Should the 2nd Amendment Truly Not Be Infringed?

It's a lie to say "government" can't go on a rampage.

Government has, does, and will continue to do so. Cops are shooting innocent civilians all too frequently, right in the streets, simply because they think they are a threat - exercising their rights. The discussion on whether to Open Carry has that as a core issue - can you trust the cops to not shoot you on sight?

Oh, yes they do - and ignoring that happening in our society right now is something that white suburbanites seem to be in denial about. Largely because it's young black men being gunned down. If it was your son stepping out of a car on private property to go hunting you'd be enraged - yet a young black man - or even boy - toying with a plastic firearm is gunned down within two seconds of a patrol car literally driving up next to him in a public park.

Apparently that the legal response you want practiced. Seems selective if it's ok to inflict on Americans of African descent. A young black man can be stopped and frisked, found to have a lockback knife, then beaten and left to die in a police van. Too bad for him. But government is flawless in protecting YOUR rights.

People are putting their trust into the Cloud rather than humans. We know we can make mistakes, but add a veneer of legitimacy and it's all OK. I suppose government didn't deliberately hold up tax exemptions for conservative organizations, and the officials who illegally did that getting away with it is OK, too. Letting guns cross the border and kill citizens, even our own agents is OK.

The ones directing this are also the ones who are now calling for our disarmament - and telling us it's OK, they are going to pass a tax to finance it, that WE will have to pay.

All too many are standing around trusting the government but not trusting their neighbor. Your neighbor is LESS likely to come out of his home shooting than a local government employee investigating a "Man with a gun" report.

The #1 lesson to be taken away from the American Revolution: GOVERMENT FAILED US. They instituted an oppressive war of occupation to enforce their agenda of milking us for taxes and disarming us. What we paid for in blood is what we read in the Bill of Rights.

Anyone in denial of that is forcing us to learn the lesson again. We are already seeing precursors and most of us are just whistling past the graveyard trying to ignore it.

Can we accept another infringement of our 2A rights? The question should be can you accept the loss of your rights at all? Just because you think it's ok doesn't mean you have a good grasp of the real picture. If you cultivate your point of view to only see pretty things how do you ever see the reality?

Basically those who can't see it aren't the ones who will be called on to clean up the mess. That's what we see in history over and over. The ones calling on disarmament won't be going into the streets to enforce it - and the ones resisting it won't come from those who trust in government.

The rain falls on the just and unjust alike, however. Don't think you will be free of paying the price for putting faith in "government." It has, can, and will fail you.

AlexanderA said:

Scalia's opinion in the Heller case is the ultimate example of this. He essentially converted a collective, political right of the people to monitor their government (insurrectionism!) into an individual, personal right of self-defense. The fact is, the "system" would not have tolerated a broader interpretation (nor would 5 justices have signed onto it).

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The fact of the matter is that Justice Scalia did no such thing in writing the Heller majority opinion

The Supreme Court held in part:

(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[emphasis added], 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.

^2

All I can say about that is one needs to work for the gov't for awhile. I have and I've seen gov't fail. To believe that the gov't can't fail is to believe that it is populated with someone other than regular people like the ones that you see doing really stupid things everyday. Those people are the gov't. F&F comes to mind here. The ATF, right up to the AG, believed that they could do what they did with impunity. Actually they did. That didn't just involve US citizens in this country, it involved operating in a foreign country in a clandestine operation without informing that gov't. If they are going to do that they won't have any problem trying to put one past the good citizens of this country.

Now someone tell me again how our gov't is above reproach.

As someone pointed out, I'll trust my neighbor long before I trust the gov't.

The #1 lesson to be taken away from the American Revolution: GOVERMENT FAILED US.

