most populous branch of the legislature).
But the point is there were *different* subsets of "the people" defined for different purposes, voting, mandatory militia service, etc. But they were always spelled out where they applied. That is the militia act spelled out what subset of the people were required to serve in the militia, the North Carolina provisions spell out the subsets of the people who could vote for state Senators or members of the state House of Commons respectively.
The second amendment doesn't offer any qualifications, ergo, like the rest of the bill of rights, it's the whole people that is being referred to.
There you go. The new slogan for 2008
If you liked what they did with the Commerce Clause, you're gonna love what they do to the Second Amendment
Bingo.
If the federal government infringed either one it's unconstitutional -- the enfranchised body politic is the entity protected.
I used "adult, white, male citizens" because I knew you wouldn't understand the big-person words.
You go ahead and substitute "the voters" for "the people". Then you won't have to worry your little brain with that messy 21 here and 18 there and taxpayers over there and property owners here and all that.
Good point. Actually, I realized that, but I had just finished a discussion with someone who claimed that he had a constitutional right to vote for the President, and my mind was still on the "no you don't" side of the discussion.
Thanks for keeping me straight on this.
Mark
Because, even by your contorted definition of "the people", he's still a part of "the people", white, male, landowner/taxpayer) and thus the second amendment which protects a "right of the people" still protects his right to keep and bear arms.
Otherwise you are saying it's "right of the militiamen", but the Constitution terms it the "right of the people".
If it's a right of the people, then one must ask, which subset. No subset is defined by the language of the second amendment. Although I'm sure you'll say it is, experts in English grammar say otherwise. Thus the phrase "the people" can only refer to the whole people. In fact that's exactly what Chief Judge Joseph Henry Lumpkin, of the Georgia Supreme Court said it meant in Nunn v. State, 1 Kelly 243 (Ga. 1846)
"The right of the people to bear arms shall not be infringed;" The right of the whole people, old and young, men, women and boys, and not militia only, to keep and hear arms of every description, not merely as are used by the militia, shall not be infringed, curtailed, or broken in upon, in the smallest degree; and all this for the important end to be attained: the rearing up and qualifying a well-regulated militia,
Everybody knows that the Second Amendment is exclusively to protect the right to hunt deer and shoot clay pigeons. Duh.
Who? The whole people? Not to be confused with the partial people? What are you talking about?
Do you think you're actually adding clarification to the issue by saying the whole people? Who are the whole people? Everyone? All citizens? Did you mean "The Mole People"?
US Constitution - 2nd Amendment Verbatim:
A well regulated Militia, being necessary for the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.
The fact you are responding with childish and bandwith wasting posts shows just how bankrupt your position is. Obviously as post #276 illustrates the courts of the 19th century understood the intent of the 2nd Amendment and what and who “the people” were defined as. Your socialist interpretation only came into being in the 20th century by gun grabbing Marxist liberals.
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