[Home]  [Headlines]  [Latest Articles]  [Latest Comments]  [Post]  [Mail]  [Sign-in]  [Setup]  [Help]  [Register] 

[FULL VIDEO] Police release bodycam footage of Monroe County District Attorney Sandra Doorley traffi

Police clash with pro-Palestine protesters on Ohio State University campus

Joe Rogan Experience #2138 - Tucker Carlson

Police Dispersing Student Protesters at USC - Breaking News Coverage (College Protests)

What Passover Means For The New Testament Believer

Are We Closer Than Ever To The Next Pandemic?

War in Ukraine Turns on Russia

what happened during total solar eclipse

Israel Attacks Iran, Report Says - LIVE Breaking News Coverage

Earth is Scorched with Heat

Antiwar Activists Chant ‘Death to America’ at Event Featuring Chicago Alderman

Vibe Shift

A stream that makes the pleasant Rain sound.

Older Men - Keep One Foot In The Dark Ages

When You Really Want to Meet the Diversity Requirements

CERN to test world's most powerful particle accelerator during April's solar eclipse

Utopian Visionaries Who Won’t Leave People Alone

No - no - no Ain'T going To get away with iT

Pete Buttplug's Butt Plugger Trying to Turn Kids into Faggots

Mark Levin: I'm sick and tired of these attacks

Questioning the Big Bang

James Webb Data Contradicts the Big Bang

Pssst! Don't tell the creationists, but scientists don't have a clue how life began

A fine romance: how humans and chimps just couldn't let go

Early humans had sex with chimps

O’Keefe dons bulletproof vest to extract undercover journalist from NGO camp.

Biblical Contradictions (Alleged)

Catholic Church Praising Lucifer

Raising the Knife

One Of The HARDEST Videos I Had To Make..

Houthi rebels' attack severely damages a Belize-flagged ship in key strait leading to the Red Sea (British Ship)

Chinese Illegal Alien. I'm here for the moneuy

Red Tides Plague Gulf Beaches

Tucker Carlson calls out Nikki Haley, Ben Shapiro, and every other person calling for war:

{Are there 7 Deadly Sins?} I’ve heard people refer to the “7 Deadly Sins,” but I haven’t been able to find that sort of list in Scripture.

Abomination of Desolation | THEORY, BIBLE STUDY

Bible Help

Libertysflame Database Updated

Crush EVERYONE with the Alien Gambit!

Vladimir Putin tells Tucker Carlson US should stop arming Ukraine to end war

Putin hints Moscow and Washington in back-channel talks in revealing Tucker Carlson interview

Trump accuses Fulton County DA Fani Willis of lying in court response to Roman's motion

Mandatory anti-white racism at Disney.

Iceland Volcano Erupts For Third Time In 2 Months, State Of Emergency Declared

Tucker Carlson Interview with Vladamir Putin

How will Ar Mageddon / WW III End?

What on EARTH is going on in Acts 16:11? New Discovery!

2023 Hottest in over 120 Million Years

2024 and beyond in prophecy

Questions


Status: Not Logged In; Sign In

Bang / Guns
See other Bang / Guns Articles

Title: A Revision on the Bill of Rights, Part III
Source: Huffpost Politics
URL Source: [None]
Published: May 4, 2016
Author: Justin Curmi
Post Date: 2016-05-04 21:51:54 by tpaine
Keywords: None
Views: 3217
Comments: 22

A Revision on the Bill of Rights, Part III

04/26/2016 01:07 pm ET 2.5 K

Justin Curmi

A blogger that seeks to engage people in thought and conversation through presenting new views to matters, new or old.

“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.”

The Second Amendment is highly contested. There is no doubt that people do have the right to carry and have a stockpile of guns (“the right of the people to keep and bear arms”) and a state has the right to organize a well-regulated Militia. But, the main issue is on the right to self-defend with a firearm.

The main problem with the notion of self-defense is it imposes on justice, for everyone has the right for a fair trial. Therefore, using a firearm to defend oneself is not legal because if the attacker is killed, he or she is devoid of his or her rights. In addition, one’s mental capacity is a major factor in deciding whether a man or woman has the right to have a firearm. There are two reasons for ensuring mental capacity. First, one of the Five Aims is to ensure domestic tranquility and there can be no tranquility if one does not have the capacity. Second, if one’s brain is distorting his or her reality, they do not have the proper reasoning and deduction skills to use a firearm.

