Gun control: no constitutional right to concealed carry

You can gauge an appropriate response if you see them cumin.

12 Likes

I donā€™t see ā€œthe right of the state to keep and bear armsā€ as the second clause.

The militia argument is inconsistent with every other amendment in the bill of rights. In every other amendment ā€œthe peopleā€ refers to individuals. Originally white male landowners, but with the 14th amendment it was corrected, and it continues to be corrected to a more inclusive ā€œpeopleā€ by statute.

The ā€œmilitiaā€ of the first clause was more likely the armed forces of the US, which at the time had been built from individuals who were not professional soldiers in a standing army. They were people whose skill at arms was developed through personal practice and hunting. The proto-government had relied on their home grown skill (and the French) to field an effective fighting force without having the infrastructure of a standing army.

This amendment was written by rebels afraid of strong government as way to ensure revolution was always possible. See Jeffersonā€™s musings on ā€œThe tree of Libertyā€ and how we should have armed revolt every few decades.

Perhaps you donā€™t think we need the right to keep and bear arms with our standing army and paramilitary police. The people who wrote the amendment may have thought we needed it becomes those things.

And maybe they were wrong. But that doesnā€™t change why they wrote it.

6 Likes

Truly we were a bunch of irregulars.

2 Likes

No problem.

3 Likes

This isnā€™t the 19th Century, America.

2 Likes

This is one of the things that has bothered me about the Heller and McDonald decisions; the fact that they were based on a right to self defense seems about as far from originalism as the court could get. The words ā€œself defenseā€ and ā€œdefense of homeā€ do not appear in the constitution anywhere.

Exactly. It seems all this talk of self-defense is really a twisting by the courts to support the notion of individual right to bear arms without admitting that the Constitution actually has the means for its own undoing written right in to it.

3 Likes

Weā€™re not better people because we have iPhones.

In the another thread, we were just discussing the rape rate. 1 in 4 is a good reason to carry. Yes, society has problems, what else is new?

1 Like

This is mine:

Whoops! Shoo!

Canā€™t move for cats in this internet

9 Likes

I believe youā€™re forgetting something.

4 Likes

Hereā€™s a much shorter version:

Obama declares guns to be really awesome, writes executive order that everyone should have one.

The NRA would be out of business by the end of the week.

5 Likes

Well, the Continental Army wasnā€™t really a standing army. It was several successive armies. Early (1775) enlistment periods were short, for fear of the possibility it evolving into a permanent army. But in later armies they got longer.

On the other hand the first one was largely about conquest rather than defence; one of the big fears about having a standing army. The rebels had created a ā€œContinental Congressā€ expecting that the entire continent would rush to join, pausing only for adulation and the occasional rapturous fainting incident. When that failed they used their ā€œContinental Armyā€ to invade Canada in 1775. They were defeated.

6 Likes

That would still increase the number of guns around. My way leads to less.

1 Like

Um, no. Everyone in Congress does exactly the opposite of what he asks.

5 Likes

O-M-G!! How do they live in countries without American freedoms? I mean, do the Dutch hunt gay people?

3 Likes

I donā€™t see anything contradicting the analysis. The Continental Army was built from the ground up for the Revolution. It was designed to be torn down to the bare minimums after the war, with a core that could remobilize an cadre of reservists to serve as the root for draftees, state militias and volunteers to be added to to bring the army up to the strength needed to handle the conflict at hand.

The modern standing armed forces is about 0.45% of our population. The Continental Army was about 0.02% of the total population after demobilization. None of which changes the ā€œRight of the people to keep and bear arms,ā€ to refer to the states, state or federal militias or anything else then ā€œthe peopleā€ as the rest of the Bill of Rights states.

Iā€™m having a conflict between pure design:


and cultural heritage:

3 Likes

Couldnā€™t say about the Dutch, but hate crimes affect a much larger percentage of the LGBT+ community then assault or murder affect the general US population.seems to me to be a reason a person might feel they need a gun while out and about.

Hereā€™s the UK,

Hate Crimes in general in the US:

Maybe. But the nature of gun ownership since that time has surely changed. After all, an arsenal of semi-automatic guns isnā€™t precisely the same thing as a (incredibly inaccurate and time consuming to load) musket. Shit changes. The constitution was written in such a way to take that into account.

2 Likes

Iā€™m well aware of the hate crime statistics. You know what? Arming all citizens to the teeth isnā€™t the solution. Iā€™m more afraid of you or Joe Citizen with a gun than I am of the cops, and I donā€™t like the cops.

The solution to crime and violence isnā€™t ā€œhey, letā€™s add guns!!ā€

10 Likes