Gun Rights and Gun Control

[carpedm9587]

Are you insane? The US didn't believe in personal protection until the 1970's?

Since that was not what I said, I have no response.

Never watched a western I guess? Or read a history book?

Yes, I have

The amendment is pretty clear and has always allowed personal protection.

The amendment says, "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." Historically, that was rooted in the desire by the Founding Fathers to NOT have a standing army, but rather to call uppon citizen militia's to protect the country. This is why they also created a registry for arms. It did not take long for them to reverse this position and create a standing army, obviating most of the need for a citizen militia. Still, this was the context in which the amendment was primarily interpreted (https://www.loc.gov/law/help/second-amendment.php).

In the 1970s, there was a major shift in the leadership of the NRA and it went from an organization largely focused on promoting gun safety and outdoor recreation, to a lobbying organization for "gun rights." That transition is well documented. The original leadership, which was advocating a return of the NRA headquarters to Denver and a focus on these original concepts, was diplaced by a hard-line, gun rights leadership. They shifted the focus of their lobbying to "personal protection," which became almost the exclusive focus until the 2008 ruling which formally adopted this interpretation.

And no - I'm not insane...

[Teallaura]

all that is true, but then the gun control lobbies say that reducing guns would reduce crime. So they are assuming a correlation already. Using their own standards, we can see that an increase in guns did not lead to an increase in crime, instead for whatever reason crime went down. If reducing guns would reduce crime this should not have happened. Either guns are irrelevant to crime stats, or there is a correlation but the opposite of what the GCL's are claiming.

Um, let's rewind - it does in fact reduce 'gun crime' (really hard to commit a crime with a gun if you don't have a gun). The 'all crime will go away' nonsense is a strawman.

The argument was never that all crime would be reduced.

[Jedidiah]

Um, let's rewind - it does in fact reduce 'gun crime' (really hard to commit a crime with a gun if you don't have a gun). The 'all crime will go away' nonsense is a strawman.

The argument was never that all crime would be reduced.

But the fact is that what we have seen to date does correlate in the exact opposite direction of what the gun grabbers suggest will happen.

[Sparko]

Um, let's rewind - it does in fact reduce 'gun crime' (really hard to commit a crime with a gun if you don't have a gun). The 'all crime will go away' nonsense is a strawman.

well 1. it doesn't reduce gun crime because it is not taking guns away from criminals. And two, nobody said "all crime will go away" so you accusation of my using a strawman argument is itself a strawman.

[lilpixieofterror]

First of all - that is a point of debate. Until the 1970s, that amendment was intepreted to be what the founders intended: for the support of a citizen militia. Since then, it has been re-interpreted to include personal protection. For all that Scalia was an originalist, he actually sided with an interpretationalist viewpoint when it served him.

[carpedm9587]

Nobody said that the right to own firearms was not specified, Pixie. What shifted was the emphasis of the 2nd amendment from a focus on support for a militia, which the 2nd amendment explicitly specifies, to a focus on personal protection. I provided the link below for my sources, so I'll let that stand.

[Roy]

What is "The Federalist"?

[carpedm9587]

What is "The Federalist"?

The Federalist Papers are a series of essays from the early days of the republic. I believe Alexander Hamilton is the author of 28 and 29 and Madison (or Adams?) of 46. There were several different authors. They are often turned to for insight into what the founding fathers were thinking.

I'm not sure where Pixie is getting her info, but Hamilton's two essays were all about the importance of an armed militia controlled by the state (Federalist 29) and the importance of an armed populace in the event a government tries to seize too much power (Federalist 28). I don't recall a lot about "personal protection" in the way it is advocated today (i.e., protection against criminals). I don't remember Federalist 46, so I'll have to go refresh myself at some point.

[Sparko]

The Federalist Papers are a series of essays from the early days of the republic. I believe Alexander Hamilton is the author of 28 and 29 and Madison (or Adams?) of 46. There were several different authors. They are often turned to for insight into what the founding fathers were thinking.

I'm not sure where Pixie is getting her info, but Hamilton's two essays were all about the importance of an armed militia controlled by the state (Federalist 29) and the importance of an armed populace in the event a government tries to seize too much power (Federalist 28). I don't recall a lot about "personal protection" in the way it is advocated today (i.e., protection against criminals). I don't remember Federalist 46, so I'll have to go refresh myself at some point.

FYI for Roy - the Federalist Papers online archive

http://www.let.rug.nl/usa/documents/...ralist-papers/

[lilpixieofterror]

Nobody said that the right to own firearms was not specified, Pixie. What shifted was the emphasis of the 2nd amendment from a focus on support for a militia, which the 2nd amendment explicitly specifies, to a focus on personal protection. I provided the link below for my sources, so I'll let that stand.

[Terraceth]

What is "The Federalist"?

Well, they're better known as The Federalist Papers now (when I see "The Federalist" I think it's a reference to a right-wing website of that name), but they're a collection of essays written by various proponents of the US Constitution originally published as The Federalist. They were originally published under a pseudonym but we now know that the writers were Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, and John Jay.

The context was this: After the US won independence, it set up the Articles of Confederation as the foundation for the government, which gave supreme power to the states and very limited power to the federal government. However, the federal government was so weak that all sorts of problems very quickly cropped up, the most notable being that the federal government lacked a way to make the states pay taxes (essentially, its power was limited to asking the states nicely for money).

As a result, there was strong agreement that the articles had to be changed in some way. But some people, most notably James Madison, thought they should just do away with them and replace them with a new document altogether, the Constitution. The Constitution provided substantially more powerful to the federal government than the Articles of Confederation did, and this sparked a debate between the pro-Constitution federalists and the anti-federalists, who feared a stronger national government and were against the Constitution (it's a little amusing that people thought the original Constitution gave the federal government too much power--the Fourteenth Amendment probably would've given them conniptions).

The Federalist Papers were thus written primarily to try to convince people about why the Constitution was so gosh darn great and that it should be ratified, chiefly aimed at the state of New York which was very split on the subject. How much of an effect it actually had on getting the Constitution ratified has been debated, but at any rate it showed the views of some of the major writers of the Constitution and what their rationales were for the various parts of it. As a result, it's often cited as a way of trying to determine the intent of various things in the Constitution, though it was written before the Bill of Rights were created (ironically, #84, written by Alexander Hamilton, argues against the creation of the Bill of Rights).

[lilpixieofterror]

The Federalist Papers are a series of essays from the early days of the republic. I believe Alexander Hamilton is the author of 28 and 29 and Madison (or Adams?) of 46. There were several different authors. They are often turned to for insight into what the founding fathers were thinking.

I'm not sure where Pixie is getting her info, but Hamilton's two essays were all about the importance of an armed militia controlled by the state (Federalist 29) and the importance of an armed populace in the event a government tries to seize too much power (Federalist 28). I don't recall a lot about "personal protection" in the way it is advocated today (i.e., protection against criminals). I don't remember Federalist 46, so I'll have to go refresh myself at some point.

[Jedidiah]

You said specifically that

Until the 1970s, that amendment was intepreted to be what the founders intended: for the support of a citizen militia. Since then, it has been re-interpreted to include personal protection. For all that Scalia was an originalist, he actually sided with an interpretationalist viewpoint when it served him.

Lilpixie has demonstrated that to be false.

[Roy]

Thanks Sparko/carpedm/terraceth. I learnt something today.

[carpedm9587]

Actually - it's exactly what I said - I'll respond to you and Jed together.