That is actually a very good point. The founders had a well-recognized antipathy to standing armies, primarily due to the standing army of Britain that had been the enforcers of the King’s rule, and the tramplers of the Colonies’ aspirations to liberty and self-determination, throughout the Colonial period. The state militias, which were to be comprised of the citizens themselves, to be called to duty when need arose, were conceived of as fulfilling the needs of a military without the threat of tyranny that a standing army was thought to pose.
Obviously, we’ve long since embraced standing, professional armies.
I believe the particular logical fallacy you are operating under is the false dilemma. The options in the gun control debate are not merely total deregulation or confiscation. There are any number of gun control measures that would not require law-abiding citizens to give up their guns.
I can handle that, but I don’t understand them. Guess that’s why we have lawyers, right? Does this mean that the second amendment is unequivocably a collective right? Or is it still up for grabs? English please.
I can handle that. Thou hast said it.
You GO girl! Thanks for finally letting us know you’re a lawyer, too. That helps.
Perhaps I should have phrased my comment more carefully. I’m only a measly B.A. Eng. grad and an M.A. in Cultural Anthropology, having taught both for TOO, TOO long. (Those who can’t do, teach. Attribute forgotten)
You can see why I value your input here, (though I’ve been taught never to trust lawyers).
I’m not trying to put you down, I’m not trying to dis you. I’m really trying to be friendly, cooperative, etc. I don’t feel that you are operating from that mode, I feel attacked. May be cause something that is SO obvious to you is not to me, whatever. I feel like I’m getting at least the second degree…
OK. My education can’t compare to yours. For an English professorship you claim, I’m surprised that you don’t hve a firmer grasp of modifying absolutes, but then different schools focus on different stuff, so it’s not outside the realm of possibility (that my undergrad school was better than your grad school… )
Only kidding.
Hey, I want to be friends. I think we can though we disagree on some issues. Really, I’m not trying to rile you or offend you, but your posts seem riled and offensive…
I, and most of the other people here, have NO legal background (other than traffic tickets). We can’t compete. Doesn’t mean our ideas are wrong. Can you be a bit less offensive in your posts? “Just the facts, Ma’am” (Joe Friday) Or is it your intention to put us down for not having the eduation you do?
I’m sure that in your heart you have Cecil’s imperitive: ‘To Conquer Ignorance.’ But if you talk in a language we don’t understand, we ain’t gonna get it, and ignorance won’t be conquered.
Shit no! Not if it’s Truth. I can admit to being wrong.
It’s looking that way, but I still can’t understand what he, or she - I’m not sure yet - is saying. If my clock needs cleaning, then clean away, and bill me later. I’d rather be on time then right. But what does it mean that it’s on the collective side? If the second amendment only guarantees a collective right, why haven’t our guns already been taken away? Sure, it is but what is it?
Are you accusing me of owning guns? Or are you referring to yourself?
I don’t own guns.
I support the right of law-abiding, firearm educated (and I don’t mean Hunter Safety) citizens to own guns personally and as a part of an unorganized “well-regulated” militia. (Are y’all aware that “regulated” in the late 1700’s early 1800’s was a euphamism for “armed;” kinda like saying a “well-heeled” militia.)
I have trained extensively with a variety of fireams, and I have carried a number of firearms in combat. I’m not unexperienced, but currently I choose to not own or carry guns. Though I have been thinking about it more and more since 9-11. It’s pretty isolated out here in Kahalu`u, and I don’t trust the military OR police to protect me. So far I haven’t felt the need for protection.
It means that the collective rights interpretation is the current state of Second Amendment law in the 1st, 4th, 6th, 7th, 8th, 9th, 10th, and 11th Circuits, and that the individual rights interpretation is the current state of the Second Amendment in the 5th Circuit. The 2nd and 3rd Circuits have not yet ruled on the issue, nor has the Supreme Court.
Guy, actually.
How, as an appeal to my own authority? So let it be written!
I said “instructor,” to be precise. Adjunct faculty member, whatever, but definitely not a prof.
I understand your objection. I merely reject it.
I argue vociferously, but bear you no grudge. However, I do dislike being told I’m incorrect on a matter of fact, or that it is reasonable to disagree with me on that matter of fact, when I have come forward with the evidence for my claim and the opposing party fails to marshal evidence in rebuttal. GD is a rigorous forum, so be prepared to back up your factual assertions or concede your error when shown to be wrong.
