*Originally posted by Sssssssnake *
Do you have a cite for this?
As far as I can determine, “to regulate” has always meant “to impose controls on”.
RM,
I appreciate you noticing that little detail! 
Sirreal72’s posting was very good and rather mirrors my own beliefs. I don’t much care for political parties myself. In the end we all wind up losers though there’s no real alternative to them. But like Sirreal72, I judge an issue on it’s merits, not it’s politics. I’m pro-gun and pro-choice. And I dislike government regulating behavior. If killers were dealt with correctly the first time, there’d be no repeat offenders, right? There would be no worries about people with known proclivities towards killing buying a gun on a streetcorner. It would also help if citizens were more responsible about telling the police things they’ve seen or know about. With time, the numbers of gun-related deaths would go down through attrition.
The war on drugs has never been won and never will be. And while the government could conceivably try and disarm the legal gun owners in this country, there’s no more chance of getting illegal weapons off the streets than there is of getting drugs off. -Rod-
USAPatriot hit on the real crux of the matter, though I’m not sure how much he was aware of it.
It really doesn’t matter what the Constitution (or anything else) says. What matters is how any particular court interprets the law on any particular occasion, with more weight given to the accumulated tradition of precedents than to the plain(?) meaning of the original law.
Now then, my own attempt at muddying the waters: I don’t think the Second Amendment had anything to do with the question of personal gun ownership. “Bearing arms” sounds like a synonym for military service (in this case, militia service). Keeping a Colt under your pillow is not “bearing arms”; it’s an act of self-protection, or paranoia, or amusement, etc. To bear arms, you need to join an organized effort to run the Redcoats out of New England, or Saddam out of Iraq, or the FBI out of Idaho, or whatever…
Sorry, I don’t think that holds up.
A well-regulated militia, being necessary for the security of a free state, the right of the people to join the militia, shall not be infringed.
It certainly says something different.
Justify “bear arms” as meaning something other than “carry/own weapons”. To bear is to carry, and arms are armaments, or weapons. That part seems straightforward. And what wording would you have had them use instead, to mean own guns? I don’t think they wanted to limit that to any particular class of weapons. The right to bear firearms* would exclude other weapons, from swords and bows to what might eventually be the replacement for them. The right to bear muskets would have been even more limited.
Of course with this reading, maybe what they meant wasn’t that anyone can own weapons, but everyone has the right to carry whatever they like. Go down to the local armory and check out the communal weapon of your choice. “I think I’ll tote around a rocket launcher today.” 
The trouble with the Second Amendment is not understanding what it means, nor what the people who adopted it intended through making it law. Both are relatively plain to students of English 16th, 17th and 18th centuries history.
The trouble with the amendment is that it can’t be allowed currently to mean what it originally did, because there wasn’t the possibility of carrying around a personal anti-aircraft rocket or a suitcase sized nuclear weapon then, let alone automatic and semi-automatic weapons and the like. Because we find it very difficult to overcome inertia when amending our federal constitution, the Supreme Court has spent the last roughly 70 years intentionally mis-interpreting the meaning of the Amendment, as well as totally ignoring it whenever possible. But, as even the formerly staunchly pro-regulation Professor Lawrence Tribe has recently concluded in the latest edition of his hornbook on constitutional law, the right embodied in the Second Amendment is a personal right, held by the individual, preventing the federal government from taking his weapon away.
Fortunately, no court has insisted that this right was ever integrated selectively into the 14th Amendment’s “due process” clause. States can regulate the hell out of guns, and should.
Then they should try to change it.
You mean the one that says “No state shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States”?
Maybe it’s not the public schools fault that kids can’t read.
I sense a lot of emotion creeping into this debate. Liberalism is an art, which is why there are “Liberal Arts” colleges.
In reference to BJMoose’s glowing worship of precedent in the courts, the fact is, * stare decisis* is a farce. It deprives citizens of due process since the court can simply take a fallback position and say that the matter was decided previously and therefore not consider a current case in full. Court opinion, while it may be useful in determining how a court arrived at a decision, is in itself not law. A court need only rule in favor or against a case or petition. The ruling is the law, not the logic behind it.
People may, and often do, argue about nukes, tanks, chemical weapons, automatic or semiautomatic weapons, all sorts of issues. It’s all smoke and mirrors…and emotion. People should actually take the time to READ (now there’s a concept) the federal laws that govern various weapons and see what the facts are.
