National School Walkout

[Starlight]

It's worth noting that attempts to interpret the Second Amendment as protecting anything other than an individual right is an argument that would have baffled anybody up until about 50-years ago. It's a relatively recent position.

You seem to have that backward. DC v Heller in 2008 was a landmark case precisely because it discovered within the 2nd amendment an individual right in a way courts previously hadn't.

Prior to 50 years ago the idea that the 2nd amendment contained an individual right to bear arms would have baffled anyone. There's a good 4-page article here that explains how the NRA very deliberately creatively reinterpreted the 2nd amendment over the last 50 years to pretend there was an individual right in it. From the article:

From 1888, when law review articles first were indexed, through 1959, every single one on the Second Amendment concluded it did not guarantee an individual right to a gun.and long lost

[carpedm9587]

Not it doesn't, not historically, as has been demonstrated - so again does the right of the people only mean some people?

Actually - it has been shown to apply. It's in the federalist papers and the writings of many FFs. The original intent was for our country to be protected by a "well regulated militia."
There was even a registry created to log all gun ownership, to what end. It soon became clear that the task was logistically untenable, and a standing army was turned to instead. This is all historically verifiable.

How does that work out for "the right of the people" in the above amendments?

None of these are qualified in the way the 2nd is qualified. They are not prefixed by a context - the right is asserted across the board. The 5th is qualified only by "probable cause," which is the legal norm. But somehow, the qualifier in the 2nd is simply conveniently ignored. And all of this is moot if the amendment is repealed.

[seer]

Actually - it has been shown to apply. It's in the federalist papers and the writings of many FFs. The original intent was for our country to be protected by a "well regulated militia."
There was even a registry created to log all gun ownership, to what end. It soon became clear that the task was logistically untenable, and a standing army was turned to instead. This is all historically verifiable.

None of these are qualified in the way the 2nd is qualified. They are not prefixed by a context - the right is asserted across the board. The 5th is qualified only by "probable cause," which is the legal norm. But somehow, the qualifier in the 2nd is simply conveniently ignored. And all of this is moot if the amendment is repealed.

But even if you are right, which you aren't, there is nothing in the Constitution that prevents private citizens from forming their own militias, with their own firearms, like the Minutemen and Green Mountain Boys that I mentioned earlier.

[carpedm9587]

But even if you are right, which you aren't, there is nothing in the Constitution that prevents private citizens from forming their own militias, with their own firearms, like the Minutemen and Green Mountain Boys that I mentioned earlier.

No - there is nothing to prevent it. The 2nd also was intended to support such actions.

Times have changed. This is not the 1700s, and the amazing explosion of gun ownership in the U.S. is now a threat to our society, for the reasons I have previously cited. The right is intransigent in helping to find ANY solution to the carnage, as I have outlined and noted before. The only thing that will satisfy them is "more guns" and "less control." In the face of that, it is time for the rest of us to act. Though I think it unlikely in my lifetime, I will throw my support behind repealing the 2nd Amendment, in the hopes that more and more like me will see the danger posed by people like you, and those who support your position. Until then, I will get behind every initiative to put in office people willing to ditch the NRA and begin listening to the majority of us people. I am now convinced that guns should be a privilege one earns, not a right one demands. England, NZ, Australia, the Scandanavian countries, Hong Kong, and all of the other nations that have moved in this direction are reaping the benefits.

And each additional slaughter on American soil will raise more voices, and create more David Hoggs and Emma Gonzalezs. The children who have grown up in schools practicing "shooter" drills, wondering when their school will be next, will gain the ability to vote. It will get continually harder for the gun lobby, NRA, and those like you to continue to claim your right in the face of such fear and loss. When children lose their lives at the hands of a shooter - they will not have a great deal of sympathy for those arguing "we need more guns," and eventually they will vote.

I stand with them. They're right, and I was wrong.

[Mountain Man]

You seem to have that backward. DC v Heller in 2008 was a landmark case precisely because it discovered within the 2nd amendment an individual right in a way courts previously hadn't.

