# Would you have shot the gun confiscators when they came to your door? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [April 11, 2009, 8:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-have-shot-the-gun-confiscators-when-they-came-to-your-door/492770 "2009-04-11T20:55:13Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 8
**Author:** ![Grumman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/43a26b/32.png) [@Grumman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Grumman)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2009, 8:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-have-shot-the-gun-confiscators-when-they-came-to-your-door/492770/141 "2009-04-13T20:23:18Z")
> [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](#): > > And “moral compass?” Please people with a moral compass don’t murder cops. Cops with a moral compass don’t violate the constitution. And really, once they start doing that, why should they still be receiving special treatment for being cops? ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2009, 8:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-have-shot-the-gun-confiscators-when-they-came-to-your-door/492770/142 "2009-04-13T20:27:57Z")
Your personal opinion that they are “violating the Constitution,” does not morally justify murdering them, and refraining from murdering them is not “special treatment.” ---
**Author:** ![Scumpup](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ce73a5/32.png) [@Scumpup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scumpup)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2009, 8:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-have-shot-the-gun-confiscators-when-they-came-to-your-door/492770/143 "2009-04-13T20:28:13Z")
> [@Grumman](#): > > Cops with a moral compass don’t violate the constitution. And really, once they start doing that, why should they still be receiving special treatment for being cops? Excellent point. ---
**Author:** ![Scumpup](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ce73a5/32.png) [@Scumpup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scumpup)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2009, 8:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-have-shot-the-gun-confiscators-when-they-came-to-your-door/492770/144 "2009-04-13T20:30:57Z")
> [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](#): > > Your personal opinion that they are “violating the Constitution,” does not morally justify murdering them, and refraining from murdering them is not “special treatment.” You’ve done plenty of sneering at where I draw the line. What about you? At what point do you say “no” to the uniforms and badges? Or are you willing to follow their every order as long as you believe it will keep them from hurting you? ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2009, 8:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-have-shot-the-gun-confiscators-when-they-came-to-your-door/492770/145 "2009-04-13T20:31:33Z")
> [@billfish678](#): > > Shocking as it may seem, some people have a moral compass that actually includes the bigger picture sometimes, rather than thier own precious hide. Some people have a moral compass which includes more than their own self-important gun fetishes. ---
**Author:** ![Grumman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/43a26b/32.png) [@Grumman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Grumman)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2009, 8:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-have-shot-the-gun-confiscators-when-they-came-to-your-door/492770/146 "2009-04-13T20:31:45Z")
> [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](#): > > Your personal opinion that they are “violating the Constitution,” does not morally justify murdering them, and refraining from murdering them is not “special treatment.” If they are entering your house without your permission to unlawfully take your property, then _yes_, not treating them as aggressors _is_ giving them special treatment. ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2009, 8:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-have-shot-the-gun-confiscators-when-they-came-to-your-door/492770/147 "2009-04-13T20:38:51Z")
> [@Scumpup](#): > > You’ve done plenty of sneering at where I draw the line. What about you? At what point do you say “no” to the uniforms and badges? Or are you willing to follow their every order as long as you believe it will keep them from hurting you? I would draw the line if they were trying to physically hurt my family. Other than that, I’m going to live to fight another day. Trying to shoot it out over some stupid, temporary, emergency gun restriction would be insane. I also have enough perspective not to see the cops trying to do their job as my mortal enemies. Trying to shoot it out with them would accomplish nothing anyway. The cops would still achieve ther objective, and my kids would be out a dad, either because I’d be dead or in jail. It would not change any law or benefit any other human. The most I might accomplish is being able to destroy the families of whatever cops I managed to kill before they blew my brains out. ---
**Author:** ![Scumpup](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ce73a5/32.png) [@Scumpup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scumpup)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2009, 8:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-have-shot-the-gun-confiscators-when-they-came-to-your-door/492770/148 "2009-04-13T20:41:41Z")
So, you’re willing to “murder policemen” for trying to do their jobs. ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2009, 8:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-have-shot-the-gun-confiscators-when-they-came-to-your-door/492770/149 "2009-04-13T20:43:39Z")