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And has to this day................a little anarchy now and again is a good thing....
The tyranny started in earnest with Abe Lincoln and started to rapidly accelerate with Wislon and the rest of the Socialists

oneounceload said:

And has to this day................a little anarchy now and again is a good thing....
The tyranny started in earnest with Abe Lincoln and started to rapidly accelerate with Wislon and the rest of the Socialists

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Delusional far-right wing rhetoric that does nothing to promote increased support for preservation of Second Amendment rights. A classic example of a self-inflicted wound to the cause of supporting the RKBA. Oneounceload's comments will be considered outrageous, insulting, and alienating by many people that could be swayed to either side of the fight for the RKBA.

I disagree completely. The Second Amendment is an individual right, as much as the First Amendment lists the right to free speech as an INDIVIDUAL right in order to enforce a collective action, that against a tyrannical government.

All rights contained in what we now call the BOR are individual rights.

For further edification as to the meaning behind the 2nd A, see Federalist Papers #46.

The Alaskan said:

The fact that you actually believe that is the most frightening thing of all.

Sure, I'm an honest, law abiding, person. I can pass a NICS check. I can pass a drug test. I have no history of mental illness. But you don't know me, and none of the above proves I won't push the button.

Do you really want to take that chance? I don't.

And therein lies the problem. You don't know me and I don't know you. I don't think you should be as well armed as the military because I don't trust you not to kill me (or my son in his school). In fact, I'm far more afraid of YOU going on a rampage with your assault weapon (or your howitzer, or your tank, or your Minuteman Missile) than I am of the government sending other men, who I also don't know, to kill me with their assault weapons, their howitzers, and their tanks.

And the reality is that, historically speaking, YOU are FAR more likely to go a rampage than our government is.

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I know of no law that prohibits the private ownership of nuclear weapons, and yet we are all still here.

I think that anone arguing that the 2A should be taken literally should answer this question:

Do you want the young, angry white kid (that guy who never fit in and was always a little violent and weird in your or your kid's school) being able to obtain and own a grenade launcher?

Do you want your crazy anti-government doomsday-prepper anti-Arab anti-Semetic Stormfronting neighbor to be able to legally own a belt-fed HMG?

Why not napalm?

yokel wrote:

The fact of the matter is that Justice Scalia did no such thing in writing the Heller majority opinion

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You have to compare what Scalia did in Heller with what he could have done. A stronger result for gun owners would have been to base the 2nd Amendment right on the militia clause, with the proviso that the "militia" had universal membership. (That's in contravention to the minority justices, who would have held that the "militia" is limited to the National Guard.)

Such a result would include what Heller actually included (individual ownership of ordinary self-defense weapons) but it would also include the principle that the public could own the usual arms issued by the military. By necessity, that would mean that the National Firearms Act would be declared unconstitutional.

Clearly, that was much too extreme a position for Scalia. But that's what the Founders meant by the 2nd Amendment in 1791. So much for Scalia's famous "original intent." He did exactly what he decries in others, that is, "legislate from the bench."

Rocketmedic said:

I think that anone arguing that the 2A should be taken literally should answer this question:

Do you want the young, angry white kid (that guy who never fit in and was always a little violent and weird in your or your kid's school) being able to obtain and own a grenade launcher?

Do you want your crazy anti-government doomsday-prepper anti-Arab anti-Semetic Stormfronting neighbor to be able to legally own a belt-fed HMG?

Why not napalm?

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That's pretty much my point exactly.

However, the the second amendment purists/extremists (depending upon through which lens you view it) will counter by saying you can already make napalm in your sink, so if they, whoever "they" are, want it they can get it. (Insinuating we shouldn't make a law prohibiting it.) It's really not unlike the liberals saying marijuana should be legal because everyone is already using it. (Ohhhhh, did I go there? oopsie.)

Tirod said:

It's a lie to say "government" can't go on a rampage.

Government has, does, and will continue to do so. Cops are shooting innocent civilians all too frequently, right in the streets, simply because they think they are a threat - exercising their rights. The discussion on whether to Open Carry has that as a core issue - can you trust the cops to not shoot you on sight?