Therefore, if we ponder and meditate on the recent events in news about guns, it would be obvious that the current state is incorrect. A gun for civilians is a weapon for a revolution and not for ordinary use. The belief that a gun is a useful tool to protect one is counterintuitive because guns get into the hands of people who use them for horrible reasons. In addition, there are reasons why cops are trained to use a firearm in stressful situations. It is not to keep their mind at ease or anything of that sort, but to be able to fire accurately at the target in the correct location. It is immensely difficult to fire when under pressure. Moreover, one may argue this is an analogous argument and yes it is because the United States government is lobbied to not study or fund research that observes the effects of guns. This cripples the chance of evaluating a proper policy to deal with gun violence. But, there was one study by ABC, which observed using guns in a classroom. All the participations poorly performed at the mock situation.

Once again, if there is an argument in the reasoning of this amendment and others, one must filter it through the Five Aims of the USA and the Bill of Rights. This is to ensure that any argument can be answered, avoiding a political divide.


Poster Comment:

What in hell is the "Five Aims of the USA"?

Post Comment   Private Reply   Ignore Thread  


TopPage UpFull ThreadPage DownBottom/Latest

Begin Trace Mode for Comment # 20.

#5. To: tpaine (#0)

A gun for civilians is a weapon for a revolution and not for ordinary use. The belief that a gun is a useful tool to protect one is counterintuitive because guns get into the hands of people who use them for horrible reasons.

A gun for civilians is a protected right for self-defence.

The second amendment establishes no right, it forbids the Federal government from infringing upon a pre-existing right.

The pre-existing right was established in English common law long before the creation of the Constitution.

http://avalon.law.yale.edu/18th_century/blackstone_bk1ch1.asp

Blackstone's Commentaries on the Laws of England

Book the First - Chapter the First: Of the Absolute Rights of Individuals (1765)

5. THE fifth and last auxiliary right of the subject, that I shall at present mention, is that of having arms for their defence, suitable to their condition and degree, and such as are allowed by law. Which is also declared by the same statute 1 W. & M. ft. 2. c. 2. and is indeed a public allowance, under due restrictions, of the natural right of resistance and self-preservation, when the sanctions of society and laws are found insufficient to restrain the violence of oppression.

Gun do get into the hands of people who use them for horrible reasons. So do knives, yet we are not required to forego knives.

nolu chan  posted on  2016-05-04   23:52:53 ET  Reply   Untrace   Trace   Private Reply  


#8. To: nolu chan (#5)

"A gun for civilians is a protected right for self-defence."

When written, not by the second amendment. As evidenced in Miller, the only weapons protected by the second amendment were those "suitable for use" by a state Militia.

State constitutions protected the individual right of civilians to keep and bear arms. States have always (until Heller) defined who may own weapons, what kind of weapons, and how they may be used. Which is why the gun laws in each state were different.

misterwhite  posted on  2016-05-05   10:01:47 ET  Reply   Untrace   Trace   Private Reply  


#17. To: misterwhite (#8)

When written, not by the second amendment. As evidenced in Miller, the only weapons protected by the second amendment were those "suitable for use" by a state Militia.

State constitutions protected the individual right of civilians to keep and bear arms. States have always (until Heller) defined who may own weapons, what kind of weapons, and how they may be used. Which is why the gun laws in each state were different.

Nonsense. The Second Amendment created no right to keep and bear arms. It protected a pre-existing right existing in the people by explicitly withholding from the Federal government, any power or authority to infringe upon that pre-existing right.