> [@Grumman](#): > > If they are entering your house without your permission to unlawfully take your property, then _yes_, not treating them as aggressors _is_ giving them special treatment. That’s the legal defense you’d go with, huh? Good luck with that. Of course, you’d probably never live to see a trial anyway. ---
**Author:** ![billfish678](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7bcc69/32.png) [@billfish678](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/billfish678)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2009, 8:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-have-shot-the-gun-confiscators-when-they-came-to-your-door/492770/150 "2009-04-13T20:43:58Z")
> [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](#): > > Some people have a moral compass which includes more than their own self-important gun fetishes. Dude I dont even HAVE A GUN. Fired em 2 or 3 times DECADES AGO. Don’t even like shoot em up movies. Might want to look up the definition of fetish sport. ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2009, 8:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-have-shot-the-gun-confiscators-when-they-came-to-your-door/492770/151 "2009-04-13T20:47:40Z")
> [@Scumpup](#): > > So, you’re willing to “murder policemen” for trying to do their jobs. I can’t conceive of a scenario in which they’d be ordered to try to hurt my family, but if they were, then yes, I would kill to protect my kids and take the consequences. The scenarios are not remotely comparable, though. The New Orleans scenario does not involve defending human life, just inanimate objects. ---
**Author:** ![CannyDan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cannydan/32/548_2.png) [@CannyDan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CannyDan)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2009, 8:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-have-shot-the-gun-confiscators-when-they-came-to-your-door/492770/152 "2009-04-13T20:52:49Z")
Of course it would be idiotic to violently resist an illegal confiscation of one’s guns and/or other property by police. Considering yourself to be justified in mounting an armed defense would be acceptable only if there was no other means by which law and order could be returned. If law and order would be restored in some due time without your armed resistance, then your armed resistance is unnecessary. And stupid, if it gets you killed in the meantime. After Hurricane Andrew in Miami I wore a visible sidearm and often also carried a carbine in many places, for about a week. (If you have forgotten Andrew, google some pictures; it landed as a Cat 5 storm. “Wild west scenario” hardly describes some places like Naranja.) Luckily, both the local cops and the National Guard (when they finally arrived, somewhere along the 3rd day) took no issue with residents being visibly prepared to resist looters and thieves. Guns were taken from people who were obviously misusing them, like those who brandished them to gain a better place in the line for ice distribution. The rest of us were tacitly acknowledged to be law abiding. ---
**Author:** ![Grumman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/43a26b/32.png) [@Grumman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Grumman)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2009, 8:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-have-shot-the-gun-confiscators-when-they-came-to-your-door/492770/153 "2009-04-13T20:59:22Z")
> [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](#): > > I also have enough perspective not to see the cops trying to do their job as my mortal enemies. They aren’t doing their job if they’re violating the Constitution they swore to uphold. > [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](#): > > That’s the legal defense you’d go with, huh? Good luck with that. Of course, you’d probably never live to see a trial anyway. Might makes right, huh **Dio**? ---
**Author:** ![billfish678](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7bcc69/32.png) [@billfish678](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/billfish678)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2009, 9:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-have-shot-the-gun-confiscators-when-they-came-to-your-door/492770/154 "2009-04-13T21:03:29Z")
> [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](#): > > I can’t conceive of a scenario in which they’d be ordered to try to hurt my family, but if they were, then yes, I would \*\*kill \*\*to protect my kids and take the consequences. > > . You misspelled murder. ---
**Author:** ![Lochdale](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/edb3f5/32.png) [@Lochdale](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lochdale)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2009, 9:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-have-shot-the-gun-confiscators-when-they-came-to-your-door/492770/155 "2009-04-13T21:06:23Z")
Frankly, I think it would depend on the circumstances. That said, 99.9% of the time I would work with the authorities and hand over my guns. If I were given notice then I would indeed hide my guns. There is no doubt in my mind that I would hide the guns. Absent notice, I would imagine that I’d hand over the guns. That said, I’m assuming that this is a natural disaster type situation. If it were the government trying to impose stringent anti-gun legistlation then I think my reaction would be slightly different. I would resist non-violently though I would still hand over the guns (assuming I haven’t hidden them). I’m not prepared to start shooting policemen. ---