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I am really quite surprised to read anti police rhetoric from this group. But to answer your question, yes, I trust law enforcement not to shoot me. You know why? Because I'm a law abiding citizen and have no reason to fear the police. Because I'm not stupid enough to carry a firearm in the open where it will raise an alarm. Have I had bad interactions with police? sure. Have I experienced police overstepping their bounds? absolutely. (I was once party to an overzealous search during a traffic stop.) Have I ever feared for my life from the police? Don't be absurd.

Tirod said:

Largely because it's young black men being gunned down...Seems selective if it's ok to inflict on Americans of African descent. A young black man can be stopped and frisked, found to have a lockback knife, then beaten and left to die in a police van. Too bad for him. But government is flawless in protecting YOUR rights.

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Aaaaaaand now we have the race card. If someone would just call someone else a Nazi, this thread would have everything.

AlexanderA said:

yokel wrote:



You have to compare what Scalia did in Heller with what he could have done. A stronger result for gun owners would have been to base the 2nd Amendment right on the militia clause, with the proviso that the "militia" had universal membership. (That's in contravention to the minority justices, who would have held that the "militia" is limited to the National Guard.)

Such a result would include what Heller actually included (individual ownership of ordinary self-defense weapons) but it would also include the principle that the public could own the usual arms issued by the military. By necessity, that would mean that the National Firearms Act would be declared unconstitutional.

Clearly, that was much too extreme a position for Scalia. But that's what the Founders meant by the 2nd Amendment in 1791. So much for Scalia's famous "original intent." He did exactly what he decries in others, that is, "legislate from the bench."

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You know this is actually a good post. I have to point out, however, that your interpretation of the original framers' intent is obviously different than that of Justice Scalia's, and Scalia is the one sitting on the bench. You may certainly disagree with it (I stringently, vehemently disagree with several Supreme Court decisions based on my own interpretation of the Constitution.), but, like it or not, the Constitution says whatever the Supreme Court says it says. (And lately, I like it a lot less every day.)

On your discussion of "universal membership" in the "militia:" I don't disagree that your interpretation is plausible, but I would take issue on it on the grounds of, or on behalf of, Conscientious Objectors. Someone (might have been you) posted an earlier draft of the 2nd, an unedited draft if you will, that included a statement about Conscientious Objection. The problem I have with that is it wold preclude someone with sincerely held religious objections to war from owning a firearm, as they were not universal members of the militias. Refusing to kill another human being on religious grounds does not mean one is opposed to hunting.

That's a little off topic, but it throws in yet another angle to be conisdered.

The Alaskan said:

I am really quite surprised to read anti police rhetoric from this group. But to answer your question, yes, I trust law enforcement not to shoot me. You know why? Because I'm a law abiding citizen and have no reason to fear the police. Because I'm not stupid enough to carry a firearm in the open where it will raise an alarm. Have I had bad interactions with police? sure. Have I experienced police overstepping their bounds? absolutely. (I was once party to an overzealous search during a traffic stop.) Have I ever feared for my life from the police? Don't be absurd.

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I'll bet most of the people who've been unjustly murdered by police trusted law enforcement not to shoot them, strangle them, beat and leave them to die, also. I also bet the lawful anti-war protesters at Kent State didn't expect their government to send the National Guard in to shoot them, either.

So no, it's not anti-police rhetoric. It's acknowledging that there are bad people in uniform, people who should be trusted, but have broken that trust. I do not hate police, but I don't trust them as much as I used to.

You and Rocketmedic have given in to your fears, irrational as they are.

However, the the second amendment purists/extremists (depending upon through which lens you view it) will counter by saying you can already make napalm in your sink, so if they, whoever "they" are, want it they can get it. (Insinuating we shouldn't make a law prohibiting it.) It's really not unlike the liberals saying marijuana should be legal because everyone is already using it. (Ohhhhh, did I go there? oopsie.)