Your interpretation of Miller (1939) is nonsense, directly refuted by the holding in Heller in 2008.

http://laws.findlaw.com/us/000/07-290.html

DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA et al. v. HELLER

certiorari to the united states court of appeals for the district of columbia circuit

No. 07-290. Argued March 18, 2008--Decided June 26, 2008

District of Columbia law bans handgun possession by making it a crime to carry an unregistered firearm and prohibiting the registration of handguns; provides separately that no person may carry an unlicensed handgun, but authorizes the police chief to issue 1-year licenses; and requires residents to keep lawfully owned firearms unloaded and dissembled or bound by a trigger lock or similar device. Respondent Heller, a D. C. special policeman, applied to register a handgun he wished to keep at home, but the District refused. He filed this suit seeking, on Second Amendment grounds, to enjoin the city from enforcing the bar on handgun registration, the licensing requirement insofar as it prohibits carrying an unlicensed firearm in the home, and the trigger-lock requirement insofar as it prohibits the use of functional firearms in the home. The District Court dismissed the suit, but the D. C. Circuit reversed, holding that the Second Amendment protects an individual's right to possess firearms and that the city's total ban on handguns, as well as its requirement that firearms in the home be kept nonfunctional even when necessary for self-defense, violated that right.

Held:

1. The Second Amendment protects an individual right to possess a firearm unconnected with service in a militia, and to use that arm for traditionally lawful purposes, such as self-defense within the home. Pp. 2-53.

(a) The Amendment's prefatory clause announces a purpose, but does not limit or expand the scope of the second part, the operative clause. The operative clause's text and history demonstrate that it connotes an individual right to keep and bear arms. Pp. 2-22.

(b) The prefatory clause comports with the Court's interpretation of the operative clause. The "militia" comprised all males physically capable of acting in concert for the common defense. The Antifederalists feared that the Federal Government would disarm the people in order to disable this citizens' militia, enabling a politicized standing army or a select militia to rule. The response was to deny Congress power to abridge the ancient right of individuals to keep and bear arms, so that the ideal of a citizens' militia would be preserved. Pp. 22-28.

(c) The Court's interpretation is confirmed by analogous arms-bearing rights in state constitutions that preceded and immediately followed the Second Amendment. Pp. 28-30.

(d) The Second Amendment's drafting history, while of dubious interpretive worth, reveals three state Second Amendment proposals that unequivocally referred to an individual right to bear arms. Pp. 30-32.

(e) Interpretation of the Second Amendment by scholars, courts and legislators, from immediately after its ratification through the late 19th century also supports the Court's conclusion. Pp. 32-47.

(f) None of the Court's precedents forecloses the Court's interpretation. Neither United States v. Cruikshank, 92 U. S. 542, 553, nor Presser v. Illinois, 116 U. S. 252, 264-265, refutes the individual-rights interpretation. United States v. Miller, 307 U. S. 174, does not limit the right to keep and bear arms to militia purposes, but rather limits the type of weapon to which the right applies to those used by the militia, i.e., those in common use for lawful purposes. Pp. 47-54.

2. Like most rights, the Second Amendment right is not unlimited. It is not a right to keep and carry any weapon whatsoever in any manner whatsoever and for whatever purpose: For example, concealed weapons prohibitions have been upheld under the Amendment or state analogues. The Court's opinion should not be taken to cast doubt on longstanding prohibitions on the possession of firearms by felons and the mentally ill, or laws forbidding the carrying of firearms in sensitive places such as schools and government buildings, or laws imposing conditions and qualifications on the commercial sale of arms. Miller's holding that the sorts of weapons protected are those "in common use at the time" finds support in the historical tradition of prohibiting the carrying of dangerous and unusual weapons. Pp. 54-56.

3. The handgun ban and the trigger-lock requirement (as applied to self-defense) violate the Second Amendment. The District's total ban on handgun possession in the home amounts to a prohibition on an entire class of "arms" that Americans overwhelmingly choose for the lawful purpose of self-defense. Under any of the standards of scrutiny the Court has applied to enumerated constitutional rights, this prohibition--in the place where the importance of the lawful defense of self, family, and property is most acute--would fail constitutional muster. Similarly, the requirement that any lawful firearm in the home be disassembled or bound by a trigger lock makes it impossible for citizens to use arms for the core lawful purpose of self-defense and is hence unconstitutional. Because Heller conceded at oral argument that the D. C. licensing law is permissible if it is not enforced arbitrarily and capriciously, the Court assumes that a license will satisfy his prayer for relief and does not address the licensing requirement. Assuming he is not disqualified from exercising Second Amendment rights, the District must permit Heller to register his handgun and must issue him a license to carry it in the home. Pp. 56-64.