**Author:** ![Richard\_Parker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/35a633/32.png) [@Richard\_Parker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Richard_Parker)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2009, 9:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-have-shot-the-gun-confiscators-when-they-came-to-your-door/492770/156 "2009-04-13T21:28:02Z")
> [@Grumman](#): > > Cops with a moral compass don’t violate the constitution. You don’t really mean that. Cops violate the Constitution _all the time_. If you live in a busy jurisdiction, on any given day a criminal judge is ruling that a cop violated the Fourth, Fifth, or Sixth Amendments. If you walk over to the civil court, you’ll find the police department and other city departments being successfully sued for various violations of the First, Fifth, and Fourteenth. Do we conclude from this that all cops are corrupt and lack moral compasses? Well, I don’t. But you apparently do. And let’s talk about this matter that you think is so crystal clear that you would contemplate murdering a police officer over. At the time of Katrina, do you know what information a police officer would have received if he asked the attorney general about the lawfulness of that order? He would have told the officer that the matter was legally unsettled. He certainly would not have said the citizens of New Orleans had a clear-cut Second Amendment right not to give up their guns in an emergency. (The matter is a bit clearer after Heller, but even now the Supreme Court has not yet decided whether the Second Amendment applies to states or what state interests are sufficient for removal of all firearm.) The attorney general would have pointed to the existing version of 14 La. Stat. § 329.6 and noted that temporary confiscation of contraband likely does not violate the Fourth or Fifth Amendments. In this country, the Constitution gets authoritatively interpreted by courts and government officials, not the NRA or right-wing armchair lawyers. However stupid the police department’s actions during Katrina were, they were not so clearly unconstitutional at the time as to justify your labeling of the police as lacking moral compasses, much less murdering them. I see little need to delve into the absurdity of committing suicide by cop, or else suicide by state criminal law, in order to protect your family from the possibility of looting. It should be sufficient to state that it is wrong to kill cops who are not directly placing you in mortal danger–especially when good faith interpretations of the law could find the cops to be acting lawfully. ---
**Author:** ![Odesio](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/odesio/32/20003_2.png) [@Odesio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Odesio)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2009, 9:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-have-shot-the-gun-confiscators-when-they-came-to-your-door/492770/157 "2009-04-13T21:48:51Z")
> [@Grumman](#): > > They aren’t doing their job if they’re violating the Constitution they swore to uphold. It’s not really their job to decide what is and isn’t constitutional. Odesio ---
**Author:** ![kaylasdad99](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kaylasdad99/32/3398_2.png) [@kaylasdad99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kaylasdad99)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2009, 10:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-have-shot-the-gun-confiscators-when-they-came-to-your-door/492770/158 "2009-04-13T22:01:00Z")
**Lumpy** , could you please furnish a link to what your OP quoted? ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2009, 10:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-have-shot-the-gun-confiscators-when-they-came-to-your-door/492770/159 "2009-04-13T22:48:29Z")
> [@Una\_Persson](#): > > The rest of you? > > If a law was passed outlawing my firearms and allowing house-to-house confiscation, I would greet the police at the door saying “all of my firearms are in that pile to the left. I have bent the barrels and cut the receivers in half (being very careful not to obscure or damage the serial numbers) and broken the magazines - just in case one of the weapons goes ‘mysteriously missing’ from your evidence locker. The ammunition for them is in the pile to the right, you’ll notice that in each case the cartridges have been smashed - you know, just in case they were to go ‘missing’ from your evidence locker as well. The woman standing next to me is my attorney, and the person with the video camera is her assistant. Would you like some coffee? All I have is instant.” > > Look out everyone, I guess I’m one of those craaaaaaaaaaaaazy SDMB gun nuts. I’ve got no problem with how you would handle the situation _you_ described(although it wasn’t exactly how it was phrased in the OP). ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [April 13, 2009, 11:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-have-shot-the-gun-confiscators-when-they-came-to-your-door/492770/160 "2009-04-13T23:00:20Z")
A quick quiz: Whose job is it to determine whether a a police order is constitutional or not. A. The homeowner with a gun B. The police officer carrying out the order C. The court system [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-have-shot-the-gun-confiscators-when-they-came-to-your-door/492770.md?page=7) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-have-shot-the-gun-confiscators-when-they-came-to-your-door/492770.md?page=9)