When your “idea” is an incorrect statement of the law, it certainly can mean that your idea is wrong. You prefer the individual rights interpretation? Great. Just don’t claim that’s the law, 'cause by and large it ain’t. And if you do make that claim, be prepared to back it up when somebody provides evidence that you’re wrong.
Also, regarding this idea of “we can’t compete” . . . yes, you can. Those opinions are written in English. There is nothing unclear about the Silveira court’s statement that it rejects the individual rights interpretation in favor of the collective rights model, and you had a perfectly easy time identifying and quoting the relevant language of Emerson that went the other way. There is nothing magic about reading legal opinions, at least when you’re dealing with such simple concepts as individual vs. collective.
Oh, you’re right. I am a stuck up jerk. Thanks for clearing that up as part of your quest for peace.
I really can’t imagine any plausible scenario, in America, where the local police would be on one side of the barricades and the federal troops on the other. Anyhow, it makes no difference. In such a scenario, the Army would win and the police would lose. Remember who has the tanks and the flamethrowers.
Personal ownership of firearms does absolutely nothing to protect the people from government tyranny. No matter how well the people are armed, the Army will always be armed better. The Iraqi people (at least, the males) were pretty well armed (with AK-47s, not uncommonly) during all the years of Saddam Hussein’s rule, but that didn’t make it possible for them to resist him. Remember what happened when Bush I encouraged the Kurds, Shi’ites, and other dissidents to rise up against Hussein in 1991: They all got stomped; and the Kurds, afterwards, were able to hang on to a tenuous regional independence only because the U.S. gave them limited air cover.
caid mile failte - or actually a hundred thousand thank you’s. That I can understand.
Oops. :o
I disagree. In my experience, I can’t. I tried, and I couldn’t. Even the “English” is not what I would call standard English.
Again I disagree. Certainly I wouldn’t call you a jerk, I’ve seen jerks here already. I would say perhaps that you were reactive, intolerant and vehement, but not a jerk.
That was in reference to myself. I have more guns than Alec Baldwin and less than, say…Nicaragua.
The collective argument, as upheld in the courts, generally goes something like “the States have the right to maintain militias.” These are assumed to be the National Guard. SCOTUS has never ruled on the 2nd Amendment very specifically, and really, neither the gun-grabbers nor the NRA want it to. As long as the issue is up for grabs, both sides get headlines, donations, power as lobbyists, and the illusion that they are the side “Blessed By God.” If SCOTUS ever gave a definitive ruling, one group would be out of business. So it behooves both sides to fight the battle on a lower level. Think Vietnam vs MAD. Do you think Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton want a color-blind America? Hell, no! They’d have to go back to selling used cars if that happened. Same thing with HCI & the NRA.
Personally, I could give a rip. I’m not giving up my firearms under any circumstances. Period. “Cold, dead fingers,” and all that.
How can you say that? You don’t know anything about me, yet I’m being lumped in with the “cold, dead finger” crowd who sit cross-legged in front of their doors, cradling an AR-15, dreaming of The Day when government agents come crashing in so they can shoot 'em full of holes just to justify the need for an assault rifle. Maybe you don’t appreciate how insulting this is.
That’s an extremist interpretation of the absolute worst case scenario, and it ignores what I’ve said TWICE now about my position:
The Bill of Rights, including the 2nd Amendment, makes it so I don’t HAVE to worry about the day when the Government storms my home because BY LAW it’s not supposed to happen unless I give them a reason. I can say what I want, practice religion how I choose, and protect myself how I see fit (and I feel the need to point out AGAIN that I’m not a gun owner) and be safe in the knowledge that the HIGHEST LAW OF THE LAND backs me up. What’s more, since the people IN the Federal Government are citizens themselves, they benefit from it just as much as I do, which really puts us all on the same side. Therefore, as I said before, the “insurrection” scenario should never come to pass. The government is not the enemy of the people as a result. We may bump into each other from time to time, but it’s because of individual failings and not anything institutional.
I’d like to add that I see the BIG difference between the 2nd Amendment and the other amendments is that we’re protecting actions vs. protecting words and thoughts, and guns can be instantly fatal and ideas are not. I don’t have an answer on how to fix that. But I really don’t think taking away the 2nd Amendment is the answer.
