And what the hell do you think is going to happen next if some idiot takes out a “rogue” county sheriff? This isn’t some poorly written men’s novel where the Guy In The White Stetson takes the badge off the body of evil Sheriff Whiplash, pins it on himself, and the grateful townsfolk cheer. You fuck with a county sheriff like that and the Feds will be down before you have time to reload.
A local law enforcement officer wearing make-up?
Okay, seriously, I think the concept of armed resistance has to imply resistance to the national government. Because your county is supposed to be overseen by your state and your state is overseen by Washington. So if you recognize the authority of these higher level governments, you have no claim to rebel against your local government. A rebellion against any level of government is a tacit claim that you’re defying the government all the way up.
I don’t really understand how someone can object to the right to take arms against the government. What harm does it do? Yes, there are nations who are doing just fine without that right, but are they better off for not having it? I don’t think so. Sure, you just trust no one will fall off a ledge, and the vast majority of the time no one will, but what’s the harm in putting up some rails? Whether it is necessary or not is not important, should we be limited to a bare minimal set of safety, or in this case rights?
It all boils down to trust. I’d wager a pro-2nd Amendment person can envision a scenario where they can’t trust the government and must take matters into their own hands, whereas an anti-2nd Amendment person would probably find that hard to believe.
It’s better to have X and not need it, then need one and not have it, after all. In this case X just happens to be armaments, and the 2nd Amendment gives us that explicit right to it.
Or rouge angles of Satin.
I could equally point out that the local crack addict is supposed to be overseen by me local police department. So if I defend myself from the local crack addict when he tries to rape me, that is a tacit claim that you’re defying the government all the way up.
That may be true if that’s the way you choose look at it, but such a position adds little to the discussion. There are situations when I cannot avail myself of the normal chain of oversight in a timely manner, and situations where the chain of oversight breaks down. Those are simply facts.
A Black man in 1940 may have had recourse to defend himself from a lynch mob that happened to contain the local sheriff. A hotel owner in in 1930 may have had recourse to defend themself from a corrupt police officer in the pay of a gangster. In those circumstances there was no recourse to any overseeing body, yet you would argue that someone defending themself in those situations was in open rebellion against the US government, which seems extremely hyperbolic.
The whole point of the Amendment is to provide protection for situations when the system of justice and oversight breaks down. Under those circumstances, no matter how much recourse to overseeing bodies individuals may have on paper, they are unlikely to have any in practice.
When it prospers.
The point is not “guns” per se, but the practical means to resist oppression, whether that be halberds, flintlocks, or plasma rifles. It’s a second line of defense for individual liberties, in case the first line (free speech and free press) fails.
And it does. There is a reason that historically, most gun control laws in the US were aimed at blacks: in the reconstruction south, the press was not an adequate defense for the rights of freedmen, who were obliged to take up arms.
It’s certainly true that you can have some level of liberty with a disarmed populace: blacks in Jim Crow south still had *some *rights respected, and of course, much of Europe is relatively free now (though I’m always leery of assuming that recent trends are sustainable; and in the scale of history, 50 years is recent). It’s possible that that could be replicated in the US. But not, I suspect, the kind of society the framers desired.
Then again, most people nowadays don’t really want the kind of radical freedom that most of the framers envisioned, either, so in that sense, I think you could argue that it is obsolete.
It wasn’t guns that ended Jim Crow, unless you count the guns held by the 101st Airborne in Little Rock, AK.
How do you resist oppression with a 9mm Glock*? 99% of 2nd amendment discussion revolves around two topics, handguns and dangerous looking rifles, neither of which have squat to do with resisting oppression or guaranteeing the security of a free state.
*Besides waving it around prior to being shot dead by the authorities.
I can envision a scenario when you have to take matters into your own hands. But like I said in the OP, that’s revolution and then you tear up the Constitution and start over.
It’s better to have a tank and not need it, yet the 2nd amendment doesn’t give us the right to a tank. Simply from a practical matter, the guns we are allowed to have under the 2nd amendment will be useless in a rebellion against the US government.
I have no problem with people owning guns, and I would vote for legislation allowing gun ownership. I’m not anti-gun. I just don’t think we need to tie the government’s hands when it comes to regulating them. Gun laws that make sense in NYC aren’t going to make sense in Casper, WY. It’s a local issue, and should be decided that way.
The gun rights crowd can’t have it both ways. They can’t say the Founders were all knowing and we need to perpetually suck their infallible dicks, but at the same time they threw a random clause into an amendment for no reason whatsoever. Until recently, the collectivist interpretation was the mainstream interpretation of this ill-written amendment, only when the right wing took over the Supreme Court and made it a political instrument did the individualist interpretation become codified.
Yes. Without that Constitutional protection the right would not exist any longer. The very point of the Constitution’s protections is that it was recognized that those rights were at risk, else why did they specifically give them protection? If there were no possibility of the loss of freedom of speech there would be no need to protect it, yes?
Nobody regards them as Constitutional rights because they are not in need of protection. Nobody is trying to take away the right to own an automobile or a television.
