Question about the right to bear arms

[Triumph]

Originally posted by: Specop 007

Originally posted by: dullard

Originally posted by: Throckmorton
Why does the right to bear arms stop at semi-automatic rifles? ...

Does the "right to bear arms" have an asterix next to it, or does an arm only constitute the type of arms that you're an enthusiast about?

Yes, the right to bear arms basically has an asterisk next to it. Please read the 2nd amendment. I'll write one of the two recognized versions:

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.

Your "asterisk" has been bolded in the quote. This "asterisk" has been clarified in the US supreme court:

In the absence of any evidence tending to show that possession or use of a 'shotgun having a barrel of less than eighteen inches in length' at this time has some reasonable relationship to any 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. Certainly 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.

Until that ruling is further clarified, you have the FEDERAL right to bear any arm that can be shown to be ordinary miliary equipment or for common defense. I highlight federal since it is possible but highly unlikely that a state can constitutionally take that right away.

Now back to your question. At what point is a weapon neither "ordinary military equipment" nor "common defense". A bomb is military equipment, but is it ordinary for the military to all carry bombs with them? Probably not. Same with cannons and fully automatic weapoins. Yes, they are military equipment, but they aren't ordinary. Nor are they really necessary for common defense.

A future court case could remove the "ordinary" restriction if they provide evidence requested in the supreme court decision I quoted above. But until that happens, government can infringe our rights to the non-ordinary weapons.

Your view and opinion is outdated.

Since Heller the right to own IS an individual right. The liberal states are too chickenshit to uphold their state laws however and have the case tried again and become incorporated so technically yes ytour right. State law COULD override that but thus far the liberals are too fucking scared to push it.

Now you can go ahead and bold up the militia part all you want, frankly it just makes you look like a jackass as the Heller brief clearly states the first part of the statement has little bearing on the second part.

Look, it doesn't really matter. Whichever way you interpret the 2nd Amendment, the federal government has no right to enact laws that would inhibit the way a state chooses to run its militia. If my state wants its militia to be made up of citizens who have their own fully automatic firearms, than the feds have no right to infringe upon that. Which is why the NFA and FOPA are unconstitutional. Additionally, the Miller case supports this - fully automatic firearms and rifles with barrel lengths less than 16" are both in common military use by individual soldiers. Yes they're not banned, but the ability to possess them is certainly being infringed upon by federal regulation. So depending on how your state wants to run its militia, firearms laws should be regulated at the state level only. Anything else is unconstitutional. And if you live in a crappy state, then that sucks for you!

 

[Atomic Playboy]

Originally posted by: Specop 007

Originally posted by: dullard
Yes, the right to bear arms basically has an asterisk next to it. Please read the 2nd amendment. I'll write one of the two recognized versions:

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.

Your "asterisk" has been bolded in the quote. This "asterisk" has been clarified in the US supreme court:

In the absence of any evidence tending to show that possession or use of a 'shotgun having a barrel of less than eighteen inches in length' at this time has some reasonable relationship to any 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. Certainly 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.

Until that ruling is further clarified, you have the FEDERAL right to bear any arm that can be shown to be ordinary miliary equipment or for common defense. I highlight federal since it is possible but highly unlikely that a state can constitutionally take that right away.

Now back to your question. At what point is a weapon neither "ordinary military equipment" nor "common defense". A bomb is military equipment, but is it ordinary for the military to all carry bombs with them? Probably not. Same with cannons and fully automatic weapoins. Yes, they are military equipment, but they aren't ordinary. Nor are they really necessary for common defense.

A future court case could remove the "ordinary" restriction if they provide evidence requested in the supreme court decision I quoted above. But until that happens, government can infringe our rights to the non-ordinary weapons.

Your view and opinion is outdated.

Since Heller the right to own IS an individual right. The liberal states are too chickenshit to uphold their state laws however and have the case tried again and become incorporated so technically yes ytour right. State law COULD override that but thus far the liberals are too fucking scared to push it.

Now you can go ahead and bold up the militia part all you want, frankly it just makes you look like a jackass as the Heller brief clearly states the first part of the statement has little bearing on the second part.

To be fair, when you have people like mooseracing making an argument like "Everyone seems to miss the part that says SHALL NOT BE INFRINGED," I think it's reasonable to point out the well regulated militia bit. Why should we only take the last line literally but not the first? "Oh, the militia thing is outdated, but that shall not be infringed, that's the real amendment right there..." Nonsense. If you're going to try to take the Second Amendment literally, I think it's pretty clear that you need to be a member of an organized militia to own a gun. I guess the NRA probably counts...

I don't actually believe in a strict Constitutionalist view of the Second Amendment personally. I'm a "gun-hating liberal" who thinks everyone should be able to go out and buy whatever gun they damn well please. Just don't start shooting people with it (especially me). But I do have to point out the hypocrisy in someone who is willing to take the latter half of the amendment literally while ignoring the first half.

 

[mooseracing]

Originally posted by: umbrella39

Originally posted by: mooseracing

Originally posted by: Throckmorton
Does the "right to bear arms" have an asterix next to it, or does an arm only constitute the type of arms that you're an enthusiast about?

Only to people like Obama that when you ask him about his beliefs on it he always says "I bleive in the 2nd ammendment, BUT..."

Everyone seems to miss the part that says SHALL NOT BE INFRINGED.


Like I've said before we aneed a government that supports the constituition, not one that chews it up and decides how they want to interpret it.