Prior to 50 years ago the idea that the 2nd amendment contained an individual right to bear arms would have baffled anyone. There's a good 4-page article here that explains how the NRA very deliberately creatively reinterpreted the 2nd amendment over the last 50 years to pretend there was an individual right in it. From the article:

From 1888, when law review articles first were indexed, through 1959, every single one on the Second Amendment concluded it did not guarantee an individual right to a gun.and long lost

There has been ample evidence presented throughout this thread that our Founding Fathers considered keeping and bearing weapons of self-defense to be an individual right. No amount of revisionist history is going to change that.

Source: You Can Try to Repeal the Second Amendment, but You Can�t Repeal History

Never once in the founding debate did a lawmaker rise to argue that gun ownership should be limited. Most state constitutions already featured language to protect that right. A number of states demanded that the national constitution include such a provision.

https://www.nationalreview.com/2018/...trong-history/

© Copyright Original Source

To understand the Second Amendment, it's critical to understand the issue surrounding militias. It's clear from the language of the Second Amendment and other writings of our Founding Fathers that they considered the militia to be an army of the people and not of the government. As such, the right of the people to keep and bear should not be infringed.

[JimL]

There has been ample evidence presented throughout this thread that our Founding Fathers considered keeping and bearing weapons of self-defense to be an individual right. No amount of revisionist history is going to change that.

Source: You Can Try to Repeal the Second Amendment, but You Can�t Repeal History

Never once in the founding debate did a lawmaker rise to argue that gun ownership should be limited. Most state constitutions already featured language to protect that right. A number of states demanded that the national constitution include such a provision.

https://www.nationalreview.com/2018/...trong-history/

© Copyright Original Source

To understand the Second Amendment, it's critical to understand the issue surrounding militias. It's clear from the language of the Second Amendment and other writings of our Founding Fathers that they considered the militia to be an army of the people and not of the government. As such, the right of the people to keep and bear should not be infringed.

Times change, and so do circumstances. The Bill of Rights is not writ in stone for one thing and it's interpretation is not up to you, it's up to the court and guess what, the court disagrees with you. And btw, militias were well regulated, meaning they were regulated by the government. Different times, different circumstances.

[Mountain Man]

Times change, and so do circumstances. The Bill of Rights is not writ in stone for one thing and it's interpretation is not up to you, it's up to the court and guess what, the court disagrees with you. And btw, militias were well regulated, meaning they were regulated by the government. Different times, different circumstances.

Where is it implied in the Second Amendment that militias were regulated by the government? It seems you pulled that out of thin air, or perhaps from some other unmentionable place.

And where does the "court" disagree with the traditional interpretation of the Second Amendment? On the contrary, any time the Second Amendment has been challenged, the courts have ultimately affirmed the obvious intent of the Founding Fathers.

[Roy]

A reminder that guns have likely saved millions of more lives than they have taken.

...almost all of which involved some-one with a gun killing some-one else with a gun, and almost all of which would not have been necessary if guns were not readily available.

The actual situation is that guns have been used to kill several millions, but could have been used to kill millions more.

[JimL]

Where is it implied in the Second Amendment that militias were regulated by the government? It seems you pulled that out of thin air, or perhaps from some other unmentionable place.

It's implied in the Constitution itself, which of course the Bill of rights is tied to. The militias, prior to the Bill of rights were regulated by the state governments and so when stating "well regulated militia" the 2nd amendment is merely refering to governmental regulations just as had always been the case. On the other hand, if you would just use you're own common sense, you could have come to that conclusion on your own. There is no order for the people to organize and regulate themselves as a militia in the 2nd amendment, so who do you suppose would insure that these militias were well regulated, if not the government.

And where does the "court" disagree with the traditional interpretation of the Second Amendment? On the contrary, any time the Second Amendment has been challenged, the courts have ultimately affirmed the obvious intent of the Founding Fathers.

Already went over this with you, so putting it in front of your face again isn't going to help. All I'll say is that when the S. Court says that the right to bear arms is not unlimited, who do you think it is that the court is implying has the right to limit that right?

[Mountain Man]

It's implied in the Constitution itself, which of course the Bill of rights is tied to. The militias, prior to the Bill of rights were regulated by the state governments and so when stating "well regulated militia" the 2nd amendment is merely refering to governmental regulations just as had always been the case. On the other hand, if you would just use you're own common sense, you could have come to that conclusion on your own. There is no order for the people to organize and regulate themselves as a militia in the 2nd amendment, so who do you suppose would insure that these militias were well regulated, if not the government.