478 F. 3d 370, affirmed.

nolu chan  posted on  2016-05-05   23:40:21 ET  Reply   Untrace   Trace   Private Reply  


#18. To: nolu chan (#17) (Edited)

"The Second Amendment created no right to keep and bear arms."

Correct. I never said it did.

"It protected a pre-existing right existing in the people ..."

It protected the pre-existing right for some people, not everyone.

"Your interpretation of Miller (1939) is nonsense, directly refuted by the holding in Heller in 2008."

My interpretation of Miller is 100% correct as evidenced by what the court actually ruled. Heller ignored Miller and was a horrible decision.

"United States v. Miller, 307 U. S. 174, does not limit the right to keep and bear arms to militia purposes, but rather limits the type of weapon to which the right applies to those used by the militia, i.e., those in common use for lawful purposes."

Which the Heller court totally ignored. The Miller decision states that the ONLY weapons protected are those used by the military. The court's only question was if the sawed-off shotgun qualified as military arms.

misterwhite  posted on  2016-05-06   9:12:32 ET  Reply   Untrace   Trace   Private Reply  


#20. To: misterwhite (#18)

It protected the pre-existing right for some people, not everyone.

Stop being absurd.

My interpretation of Miller is 100% correct as evidenced by what the court actually ruled. Heller ignored Miller and was a horrible decision.

Oh nonsense. Heller is the binding precedent and explained why Miller is bullshit to cite as precedent as you have done.

http://laws.findlaw.com/us/000/07-290.html

DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA et al. v. HELLER

certiorari to the united states court of appeals for the district of columbia circuit

No. 07-290. Argued March 18, 2008--Decided June 26, 2008

E

We now ask whether any of our precedents forecloses the conclusions we have reached about the meaning of the Second Amendment.

United States v. Cruikshank, 92 U. S. 542, in the course of vacating the convictions of members of a white mob for depriving blacks of their right to keep and bear arms, held that the Second Amendment does not by its own force apply to anyone other than the Federal Government. The opinion explained that the right "is not a right granted by the Constitution [or] in any manner dependent upon that instrument for its existence. The second amendment ... means no more than that it shall not be infringed by Congress." 92 U. S., at 553. States, we said, were free to restrict or protect the right under their police powers. The limited discussion of the Second Amendment in Cruikshank supports, if anything, the individual-rights interpretation. There was no claim in Cruikshank that the victims had been deprived of their right to carry arms in a militia; indeed, the Governor had disbanded the local militia unit the year before the mob's attack, see C. Lane, The Day Freedom Died 62 (2008). We described the right protected by the Second Amendment as " 'bearing arms for a lawful purpose' "22 and said that "the people [must] look for their protection against any violation by their fellow-citizens of the rights it recognizes" to the States' police power. 92 U. S., at 553. That discussion makes little sense if it is only a right to bear arms in a state militia.23

Presser v. Illinois, 116 U. S. 252 (1886), held that the right to keep and bear arms was not violated by a law that forbade "bodies of men to associate together as military organizations, or to drill or parade with arms in cities and towns unless authorized by law." Id., at 264-265. This does not refute the individual-rights interpretation of the Amendment; no one supporting that interpretation has contended that States may not ban such groups. Justice Stevens presses Presser into service to support his view that the right to bear arms is limited to service in the militia by joining Presser's brief discussion of the Second Amendment with a later portion of the opinion making the seemingly relevant (to the Second Amendment) point that the plaintiff was not a member of the state militia. Unfortunately for Justice Stevens' argument, that later portion deals with the Fourteenth Amendment; it was the Fourteenth Amendment to which the plaintiff's nonmembership in the militia was relevant. Thus, Justice Stevens' statement that Presser "suggested that... nothing in the Constitution protected the use of arms outside the context of a militia," post, at 40, is simply wrong. Presser said nothing about the Second Amendment's meaning or scope, beyond the fact that it does not prevent the prohibition of private paramilitary organizations.