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Napalm already has a law restricting it. Legal possession of napalm is highly regulated, more so than just a $200 tax stamp. You must possess certain federal licenses, complete with fees, storage regulations, federal inspections, etc. to lawfully own napalm. There are thousands of law abiding citizens with these licenses, and they own explosives much worse than mere napalm. So tell me, how many people have been murdered or had severe property damage due to napalm or other explosives? How many of THOSE (if you can manage to actually find any) were done by licensed handlers?

And while completely off topic, I'm 100% in support of legalizing marijuana. The hemp industry alone would solve a great many problems.

Rocketmedic said:

I think that anone arguing that the 2A should be taken literally should answer this question:

Do you want the young, angry white kid (that guy who never fit in and was always a little violent and weird in your or your kid's school) being able to obtain and own a grenade launcher?

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Um... I was the young, angry white kid who never fit in. Never once did I think of doing anything illegal. And yes, I do want a grenade launcher. And yes, If I wanted to deal with the expenses, I'd own one. As it stands, it's not worth the expense, although I do keep looking at the 37mm flare launchers as a viable substitute. $200 later, I can register it as a Destructive Device. and lawfully launch anything from chalk rounds to grape/ buck shot, even High Explosives (with the proper licensing, BGCs and each HE grenade is an additional $200 stamp and is a DD) :banghead:

Do I want the potentially unstable kid (defined as anyone under the age of 18) to own one? Meh, currently they would not be able to lawfully own one until age 21. That, I'm okay with. But once that individual turns 21, sure. By then, he's probably already exhibited signs of mental illness, or improper parenting (which accounts for a lot of the crime and behavioral issues in this country) and done something to bar his lawful ownership of weapons, anyway.

Do you want your crazy anti-government doomsday-prepper anti-Arab anti-Semetic Stormfronting neighbor to be able to legally own a belt-fed HMG?

Why not napalm?

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As long as he has not broken the law, proven himself to be dangerous, I don't care. As long as he isn't actively calling for the deaths of such-and-such people or groups, like the New Black Panthers and the Black Lives Matter extremists have been doing (and generally getting away with), I don't care.

Until you cross a certain line, I have no problem with anyone owning anything, provided they can keep it stored safely, handle it within the scope of the law, etc. so on, so forth, ad nauseum.

As far as private ownership of nukes... It's a rather silly argument to consider possession of a city leveling weapon as a defensive deterrent against your neighbor. But all absurdity aside, once again, I don't care provided it's owned legally, stored appropriately, and used responsibly. I'd be much happier knowing my neighbor lawfully owns a Minuteman ICBM, and not unlawfully operating a meth lab. One, if stored properly, according to international regulations in place, is perfectly safe. The other is not. Not once in our nuclear history has a ICBM or any other nuclear capable device inadvertently and accidentally detonated while properly stored. Meth labs explode enough (although still rare, about as rare as the mass shootings you're so terrified of) to make them much more of a threat than lawful nukes. To put this in further perspective, you're more likely to be mugged or burglarized by your meth head neighbor than to be killed in his lab accident. You're more likely to be robbed or assaulted by your run of the mill criminal than you are to be a victim of a mass shooting in a gun free zone. You're more likely to be shot by the police than killed in a nuclear accident.

When discussions regarding the 2nd amendment come up I always have attempted to refer to the exstensive study done on the subject in 1982 by a Justice department sub comitee.
This study was done using input from historians, constitutional experts, as well as juust about anyone else that had a horse in the race so to speak. Within this report it explains the sources of the information used in significant detail.
Nop group of more qualified people has spent more effort on researching the 2nd amendment - nobody, and no group .

The bottom line of this study and report was that the 2nd amendment/right to bear arms, was and is an IDIVIDUAL right.

And yet I continue to hear in this, and in other discussions ,references to collectice rights. Apparently individuals here believe they are smarter or more learned than the those that gave input into this 1982 study. Also apparent is that many will not take the little bit of time required to read this document. (that incudes 4 members of scotus).