Comparing the XIV Amendment, Section I (I trust some of you kids can read roman numerals…) to the States regulation of firearms one easily finds that RM Mentock is 100% correct in his questioning. The second amendment right does not need to be selectively integrated because it is not selectively excluded. Nor has any other right as they are supposed to carry equal weight. But just try and tell that to the ACLU, who insists on 100% compliance with the first amendment but whom gives lip service to the second, only referencing to the 1939 Supreme Court.
As an aside, I HAVE fired in self-defense. So has my father. Some 2 million others did, in the year 2001, as well. Wanna bet Matthew Shepard would have used a 9 mil the night he died if he’d had one? -Rod-
The ACLU website has a list of Issues: Criminal Justice, Cyber-Liberties, Death Penalty, Disability Rights, Drug Policy, Free Speech, HIV/AIDS, Immigrants Rights, Int’l Civil Liberties, Lesbian & Gay Rights, National Security, Police Practices, Prisons, Privacy & Technology, Racial Equality, Religious Liberty, Reproductive Rights, Rights of the Poor, Students Rights, Voting Rights, Women’s Rights, Workplace Rights, Safe and Free.
I’m not sure if any one of them involves gun control. The link to Safe and Free seems to be about Homeland Security and the Patriot Act.
If you do a search on the The ACLU website, for “Second Amendment” (Or perhaps “2nd Amendment” I don’t recall which) you’ll find their policy on it. The last time I looked, about 3 months ago, that was the single hit. They totally ignore the issue. -Rod-
The reference to the Privileges and Immunities clause of the 14th Amendment is incorrect. A “right” is not a “privilege”, nor is it an “immunity”. The fact that the Supreme Court of the United States rendered the P & I clause meaningless some 130 years ago is also of note.
And don’t bother to say that the clause “should” be read differently; you might as well join up with poor David and his insistence that the First Amendment precludes any hint of religious entanglement by government. The fact remains that the right contained in the Second Amendment exists only against the federal government. State governments are governed by the respective constitutions of the individual states, some of which do include provisions regarding the right or lack thereof to keep and bear arms.
Finally, the rant of USAPatriot about stare decisis shows both lack of understanding of how a legal system ruled by precedent is run as well as a lack of comprehension as to how difficult it can be to live in systems that aren’t ruled by precedent. While it certainly can be occaisionally annoying to have to overcome the inertia of past decisions, it beats hell out of having the law change with every incoming administration.
Not that one expects people with a position they want to hold in the face of rational discussion to care…
Exactly
The Lawyer speaketh Thusly:
“While it certainly can be occaisionally annoying to have to overcome the inertia of past decisions, it beats hell out of having the law change with every incoming administration.”
You really should pay more attention to the world around you. The law DOES change with every administration. If Bush is uninvited from the white house in 2004, the tax cuts the congress just implemented will get rewritten and we’ll wind up with a tax hike instead.
As for my so-called rant, you actually made my point and made it very well: The Supreme Court as well as the inferior courts have been rewriting the Constitution at will and in direct violation of the same Constitution they have sworn to protect. Read Article V. The notion that the courts have tossed out the XIV Amendment SHOULD cause you great alarm. But since the doing so fits with your liberal politics, you just smile and say “Cool Dude!”. -Rod-
To everyone claiming that the states should be running gun laws:
"Amendment X
The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people." (http://www.archives.gov/exhibit_hall/charters_of_freedom/bill_of_rights/amendments_1-10.html)
This amendment is what says the individual states are not supposed to regulate guns. Because the right to keep and bear arms is specifically granted in Amendment II, it definitely does not fall into the domain of state regulation. Oddly enough, people argue that other things, e.g. abortion, are Constitutional rights, but if you take what the Constitution says, that’s dead wrong. To continue with my example, abortion is not mentioned in the U.S. Constitution or its amendments, so it is something that is supposed to be regulated as the states see fit.
Um, kunoichi, nice try, incorrect analysis.
Just because a person has a right not to have the federal government do something doesn’t mean that he has an unfettered right which the states cannot infringe as well. The 10th Amendment merely means that the United States cannot do anything it has not specifically been allowed to do by the Constitution, and the states are allowed to control anything not specifically prohibited them in the Constitution. Thus, for instance, the federal government can provide and maintain a Navy, because Article I Section 8 says it can; by contrast, states cannot coin money because Article I Section 10 says specifically they can’t. The federal government cannot create jurisdiction in its courts to try cases not covered by the jurisdictional grant of Article III, Section 2, or any jurisdictional grant from any amendment to the Constitution; the power is reserved to the states.