Justice Stevens places overwhelming reliance upon this Court's decision in United States v. Miller, 307 U. S. 174 (1939). "[H]undreds of judges," we are told, "have relied on the view of the amendment we endorsed there," post, at 2, and "[e]ven if the textual and historical arguments on both side of the issue were evenly balanced, respect for the well-settled views of all of our predecessors on this Court, and for the rule of law itself ... would prevent most jurists from endorsing such a dramatic upheaval in the law," post, at 4. And what is, according to Justice Stevens, the holding of Miller that demands such obeisance? That the Second Amendment "protects the right to keep and bear arms for certain military purposes, but that it does not curtail the legislature's power to regulate the nonmilitary use and ownership of weapons." Post, at 2.

Nothing so clearly demonstrates the weakness of Justice Stevens' case. Miller did not hold that and cannot possibly be read to have held that. The judgment in the case upheld against a Second Amendment challenge two men's federal convictions for transporting an unregistered short-barreled shotgun in interstate commerce, in violation of the National Firearms Act, 48 Stat. 1236. It is entirely clear that the Court's basis for saying that the Second Amendment did not apply was not that the defendants were "bear[ing] arms" not "for ... military purposes" but for "nonmilitary use," post, at 2. Rather, it was that the type of weapon at issue was not eligible for Second Amendment protection: "In the absence of any evidence tending to show that the possession or use of a [short-barreled shotgun] at this time has some reasonable relationship to the preservation or efficiency of a well regulated militia, we cannot say that the Second Amendment guarantees the right to keep and bear such an instrument." 307 U. S., at 178 (emphasis added). "Certainly," the Court continued, "it is not within judicial notice that this weapon is any part of the ordinary military equipment or that its use could contribute to the common defense." Ibid. Beyond that, the opinion provided no explanation of the content of the right.

This holding is not only consistent with, but positively suggests, that the Second Amendment confers an individual right to keep and bear arms (though only arms that "have some reasonable relationship to the preservation or efficiency of a well regulated militia"). Had the Court believed that the Second Amendment protects only those serving in the militia, it would have been odd to examine the character of the weapon rather than simply note that the two crooks were not militiamen. Justice Stevens can say again and again that Miller did "not turn on the difference between muskets and sawed-off shotguns, it turned, rather, on the basic difference between the military and nonmilitary use and possession of guns," post, at 42-43, but the words of the opinion prove otherwise. The most Justice Stevens can plausibly claim for Miller is that it declined to decide the nature of the Second Amendment right, despite the Solicitor General's argument (made in the alternative) that the right was collective, see Brief for United States, O. T. 1938, No. 696, pp. 4-5. Miller stands only for the proposition that the Second Amendment right, whatever its nature, extends only to certain types of weapons.

It is particularly wrongheaded to read Miller for more than what it said, because the case did not even purport to be a thorough examination of the Second Amendment. Justice Stevens claims, post, at 42, that the opinion reached its conclusion "[a]fter reviewing many of the same sources that are discussed at greater length by the Court today." Not many, which was not entirely the Court's fault. The respondent made no appearance in the case, neither filing a brief nor appearing at oral argument; the Court heard from no one but the Government (reason enough, one would think, not to make that case the beginning and the end of this Court's consideration of the Second Amendment). See Frye, The Peculiar Story of United States v. Miller, 3 N. Y. U. J. L. & Liberty 48, 65-68 (2008). The Government's brief spent two pages discussing English legal sources, concluding "that at least the carrying of weapons without lawful occasion or excuse was always a crime" and that (because of the class-based restrictions and the prohibition on terrorizing people with dangerous or unusual weapons) "the early English law did not guarantee an unrestricted right to bear arms." Brief for United States, O. T. 1938, No. 696, at 9-11. It then went on to rely primarily on the discussion of the English right to bear arms in Aymette v. State, 21 Tenn. 154, for the proposition that the only uses of arms protected by the Second Amendment are those that relate to the militia, not self-defense. See Brief for United States, O. T. 1938, No. 696, at 12-18. The final section of the brief recognized that "some courts have said that the right to bear arms includes the right of the individual to have them for the protection of his person and property," and launched an alternative argument that "weapons which are commonly used by criminals," such as sawed-off shotguns, are not protected. See id., at 18-21. The Government's Miller brief thus provided scant discussion of the history of the Second Amendment--and the Court was presented with no counterdiscussion. As for the text of the Court's opinion itself, that discusses none of the history of the Second Amendment. It assumes from the prologue that the Amendment was designed to preserve the militia, 307 U. S., at 178 (which we do not dispute), and then reviews some historical materials dealing with the nature of the militia, and in particular with the nature of the arms their members were expected to possess, id., at 178-182. Not a word (not a word) about the history of the Second Amendment. This is the mighty rock upon which the dissent rests its case.24

