Should Dueling be illegal?

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It's amazing to find out all the duels that happened among are early American leaders, I believe Abraham Lincoln almost found himself in a duel after critizing someone....he learned after that, its said, that he chose his words more carefully when it came to being critical....they probably believed it was normal an right back then...but then again they thought slavery was ok too..
 
Duels in the 1700's and early 1800's were for the most part between gentlemen held in a code of honor. Andy "by God" Jackson dueled a guy (forget his name) who drew first and shot first at Jackson but missed. Of course being a gentleman, upholding the code of honor, he stood there for Jackson to fire at him. Jackson could now take careful aim..............he did, and didn't miss.
 
Dueling as a contract with potentially lethal consequences, agreed to between two consenting individuals of sound mind, should be legal.

Is it stupid? Yes.
Is it unnecessary? Yes.
Are there better ways to resolve conflict? Yes.

However, there should be no reason to interfere with two consenting adults from engaging in mutual combat, be it in a boxing ring with gloves, or a field with pistols, so long as nobody else is directly harmed or put in danger from said combat. It falls under the same auspices as suicide: It's usually selfish and illogical, but by no means does that make it any less of a right for an individual to decide his own fate.
 
It was very common for both participants to fire into the air thus demonstrating their courage and honor so everyone could go drinking. Hamilton fired into the air, Burr then shot and killed him.

PS - suicide is illegal
 
Threads like this are why antis troll THR for material.
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No way. Those who are anti gun don't need fuel. Not this type of fuel. They know there won't be long lines of people wanting to try their hand at dueling.
 
Many of the post here make it sound like dueling doesn't involve two guys firing handguns at each other.

That's what I've always thought dueling was.
Don't the Bloods and Crips do this everyday on the streets of L.A.?
Worst case scenario, two guys die of gunshot wounds. Yeah, that should be legal.:rolleyes:
 
I should not feed a troll. But I think Dueling is a part of History long ago and is illegal, crazy and dumb today.

Hell, most people get into gunfights over very minor slights and insults so fast there is no time to count down from 10 to 9.
 
That whole "gentlemen's code of honor" deal largely applied only to people of one's own social class or better. Through most of the time period where "gentlemen" dueled, that meant being born to the dueling class.
 
I think we should start by making fist fights legal first. Two grown, consenting men can't even kick each others a$$e$ anymore without both of them getting arrested.

The fact remains, it doesn't matter how evolved we think society is, some people still need to have their a$$ kicked. Unfortunately, the worst they might get for their reckless behavior is a ticket or something.
 
You know how to tell who the winner and the loser of a knife fight is? The loser dies on the scene and the winner dies in the hospital..





The thought of dueling being legal is interesting, albeit it a stupid way to settle things. If two people want to do it then so be it, as long as there is 0 chance of anyone else being hurt. You sure as heck wouldn't find me in one.
 
Bullet points (no doubt with pun intended) were asked for earlier.

First one is that you have a situation where two people are engaged in a specific premeditated act of grivious violence. Which is then further complicated by other persons in accomplice of said actions.

More telling for Americans is that it also rather requires a codified social strata where there are those, granted by birth, the rights of high an low justice. Since they have inherited the status of being justicars innately, they can dispense with trivialities such as crimial conspiracy and aiding & abetting. Also has an ugly side of not needing to "bother" with the formal rules if offended by a person of lower social status, they can be killed for the offense per se.

Now, in favor of the supposition, it did serve as a rather crude form of birth control for the clumsy, lazy, rude, and inept members of the aristocrasy--a cohort often in dire need of culling. Now, perhaps if we could get the celebritards to state engaging in the practice . . .
 
it is not a good way to settle disputes at all, but I think it's all these laws stopping the stupid people from controlling their own population that is what got us where we are today. If someone is unintelligent enough to want to take part in a duel I say let them. The quote I always love:
"I’m not saying there should be a capital punishment for stupidity, but why don’t we just take the safety labels off of everything and let the problem solve itself?"
 
It should be legal, not only is it a great means for hot heads to deal with their issues without innocent bystanders getting hurt but I think you'd see people being more polite as well.
 
Capnmac well said. But you don't touch on the issue of consent. Boxing meets your first definition. Consent and harm are rather fundamental principles of justice. The matter of harm can be legally 'waived' by explicit witnessed consent.

Re: classes, they already exist in a very big way, and they would not negate the need for consent.
 
More telling for Americans is that it also rather requires a codified social strata where there are those, granted by birth, the rights of high an low justice. Since they have inherited the status of being justicars innately, they can dispense with trivialities such as crimial conspiracy and aiding & abetting. Also has an ugly side of not needing to "bother" with the formal rules if offended by a person of lower social status, they can be killed for the offense per se.
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This bears repetition. As I already mentioned upthread: You are born to the duelling class. All that etiquette and code duello and other fooferallity was reserved for other gentlemen. Those not of the aristocracy, which would be pretty much everybody here, could be flogged (by retainers since a gentleman wouldn't soil his hands that way) or simply killed if he offended a gentleman. Common folk couldn't even duel with each other without running afoul of the law. When gentlemen did it, it was a duel and an affair of honor. When common folk did it, it was brawling and breach of the peace and, possibly, murder.
Those who romanticize duelling today are almost entirely descended from the lower classes who were never permitted to do so.
 
yes--but restricted to lawyers and politicians

forget 'restricted' -- it should be mandatory.
 
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