The power of the states to control gun ownership is not affected by this amendment in any way, because the power of controlling gun ownership is not prohibited to the states by the Constitution.
As for USAPatriot’s commentary, how silly. What happens from a legislative standpoint has nothing to do with how the Constitution is interpreted, or how common law develops. And I did not say that the courts had tossed out the 14th Amendment; in actuality they use it quite regularly to defeat efforts by both liberal and conservative governments to infringe on the basic rights of individuals. I merely said that the privileges and immunities clause was interpreted by the Supreme Court some 130 years agao as not having much effect upon the ability of government to regulate conduct. There are some limited privileges and immunities which have been identified, but the bulk of the work of protecting individuals is carried by the due process and equal protection clauses, and who is to say that is an inherently incorrect interpretation of law?
If you are going to argue legal distinctions, including those arising out of the Constitution, at least get the law correct.
Except, of course, by the Second, to whatever extent it is able.
THE SECOND AMENDMENT DOES NOT APPLY TO THE STATES. What part of that simple concept are you failing to comprehend, RM Mentock?
Be nice DS. It’s one thing to tell someone they’re wrong, it’s another to act like you’re infallible. Typing in all caps is just rude, unless you don’t know any better…
But anyway, in response to my previous post, were you trying to say then that the individual states can go ahead and limit our constitutional rights? Let’s take another amendment as a case in point, for example, Amendment IV.
"Amendment IV
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized."
Now, most people will agree without a doubt that they don’t want the state governments ransacking their homes without warrants. Any state that would pass a law saying otherwise should technically not be allowed, as such a law would directly violate U.S. Constitutional rights. If they go ahead and do so, a “victim” of such a law can potentially appeal it to the Supreme Court, who would then declare it unconstitutional.
Of course, in practice, things might be different. Plessy v. Ferguson and Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas are some other examples of how the U.S. Constitution does indeed apply to the states’ abilities to pass laws.
The amendments do limit what the states can do–that’s clear. Do you mean that the second does not say that Federal government cannot regulate the ownership of arms by the States?
Maybe I’ll try that again without so many negatives…no, can’t.
How come the US Government allows states to restrict our freedom regarding the Second Amendment yet if individual states tried passing laws restricting freedom of speech, freedom of the press, etc, those laws would be ruled unconstitutional in a heartbeat?
A little constitutional law knowledge would allow the last three posters to understand the reason that the Second Amendment does not apply to states but states are not free to restrict speech. A hint as to the answer has already been brought up in earlier posts, under discussion of the issue of “selective incorporation”.
It is important to understand that the First through Eighth Amendments apply to the federal government only, a principle which has been confirmed for 170 years, though it was obvious from the drafting of the Amendments. See Barron v. The Mayor and City Council of Baltimore, 32 U. S. (7 Pet.) 243 (1833). After passage of the Fourteenth Amendment, assertions were made that it incorporated all the protections of the first eight amendments, limiting state government in the same way the federal government was limited. However, this assertion has been consistently rejected by the Supreme Court. Instead, that court has interpreted the due process clause of the 14th Amendment as including rights from the first eight amendments which are considered fundamental to the American system of law. Three specific guarantees of the first eight amendments have specifically been held by the court NOT to be included in the meaning of the due process clause: grand jury indictments (Hurtado v. California, 110 U.S. 516 (1884)), civil common law jury trials (Minneapolis & St. Louis R.R. Co. v. Bombolis, 241 U.S. 211 (1916)), and the right to keep and bear arms (United States v. Cruikshank, 92 U.S. 542, 553 (1876)).
Now, I apologize for some frustration and pedanticism in discussing this here and previously, but it stems from the fact that this is very basic constitutional law, which anyone who intends to seriously debate or discuss constitutional issues should understand. They aren’t issues that are controversial, being well-settled principles of long-standing nature (despite the disdain which one earlier poster had for stare decisis, we see that it has some value). They leave an abundance of room for discussion of the Second Amendment. For instance, some states also include a provision about weapon ownership in their own constitutions, while others don’t, providing fertile ground for organization of efforts to include the provision in those constitutions lacking it. And, as we have seen elsewhere in the board, there is plenty of room to discuss such things as the extent of the meaning of “infringe”, “arms” and “keep and bear.” But let’s at least do so in a message board involving the effort to fight ignorance with a basic understanding of the underlying principles of constitutional law applicable to the situation.