The idea of resistance against government tyranny is certainly quaint, but it’s arguable that the 2nd Amendment was ever intended for that purpose. Keep in mind that in 1812 the US was invaded and a war was fought for three years, which would be a prime example of what I believe they were talking about. The “free state” was challenged from without, not from within. With regard to personal defense against crime, every person is entitled to defend themselves. Every person. A firearm is simply one way, and arguably the best way, of doing that.
I’ve said this before and I will say it again. Military members are US citizens as well. Were the United States to engage in revolution the military would fracture all the same, and the oath is to the Constitution, not to the government. A citizen militia would not have to stand up to a modern military, they would be augmenting the portion of the military that chooses to participate in the revolution, who would presumably bring weapons with them.
I will absolutely acknowledge the truth of that. However, I disagree with your conclusion. Crime is not something that exists because of firearms, and taking guns away will not diminish crime in any way. What it will do is take away (IMHO) the best means of self-defense for millions of people.
It IS decided that way, John. The only thing that the recent Supreme Court decisions did was affirm the right of people to own weapons that they were told they could not have. It did not overturn the government’s right to control them. The Sullivan Act is still in place in New York City, the Roberti-Roos Assault Weapons Control Act of 1989 is still in place in California, etc. The government cannot deny you a handgun but they can definitely tell you where you may have it and which ones you can have. That we argue over those details is irrelevant to the basic right to own one to begin with. Without the 2nd Amendment we wouldn’t even be having that argument, they’d all be gone.
I know that there is a large contingent of people that would be OK with that, but fortunately that doesn’t matter. There are a lot of things that I don’t care for that you have the right to do, but I absolutely respect your right to do it.
I think that as written it may well be an anachronism.
I’d like to see it amended to read: " The absolute right of the people to secure, keep, and bear arms may not be infringed upon by the federal government. Understanding that modern warfare has necessitated the creation of weaponry capable of great destruction, and such arms were never intended for civilian use, it is the right of the states to restrict the number and type of arms available to it’s untrained citizenry; provided that such restrictions are approved by a majority of the state legislature, and do not infringe upon the absolute right provided for above."
[QUOTE=BobLibDem]
The gun rights crowd can’t have it both ways. They can’t say the Founders were all knowing and we need to perpetually suck their infallible dicks, but at the same time they threw a random clause into an amendment for no reason whatsoever. Until recently, the collectivist interpretation was the mainstream interpretation of this ill-written amendment, only when the right wing took over the Supreme Court and made it a political instrument did the individualist interpretation become codified.
[/QUOTE]
But there WAS a reason for it. It’s almost like we aren’t supposed to know that there were several early versions of the Amendment that separated the two parts, but that they were shortened and put together in the final way that we all know and love by committee. 
And it’s almost like we don’t have the writings and papers of the men who wrote the Amendment that pretty clearly demonstrate exactly what their intent was.
And I say this without tongue in cheek, because it IS like we don’t know all that stuff, and that a lot of the folks who have for decades tried to use this ridiculous argument as a wedge to remove personal ownership of firearms based on this interpretation DIDN’T seem to know any of this stuff…or care.
-XT
Ya’ll may wish to learn about a period of American history called “reconstruction.” Easy to miss, only lasted 50 years over about 1/3 of the country.
Yes, I think this is largely correct: in trying to ensure that powers remained in the hands of the people, the Framers were deliberately leaving the door open to starting over, by violent revolution if absolutely need be.
That wasn’t the goal, obviously, but they were very much concerned that the government they were creating would wind up just as bad as the one they deposed, and that their grandchildren would be back in the same position. And having just had to resort to arms themselves, against a colonial power that had tried to disarm them, they logically wished their descendants to have the same break-glass-in-emergency option.
It’s always relevent to bear in mind that the founding generation nearly all thought of themselves as Virginians, etc., first, and Americans second.
You keep saying this, but history does not bear it out. The Viet Cong were massively outgunned, as were the Mujahadin, as were the 13 colonies. There is a long, long history of guerrilla warfare being effective against technologically superior enemies.
No, it’s not. Else this legislation would not have been overturned.
People have already agreed with you that it is not on par with freedom of speech or the right to due process. The state governments have been handling gun ownership ‘rights’ for a long time now.
Again, the government has the right to regulate, not to ban. The government can mandate appearance (your typical assault weapons “ban”), magazine capacity, even caliber (.50 BMG “ban” in California), but they cannot simply decide that you, Mr. US Citizen, cannot have a weapon of whatever type AT ALL. Moreover, the overturning didn’t come as a result of an outright ban because even when the law was written the government knew they couldn’t just come out and say it. No, the law was overturned because the went the weaselly backdoor ban route. Sure, you can have one, but you have to register it first. What? You can’t register it? Looks like you don’t get to have one. It was an administrative, not legal, ban.
In any event, you will be happy to know that DC is still incredibly oppressive with regard to firearms and that the number of people willing to waste several weeks of their life trying to get a firearm legal in DC is very small.