it was nice of you to provide all those links. However, I have heard all those arguments and reject them. Well regulated means just what it says and it does not have a damn thing to do with clocks. There is no “unorganized militia” in the real world. Or have I been a secret member of an “unorganized baseball team” all these years but nobody bothered to tell me about that one either.
You guys like to pick and carefully select which portions of the Constitution you like and even which parts of which sentences you like as well. If a word gets in the way, you change the meaning of it just like you are trying to do with “well regulated” or “militia”.
And then you wonder why we cannot actually talk with each other?
It’s funny how in one post you talk about how things mean what they say, except when you think they don’t mean what they say, but that you can’t talk to us because we try to change the meanings of words to suit our purposes.
You start a thread in which you call murderers “second amendment heros”, implying that gun rights advocates glorify murder, and then you try to tell us that you are the voice of moderation and reason and that it’s our fault that we can’t have an honest, reasonable dialogue.
You are not being reasonable and I don’t think this will change. Your views are unchallengable (that is to say that you cannot critically evaluate your own views on this, so we’re arguing past you), and you misrepresent your intentions in this argument.
Really? I do not see that. I see myself as taking the entire Second Amendment and looking at what the word MILITIA meant in 1789. I see myself as looking at the word ARMS and what it meant in 1789. I see myself as looking at the words WELL REGULATED and what those words meant in 1789.
The facts are that we no longer have a MILITIA as we did in 1789 and those functions are now done by professionals.
The facts are that ARMS to the Founding Fathers bear little resemblance to the weapons of 2009.
The facts are that the meaning of the words WELL REGULATED have not changed a bit over the last 200 plus years.
Just because you disagree with us, certainly does not make us wrong and you right. So far, pretty much everything that the pro-gun types in this thread have posted were facts, rather than opinion. The fact that you cannot accept the facts as truth does not diminish it.
Gee I wonder…
We’ve asked how you’d like to compromise if we offered up the shooter’s type of gun to be banned. What would it be worth to you in the spirit of compromise and all? My guess is that your type compromise would be to ban all semi auto guns and let us keep our dirty harry guns instead. And then you wonder why we cannot actually talk with each other?
Offering to ban the shooters gun is no compromise because such things are already on the extreme of the continuum. It is as if you have 100 cans of paint in the closet and your offer of compromise is to give up one color of my choice.
Lets face it, we cannot even agree on what the words in the Second Amendment actually mean piece by piece.
We do not agree what the meaning of MILITA is.
We do not agree what ARMS are.
We do not agree what WELL REGULATED means.
We do not agree about the relationship of the first part of the Amendment to the second part of the Amendment.
And we certainly do not agree about the intent of the Second Amendment as written by the Founders way back in the 18th century.
So really, honestly, what does it matter if your “facts” about guns since World War II are right or not? This is not about technical specs. It is about how we have significantly and radically different views of the Second Amendment.
While you think its possible for everyone to just allow you to ban all privately owned paint? Ain’t gonna happen kiddo. Given the usual result of prohibitions in this country, I don’t think you would like the results much.
Okay, so tell me, what should we give up? And what are you going to give us in return?
That’s because we like to look things up before we define them, where you like to define them as best fits your opinion.
I’ll define it, as defined by the Dictionary (Merriam-Websters English and Dictionary.com), the Federal Government (in the Laws of the USA) and Popular Opinion (in Wikipedia).
The entire able-bodied population of a community, town, county, or state, available to be called to arms.
1 a : a part of the organized armed forces of a country liable to call only in emergency b : a body of citizens organized for military service
2 : the whole body of able-bodied male citizens declared by law as being subject to call to military service
all able-bodied males considered by law eligible for military service. § 311. Militia: composition and classes(a) The militia of the United States consists of all able-bodied males at least 17 years of age and, except as provided in section 313 of title 32, under 45 years of age who are, or who have made a declaration of intention to become, citizens of the United States and of female citizens of the United States who are members of the National Guard.
(b) The classes of the militia are—
(1) the organized militia, which consists of the National Guard and the Naval Militia; and
(2) the unorganized militia, which consists of the members of the militia who are not members of the National Guard or the Naval Militia.