As well as concluding that the RTKABA is an inividual right, the report gave hint to feelings that the 1968 GCA likely had provisons that viotated the constitution, and made an offer to study that issue.

This was during the Clinton administration, and the offer was ignored , and the study was buried into an actionless essay.

My point - if you haven't read it you are not educating yourself regarding the second amendment, you are merely spouting personal opinion that often conflicts with the facts.

In regards to limitations of weapons, at the time one could own their personal cannon, or your personal battleship if you had the funds. In our modern society, with the types of weapons we have, there is a way to place limits . That way is thru constitutional changes, and the procedures are well known on what it takes to make changes to our constitution.
It is not thru bastardization of our present content by passing laws that are in conflict with the existing constitution. It is by changing/modification of the constitution itself . At the framing of the BOR's the concept was that all the weapons of the soldier would be a birthright to americans.

I could go on, but I think for now I have hopefully presented at least somethings to look into and to chew on so to speak.

Got a link to that study, by any chance? Or the name of the study itself so I can find it on my own?

Thanks, Frank. Gotta give that a read.

Got a link to that study

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Thanks Frank - You beat me to it.

I am really quite surprised to read anti police rhetoric from this group. But to answer your question, yes, I trust law enforcement not to shoot me. You know why? Because I'm a law abiding citizen and have no reason to fear the police. Because I'm not stupid enough to carry a firearm in the open where it will raise an alarm. Have I had bad interactions with police? sure. Have I experienced police overstepping their bounds? absolutely. (I was once party to an overzealous search during a traffic stop.) Have I ever feared for my life from the police? Don't be absurd.

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It's not an issue of anti-police rhetoric, it's an issue of observing and recognizing history. In many cases, rather recent history, in some cases not as recent, but still relevant. About 2 million people were slaughtered by their government in Cambodia, and it wasn't because they were carrying a firearm where it would raise an alarm. Cambodia only had a population of 8 million at the time.

When a government goes on a rampage, it's not just increasing smatterings of police brutality against protesters and dissidents. That could be considered oppression, and still something worth resisting, but not the same thing as a government truly gone crazy.

When a crazy decides to pick up an automatic weapon and kill, you might see a dozen or more deaths. When a government decides to kill, you can see millions dead, even tens of millions and that's not even hinting at hyperbole, there's examples scattered all throughout the 20th century.

You might think that the USA is very far away from anything like that happening, and actually I'd probably agree with that statement. Consider this though: It wouldn't be an unreasonable statement that if one single instance of a government on a killing spree were to happen, even if limited in some way (perhaps by international opposition), more people would be dead than have ever been murdered in the USA. That's a period there, as in, more than there have ever been murders in the United States since there's BEEN United States.

That kind of genocide is much less likely to happen to an armed population. Even in the face of previously mentioned hellfire missiles, tanks, artillery, conventional air launched cruise missiles, and whatever else. It's just no longer an attractive option for securing political power.

RX-178 said:

That kind of genocide is much less likely to happen to an armed population. Even in the face of previously mentioned hellfire missiles, tanks, artillery, conventional air launched cruise missiles, and whatever else.

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First sentence of US military enlisted oath of enlistment:

I, _____, do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic

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First sentence of US military officer's oath of enlistment:

I, _____ (SSAN), having been appointed an officer in the Army of the United States, as indicated above in the grade of _____ do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic

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http://www.history.army.mil/html/faq/oaths.html

I'm pretty sure that the Second Amendment is still part of the Constitution. Those "hellfire missiles, tanks, artillery, conventional air launched cruise missiles" won't all be headed one way. Based on the voting record of the military, the VAST majority of them would be directed in support of the Second Amendment.

But the U.S. military plainly tilts toward the GOP. That’s largely because today’s military is an all-volunteer force increasingly drawn from the Sunbelt, where the Pentagon has focused its recruiting efforts since the draft ended 40 years ago. And traits the military prizes — like aggressiveness and respect for authority — tend to be more pronounced in conservatives.