We may as well consider at this point (for we will have to consider eventually) what types of weapons Miller permits. Read in isolation, Miller's phrase "part of ordinary military equipment" could mean that only those weapons useful in warfare are protected. That would be a startling reading of the opinion, since it would mean that the National Firearms Act's restrictions on machineguns (not challenged in Miller) might be unconstitutional, machineguns being useful in warfare in 1939. We think that Miller's "ordinary military equipment" language must be read in tandem with what comes after: "[O]rdinarily when called for [militia] service [able-bodied] men were expected to appear bearing arms supplied by themselves and of the kind in common use at the time." 307 U. S., at 179. The traditional militia was formed from a pool of men bringing arms "in common use at the time" for lawful purposes like self-defense. "In the colonial and revolutionary war era, [small-arms] weapons used by militiamen and weapons used in defense of person and home were one and the same." State v. Kessler, 289 Ore. 359, 368, 614 P. 2d 94, 98 (1980) (citing G. Neumann, Swords and Blades of the American Revolution 6-15, 252-254 (1973)). Indeed, that is precisely the way in which the Second Amendment's operative clause furthers the purpose announced in its preface. We therefore read Miller to say only that the Second Amendment does not protect those weapons not typically possessed by law-abiding citizens for lawful purposes, such as short-barreled shotguns. That accords with the historical understanding of the scope of the right, see Part III, infra.25

We conclude that nothing in our precedents forecloses our adoption of the original understanding of the Second Amendment. It should be unsurprising that such a significant matter has been for so long judicially unresolved. For most of our history, the Bill of Rights was not thought applicable to the States, and the Federal Government did not significantly regulate the possession of firearms by law-abiding citizens. Other provisions of the Bill of Rights have similarly remained unilluminated for lengthy periods. This Court first held a law to violate the First Amendment's guarantee of freedom of speech in 1931, almost 150 years after the Amendment was ratified, see Near v. Minnesota ex rel. Olson, 283 U. S. 697 (1931), and it was not until after World War II that we held a law invalid under the Establishment Clause, see Illinois ex rel. McCollum v. Board of Ed. of School Dist. No. 71, Champaign Cty., 333 U. S. 203 (1948). Even a question as basic as the scope of proscribable libel was not addressed by this Court until 1964, nearly two centuries after the founding. See New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, 376 U. S. 254 (1964). It is demonstrably not true that, as Justice Stevens claims, post, at 41-42, "for most of our history, the invalidity of Second-Amendment-based objections to firearms regulations has been well settled and uncontroversial." For most of our history the question did not present itself.

nolu chan  posted on  2016-05-06   12:26:20 ET  Reply   Untrace   Trace   Private Reply  


Replies to Comment # 20.

#21. To: nolu chan (#20)

Had the Court believed that the Second Amendment protects only those serving in the militia, it would have been odd to examine the character of the weapon rather than simply note that the two crooks were not militiamen.

I like the use of the word "crooks" in a Supreme Court decision.

ConservingFreedom  posted on  2016-05-06 12:41:16 ET  Reply   Untrace   Trace   Private Reply  


End Trace Mode for Comment # 20.

TopPage UpFull ThreadPage DownBottom/Latest

[Home]  [Headlines]  [Latest Articles]  [Latest Comments]  [Post]  [Mail]  [Sign-in]  [Setup]  [Help]  [Register] 

Please report web page problems, questions and comments to webmaster@libertysflame.com