Arms, defined as weapons. Encompassing Firearms, Knives, Swords, billy clubs, etc.
It’s commonly known that the term Well Regulated meant “functioning properly” for as much as 150 or 200 years after, and considerably longer before, the writing of the Constitution and Bill of Rights.
If you disagree, I encourage you to call up any historian and ask them.
There’s nothing in there, though, that requires one to be in a militia to own a firearm.
But if you read that, you can clearly see that it says, “…the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.” The point being that the people are the Militia. I can’t see how that could be made much clearer to you.
Okay, tell me, what do you think was the intent?
“Facts” are not up for debate, nor are they meant to be put in quotes to be sarcastic.
This is about technical specs – you made it that way when you decried “cop killing super guns” and “keep your dirty harry hand cannons.”
Continuum: place the arms that the Founding Fathers knew and had in mind when they wrote the Second Amendment on one end of the continuum. Then place the advanced and far more powerful weaponry available today at the opposite end of the continuum.
Definitely. And while we’re at it, the internet gives us way too much power to easily make political speech that’ll be heard by thousands or millions. In their day they thought political speech meant printing out pamphlets or making a speech at town hall - no way they’d want free speech over national television and the internet.
Todderbob - you like me and everyone else, picks and chooses what fits for them. We do than because its part of our human nature and we believe we are right.
example: you want to use a standard dictionary available today to give me the meaning of the word MILITIA because you think it favors your position. But yet, a standard term like WELL REGULATED is something you want to consult a historian about and you spurn the dictionary definition of both words because it goes against your position.
So please get off your sanctimonious high horse.
here is another example
NO. The point being that the Second Amendment applies to the people in the militia, an institution which we no longer have and has been replaced by professionals doing those jobs.
Those two definitions are not exclusive, they can exist – together – without conflicting. So you’re not incorrect when you define militia, except for the fact that you include in your definition an exclusion of half of it.
The Arms that the founding fathers knew were no less powerful than the arms that we known today. The Kinetic Energy imparted by a musket is often far greater (and far more lethal) than that of a modern weapon.
Ever heard of James Puckle? Bet Franklin had. So I guess what they intended was for me to get a machine gun? OK - I can live with that if I have to. But you’re buying my ammo.
I thought it would’ve been obvious by now that I don’t do that.
I examine the facts and then come to an opinion, rather than coming to an opinion and then examining the facts so that they fit it.
We can use the definition of Militia back in the day – that, by the way, is the same as it is today.
The term militia hasn’t changed meaning. The term well regulated has. That’s not a sanctimonious anything.
Where does it state, in the Amendment itself, that one has to be in the militia to own a firearm?
Oh wait, it doesn’t. It states that one has to be “people” to have their rights avoid being infringed.
This is getting kind of silly. The lethality of an actual projectile is probably higher, yes, but clearly modern weapons are far more effective in a general sense. We don’t have to play these sorts of games.
A well regulated Militia being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.
One single sentence.
Now I am going to tell you that the first part is there to define who the “people” in the second part actually are. You are going to tell me that it means no such thing.
You don’t seem to understand the way compound sentences work.
“A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state,” See?
“The right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.” Easy peasey.
And, even if it was an issue of whether only those in the militia could own firearms, since everyone is in the unorganized militia, ipso facto, ergo procter hoc, la la walla bing bang, problem solved!
People more informed and eloquent than you have argued your position in the threads I linked which you dismissed. That sort of phrasing with an explanatory clause followed by an operative clause is actually relatively common among state constitutions at the time. There are several that say things like (paraphrasing from memory) “A free press being necesary to the perserverence of liberty, congress shall not abridge the right of free speech” … which does not imply that only card-carrying press members have free speech.
But… whatever. This has turned into Generic Gun Debate 189568125, and quite frankly others have argued your position much better than you have, in the threads I linked above, among others. If you guys all want to duke it out for 8th millionth time, go ahead.
We should probably start another thread to do so but I’m one of those muzzleloading shooters who would debate that with you. It gets down to debating “far more effective in a general sense” more than anything else but if we’re talking assault weapons like volley guns or long-range shooting like hog and chunk rifles, our charcoal-burners can open a lot of eyes. And technically they aren’t even “firearms” under most US jurisdictions and definitions.