Already went over this with you, so putting it in front of your face again isn't going to help. All I'll say is that when the S. Court says that the right to bear arms is not unlimited, who do you think it is that the court is implying has the right to limit that right?

First of all, a militia is an army of the people and not a standing army of the state, which is why the Second Amendment explicitly protects the rights of the PEOPLE to keep and bear arms.

Secondly, I've never argued that the right to bear arms is an unlimited right, I've argued that historically, it has always been cigarettes an INDIVIDUAL right.

[Terraceth]

You seem to have that backward. DC v Heller in 2008 was a landmark case precisely because it discovered within the 2nd amendment an individual right in a way courts previously hadn't.

Prior to 50 years ago the idea that the 2nd amendment contained an individual right to bear arms would have baffled anyone. There's a good 4-page article here that explains how the NRA very deliberately creatively reinterpreted the 2nd amendment over the last 50 years to pretend there was an individual right in it.

That article has a number of problems, but I'll try to stick specifically to the issue of supreme court decisions. It makes the following claim:
"Four times between 1876 and 1939, the U.S. Supreme Court declined to rule that the Second Amendment protected individual gun ownership outside the context of a militia."

Unhelpfully, it does not state what they are (making sweeping claims without actually providing sources for them is actually a recurring issue in the article), but I assume it's Presser v. Illinois, Miller v. Texas, Robertson v. Baldwin, and United States v. Miller.

If those are them, the claim is a bit disingenuous. Robertson v. Baldwin was about bans on concealed guns. United States v. Miller was a weird case that ironically people on both sides of the debate will cite as evidence for their claims, but ultimately the decision only applied to a particular kind of gun and more importantly it was decided without any defense (Miller went into hiding because the mafia was after him and thus did not hire anyone to argue the case) so its conclusions are dubious.

Now, Presser v. Illinois and Miller v. Texas did state that the Second Amendment did not apply to the states. However, both were decided before the incorporation doctrine (which is why Presser v. Illinois also claimed the First Amendment does not apply to the states). Since said doctrine was created, no case on the subject came before the Supreme Court. So in terms of prior precedent of the Supreme Court, all that is pointed to are either cases that were not about the general issue of right to bear arms or were decided under a paradigm that no longer exists. The simple fact is that, up until Heller, there was actually a dearth of applicable Supreme Court decisions regarding individual rights and the Second Amendment or whether it applied to the states or just the federal government.

When it moves onto the Heller decision itself, I note it says this:
The author states this as if that would be preferable, but it is not stated as to what actual relevance this has on whether something is constitutional or not, which is kind of the whole question.

[Juvenal]

Originally Posted by ...

Please quote the actual user names.

Originally Posted by JimLamebrain

And refrain from altering usernames into personal attacks.

[JimL]

First of all, a militia is an army of the people and not a standing army of the state, which is why the Second Amendment explicitly protects the rights of the PEOPLE to keep and bear arms.

Wrong, a militia is an army of the people regulated by the state, which is why the 2nd amendment explicitly protects the rights of the people to keep and bear arms. Well regulated MM, well regulated.

Secondly, I've never argued that the right to bear arms is an unlimited right, I've argued that historically, it has always been cigarettes an INDIVIDUAL right.

Good, then you understand that the government of the people can decide to ban assault weapons.

[Roy]

Did the Minutemen or the Green Mountain Boys led by Ethan Allen own their own arms?

No idea. I know John Brown's troop didn't. Wikipedia suggests that most minutemen supplied their own arms, but some were provided with arms from colony armouries.

What happened in specific historical instances does not and cannot limit what is possible under other circumstances.

[Sparko]

Times change, and so do circumstances. The Bill of Rights is not writ in stone for one thing and it's interpretation is not up to you, it's up to the court and guess what, the court disagrees with you. And btw, militias were well regulated, meaning they were regulated by the government. Different times, different circumstances.

You keep ignoring the elephant in the room. The 2nd does not confer the right to bear arms. It acknowledges a preexisting right already exists and prevents the government from infringing on it. Whether that right was used to form a militia, hunt rabbits, or defend a person's home is irrelevant to the fact that we have a right to bear arms and the government can't do a damn thing about it.

Repealing the 2nd doesn't take away that right, it just allows the government to infringe on it, making them tyrants.