If the “insurrection scenario” should never come to pass, and self-defense against criminals is not what people need guns for, then what difference does it make whether you have a constitutionally protected right to bear arms or not? You seem to be thinking, though you never make this clear, that the known existence of arms among the populace has some kind of deterrent effect on the government. Think again, ElectricZ. Private gun ownership does absolutely nothing to prevent or deter government tyranny. Do you think that when John Ashcroft sent the PATRIOT Act to Congress, he lost any sleep over the possibility that true patriots with weapons would somehow obstruct its enforcement? Anyone who tried would shortly lose all his or her civil rights, and by due process of law at that. You know it, I know it, and Ashcroft knows it.
An important difference between the First Amendment and the Second Amendment: The right to free speech is one you can actually exercise, and you can do your country some good, and probably more good than harm, by exercising it. Some would say you have a duty to exercise it, to speak out in protest whenever you see something going on that isn’t right; that’s necessary for a healthy republic. But you can exercise your right to bear arms – “exercise” in the sense of using your weapons rather than merely keeping them in a case – only by:
Shooting animals, for food or for sport.
Shooting, or threatening to shoot, dangerous criminals who are endangering you.
Actually being a dangerous criminal and shooting, or threatening to shoot, your victims.
Shooting, or threatening to shoot, agents of the government.
The first two of these are relatively harmless and defensible. The second two are . . . not.
Actually, this is not as far-fetched as you make it out. No, I am not advocating taking pot-shots at the mailman. But the presence of arms in the hands of comman citizens does act as a check on governmental whims. Any actions taken by the government against the rights of the citizens have to be implemented slowly and carefully. We regard the erosion of rights with apathy. If the government tried to do what they have done all at once, there would be open rebellion. Do it slowly, and they can get away with it. Guns make them move slowly. Against an unarmed populace, the government acts with impunity.
If it ever came to open rebellion by a significant portion of the populace, I would expect a large percentage of the volunteer military to refuse to fire on civilians, armed or otherwise. So guns do make a difference.
Because no one has passed a law requiring all privately owned guns to be confiscated. Some subset of guns, yes, and they had to make the case that these particular weapons did not merit second ammendment protection. Still, the legislature is the ones who make these laws and they haven’t done anything to try to take all privately-owned firearms away, so the courts have remained silent on the issue. The court can’t decide if some law that doesn’t exist is or is not constitutional. Courts only rule when a law is challenged. No law, no challenge, no ruling.
Guns don’t make them move slowly, silenus. Guns in the hands of the people don’t scare our leaders one little bit. They might scare the cops and FBI agents who might, under some circumstances, actually have to face the bullets – but they mostly expect they can do that and live through it and boost their careers by racking up experience under fire. What makes our leaders move slowly is not the threat of armed rebellion but the threat of challenges in the courts and at the polls.
Furthermore – if, as you say, the worst encroachments on our civil liberties are those that the government slips in by stealthy, gradual stages – then why should you want them to “move slowly”? Wouldn’t you prefer a scenario where they act drastically and precipitously, and provoke the people into fighting back?
It worked that way in the Soviet Union in 1990. It wouldn’t work that way in the United States, now or in the next 50 years. Our government is much more popular at home than the Soviet government was. If the militiamen out West, the Montana Freemen or whatever, succeeded in sparking a rebellion, and a lot of their neighbors joined in, then both the National Guard troops and the Army troops would, without hesitation, obey their orders to fire. Just like they would follow orders if called in to quell an urban uprising like the L.A. riots. And, in either case, if the people they were ordered to shoot were armed and shooting back, that would make it all that much easier.
Exactly so, Mtgman. And the pool of possible cases is diminished even further because only a federal gun control measure would be within the scope of the Second Amendment. The Supreme Court ruled in the late 19th Century that the Second Amendment does not apply against the states. That was before the Court started the process of incorporating certain other provisions of the Bill of Rights to function against the states via the Due Process clause of the 14th Amendment, but the holdings have never been reversed as to the Second Amendment.
Slow is better. That gives courts a chance to overturn, elections to undo, and all sorts of legal procedures to take place to halt the erosion of rights. Slow is good.
I have no wish for there to be open insurrection in this country.
The entire population of Montana, Wyoming and Alaska combined isn’t a significant portion of the population.
Your assumption that the Army and National Guard would act is totally unfounded and without any basis in fact. They have never had to deal with shooting civilians, and I doubt very much whether they would blindly obey orders to do so.
Any government so unpopular as to provoke an armed rebellion by a significant portion of the population would not command the loyalty of the military. You said so yourself with your example of the Soviet Union.
And the Soviet people weren’t armed, were they? They didn’t have to fight the Red Army; all they had to do was get up in their faces and yell at them. It worked.
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