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Rocketmedic said:

I think that anone arguing that the 2A should be taken literally should answer this question:

Do you want the young, angry white kid (that guy who never fit in and was always a little violent and weird in your or your kid's school) being able to obtain and own a grenade launcher?

Do you want your crazy anti-government doomsday-prepper anti-Arab anti-Semetic Stormfronting neighbor to be able to legally own a belt-fed HMG?

Why not napalm?

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As USAF Vet said in his reply. If those people are not criminals and are not planning nefarious use of those items and can afford to own them, why not?

What your proposing is Prior Restraint on an individual Right protected by the Constitution. What other Rights is Prior Restraint applied to? There should be none.

If you misuse a Right and infringe on the Rights of others, then there should be consequences for your actions.

Someone cold bloodily murders someone or many, they should never see the light of day again after conviction and their name should be erased from the annals of history.

Frank Ettin said:

Then you knowledge is deficient. Possession of radioactive material is strictly controlled by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission pursuant to 42 USC, Chapter 23, Division A, Subchapter IX, and regulations adopted pursuant thereto.

There are some exceptions for, for example, small quantities such as the tritium in the glass vial in our night sights or the small amounts in such things as the smoke detectors in our homes. But the manufacturers of such items must have licenses from the NRC.

Regulations of the NRC at 10 CFR, Part 70, set out specific license requirements for the possession of uranium-235 (contained in uranium enriched to 20 percent or more in the U[sup]235[/sup] isotope), uranium-233, and plutonium.

So it would be illegal for a private citizen to own an atomic or hydrogen bomb without the necessary license from the NRC, and he's not going to get one.

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I used the term "prohibited" carefully; as you point out, there is a licensing procedure that can be complied with ending ultimately in the approval for private entities to possess a nuclear weapon. It has been done thousands of times by private entities such as Northrop Grumman, Raytheon, etc...

But I take your point. The point I was attempting to make is this: Public arsenals are already in the possession of the entity our founders feared most, and the history of bloodshed by governments over the last century proves the wisdom of that fear.

While we quibble in this thread regarding which weapons we should empower the state to deny us, let's take a moment to read how prescient our founders were in recognizing the true threat:

https://www.hawaii.edu/powerkills/COM.ART.HTM

AlexanderA said:

yokel wrote:



You have to compare what Scalia did in Heller with what he could have done. A stronger result for gun owners would have been to base the 2nd Amendment right on the militia clause, with the proviso that the "militia" had universal membership. (That's in contravention to the minority justices, who would have held that the "militia" is limited to the National Guard.)

Such a result would include what Heller actually included (individual ownership of ordinary self-defense weapons) but it would also include the principle that the public could own the usual arms issued by the military. By necessity, that would mean that the National Firearms Act would be declared unconstitutional.

Clearly, that was much too extreme a position for Scalia. But that's what the Founders meant by the 2nd Amendment in 1791. So much for Scalia's famous "original intent." He did exactly what he decries in others, that is, "legislate from the bench."

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Again, the Heller majority opinion did indeed acknowledge the militia component in the majority opinion:

(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. [emphasis added].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.

And regardless of how gung ho any of the justices are about the right to keep and bear arms, a sweeping ruling on Second Amendment rights from Heller that would effectively strike down the NFA or GCA in one fell swoop is just a fanciful and unrealistic expectation.

Nom de Forum said:

Delusional far-right wing rhetoric that does nothing to promote increased support for preservation of Second Amendment rights. A classic example of a self-inflicted wound to the cause of supporting the RKBA. Oneounceload's comments will be considered outrageous, insulting, and alienating by many people that could be swayed to either side of the fight for the RKBA.

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"outrageous, insulting, and alienating" comments are exactly those that the 1st Amendment was intended to protect.