Isn't this why we have a SC? What is your proposed alternative?

I don't know the orginal reason for a supreme court, but they take things to far out of context.

So you should also be able to threaten to kill whoever you want because congress shall not abridge the freedom of speech? I don't want to live on your planet of absolutes.

Yes you should be able to say I wish I could kill them...there is a difference between saying it and carrying it out. I can't count how many people I would like to beat over the head with a pipe on my way to work, I've said it out loud many times so I should go to jail then?

Haven't you heard give me liberty or give me death? I don't want to lose my liberties because other people are scared.

This country was founded on Freedom, now we are getting controlled by a government that the founding people came here to avoid.

 

[Specop 007]

Originally posted by: Atomic Playboy

To be fair, when you have people like mooseracing making an argument like "Everyone seems to miss the part that says SHALL NOT BE INFRINGED," I think it's reasonable to point out the well regulated militia bit. Why should we only take the last line literally but not the first? "Oh, the militia thing is outdated, but that shall not be infringed, that's the real amendment right there..." Nonsense. If you're going to try to take the Second Amendment literally, I think it's pretty clear that you need to be a member of an organized militia to own a gun. I guess the NRA probably counts...

I don't actually believe in a strict Constitutionalist view of the Second Amendment personally. I'm a "gun-hating liberal" who thinks everyone should be able to go out and buy whatever gun they damn well please. Just don't start shooting people with it (especially me). But I do have to point out the hypocrisy in someone who is willing to take the latter half of the amendment literally while ignoring the first half.

Again, read the brief. It addresses just about any and every view or angle one would want to take. Some examples are below, but the point is the Supreme Court found that the 2nd is an individual right to own firearms outside of militia or organized military service.

It is an individual right.

The Second Amendment is naturally divided into two
parts: its prefatory clause and its operative clause. The
former does not limit the latter grammatically, but rather
announces a purpose. The Amendment could be rephrased,
?Because a well regulated Militia is necessary to
the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep
and bear Arms shall not be infringed.?

That was also
the interpretation of those state constitutional provisions
adopted by pre-Civil War state courts.9 These provisions
demonstrate?again, in the most analogous linguistic
context?that ?bear arms? was not limited to the carrying
of arms in a militia.

In any event, the meaning of ?bear arms? that petitioners
and JUSTICE STEVENS propose is not even the (sometimes)
idiomatic meaning. Rather, they manufacture a
hybrid definition, whereby ?bear arms? connotes the
actual carrying of arms (and therefore is not really an
idiom) but only in the service of an organized militia.

The right ?to
carry arms in the militia for the purpose of killing game?
is worthy of the mad hatter. Thus, these purposive qualifying
phrases positively establish that ?to bear arms? is
not limited to military use.

 

[First]

The Constitution also explicitly states that blacks are 3/5ths of a person, but it eventually was amended. There's zero reason to think the right to bear arms won't be amended in some way in the future to restrict easy access. Not guns generally, just the unnecessary ones.

 

[Specop 007]

Originally posted by: Evan
The Constitution also explicitly states that blacks are 3/5ths of a person, but it eventually was amended. There's zero reason to think the right to bear arms won't be amended in some way in the future to restrict easy access. Not guns generally, just the unnecessary ones.

And that too is covered in the Scalia brief

 

[AstroManLuca]

Originally posted by: Specop 007
The Second Amendment is naturally divided into two
parts: its prefatory clause and its operative clause. The
former does not limit the latter grammatically, but rather
announces a purpose. The Amendment could be rephrased,
?Because a well regulated Militia is necessary to
the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep
and bear Arms shall not be infringed.?

This x1000. People don't understand the amendment because it was written a long time ago with old-fashioned language. But this is basically what it says.

Breaking it down further, a well-regulated militia is necessary because the states are still considered free and they have a right to raise their own militias if they want. This part is establishing that militias are important because they provide a check against the federal government's power.

The second part is basically a check against the militia's power. Militias are necessary; therefore, people must be able to have weapons. Not militias can have weapons, people. It does say "the right of the people," after all. If you can't see that, then you are deluding yourself or you simply don't understand the English language.

 

[fskimospy]

Originally posted by: mooseracing

Originally posted by: umbrella39

Originally posted by: mooseracing

Only to people like Obama that when you ask him about his beliefs on it he always says "I bleive in the 2nd ammendment, BUT..."

Everyone seems to miss the part that says SHALL NOT BE INFRINGED.


Like I've said before we aneed a government that supports the constituition, not one that chews it up and decides how they want to interpret it.

Isn't this why we have a SC? What is your proposed alternative?

I don't know the orginal reason for a supreme court, but they take things to far out of context.

So you should also be able to threaten to kill whoever you want because congress shall not abridge the freedom of speech? I don't want to live on your planet of absolutes.

Yes you should be able to say I wish I could kill them...there is a difference between saying it and carrying it out. I can't count how many people I would like to beat over the head with a pipe on my way to work, I've said it out loud many times so I should go to jail then?

Haven't you heard give me liberty or give me death? I don't want to lose my liberties because other people are scared.

This country was founded on Freedom, now we are getting controlled by a government that the founding people came here to avoid.

If you're saying this you obviously have not the issue all the way through. Do we have freedom to divulge classified information to our country's enemies? It's just the freedom to say what you want after all. Do I have the freedom to defraud you by lying to you? Congress shall make no law... All of the rights guaranteed in the BOR are not unlimited, and for very good reason. It wouldn't be freedom, it would be anarchy.