When is enough enough?

[Steelharp]

At the time, to maintain a well regulated militia.

Today enforcement of it either way by the Federal government would be a slap in the face to States Rights. If we ever have a Constitutional Convention it will be gone. I believe I have a right to carry, but forgive me if I don’t hang that right on a dog like the 2nd amendment.

Which, at the time of that being written, "regulated" meant trained. NOT what it means today.

[Guest theconstitutionrocks]

Responded how....with force???  If they had there would just be a lot of dead folks in CT right now (or in jail for the rest of their lives).

 

We can discuss the academic issue all day long and talk bout "rights" and when people have the authority to resist with force, etc but unless someone stands up as a leader and gathers a few million man/woman army to resist then any "resistance with force" will simply end with the resisting "patriot" being shot dead by police or hauled off to jail if he's lucky enough to not get killed.

Your second paragraph hit the nail on the head. Unless those rights are upheld by those in power then the assertion of those rights without something to back them up is pointless. You are further correct in that ones and twos are not going to make a difference and may very well hurt the cause. The numbers must be in the hundereds or thousands and they must be organized and banded together (500 people in one general area, aware of what is going on is a force to be reckoned with, the same 500 scattered across the county in their individual homes is not).

 

Further, I believe that it is past time to establish a legal disconnect, a safety button or valve if you will, that when a certain line is crossed, whatever that line is, that automatically kicks in to prevent domestic military employment (yeah, I know, posse comitatus etc) by an abusive government. Somewhere there needs to be something whereby the senior commanders will be REQUIRED to say No, I won't comply, neither will my troops, and, as a mattter of fact, we will intercede on the side of the population. We saw something similar to this in Little Rock in 1957 when the State National Guard was used to enforce segregation. The 101st was sent in to enforce INTEGRATION. The model remains the same, it's just the activation trigger that should be different (if the federal government crosses the line, then they lose control of the military who acts to protect the population. For sedition and treason to be applicable, the order must be legal, and to be legal it must meet the test of constitutionality.

[leroy]

I lifted this out of a website that contains the plain text of the Constitution and the Bill of Rights:   http://constitutionus.com/

 

....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. ....

I hilited the section we like... The plain reading says two things; the first talks about the militia (...there was no standing army, that wuz a big argument with the founders--- the "army" was called up as a state militia... one of my ancestors served in the revolutionary war and wuz called up in the war of 1812..... The "standing army" argument wuz a great one; research and read the details; it might change your mind about the wisdom of a "standing army"..)...

 

The second thing the sentence says is the "famous" one that we cherish:  "...the right of the people to keep and bear Arms shall not be infringed....".  It's a plain reading thing... Ya cant erase either one... They could have put two periods there and any educated man (..or woman...) knows that....The second amendment gives the "...right to keep and bear arms..." as an "absolute" right... That's why the supremes (via John Roberts..) said so in the Heller Case (...i think...)...

 

Reconstruction politics brought the "...legislature can regulate the wearing of arms with an eye toward "keeping the peace...." (...or whatever the Tennessee State Constitution says....) 

 

If a rogue federal court can erase the Second Amendment one; ya can go up to Article III of the constitution and erase it too....

 

The Second Amendment is, in fact, an absolute right given to citizens of this country as long as we follow the Constitution and the Bill of Rights...

 

The "...regulating of the wearing of arms..." thing is power conveyed to the individual states; which i think we can quibble about, but that's what the "settled law" is... That's why ya see these idiot blue state apparatchiks passing state laws and ya see the arguments like ya see in places like Colorado and New York where state citizens (...sheriffs...) rebelling against them and threatening not to enforce "state laws" that are "unconstitutional"...

 

The law is built on logic and precedent... If ya can tear down and re-rite any part of it; ya can erase, tear down, and re-rite it all; and the legal intelligentsia well knows that...

 

I wouldnt worry about a federal removal of rights and gun confiscation... I would worry about restrictive state regulation of arms... That's exactly what we've got today in some places... Ergo, my argument about the "red state" / "blue state" confederation thing...

 

Think about this a bit...

leroy

Edited January 5, 2014 by leroy

[Guest theconstitutionrocks]

Can I ask a question?

 

Who here, on this board, can honestly say they would really and truly take up arms and go into full rebellion, should federal or state gun control measures be implemented?

 

Saying and doing are two different things, but I feel that if government or a nation feels it needs to disarm its populace, then said government is too restrictive for anyone with any sense of independence or freedom to live under.

That is a very fair and very tough question to truthfully respond to...FWIW, myself personally, the issue has to be exhausted through the legislature, the courts, nullification by the state/local government, jury nullification, and, hopfully, the resistance by federal forces, the national guard, and local law enforcement. If, failing ALL that, or refusal to apply those measures, the action still continues, then, and only then, should the people...in the necessary sufficient numbers, actively resist by force. The Declaration of independence addressed this...

 

"...That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.

[enfield]

Where registration leads -

 

http://www.youtube.com/embed/03XEUPfD0qM

[Guest theconstitutionrocks]

Registration = confiscation = extermination. Any politician that votes for registration and any government agent that facilitates or attempts to enforce that registration declares themselves an enemy of the American people by their actions and are therefore a valid target for assassination. Attempts to disarm the American people aren't simple misguided political positions, they are overt acts of war against the American people and should be handled accordingly.

I will agree with your statement only with the following provision. If, and ONLY if, it ever comes to full blown hostilities (aka the Second Civil War), or if the entities you describe absolutely gut our method of government (delete congress, remove the courts, shred the constitution, and become a dictator), then, and ONLY then, are those people considered legitimate targets. This is a well established prescident in conflict (Saddam himself was considered an operational center of gravity target).

[Guest Lester Weevils]

I lifted this out of a website that contains the plain text of the Constitution and the Bill of Rights: http://constitutionus.com/
I hilited the section we like... The plain reading says two things; the first talks about the militia (...there was no standing army, that wuz a big argument with the founders--- the "army" was called up as a state militia... one of my ancestors served in the revolutionary war and wuz called up in the war of 1812..... The "standing army" argument wuz a great one; research and read the details; it might change your mind about the wisdom of a "standing army"..)...

The second thing the sentence says is the "famous" one that we cherish: "...the right of the people to keep and bear Arms shall not be infringed....". It's a plain reading thing... Ya cant erase either one... They could have put two periods there and any educated man (..or woman...) knows that....The second amendment gives the "...right to keep and bear arms..." as an "absolute" right... That's why the supremes (via John Roberts..) said so in the Heller Case (...i think...)...

Yep a modern reader would tend to read the second phrase "not semantically dependent" on the first phrase. Though many modern readers do see them semantically connected, either thru honest opinion or wishful thinking.

Dunno how it would be commonly read near 250 years ago. Maybe not semantically connected back then as well.

I can't help but read the first phrase as an explanation of the second phrase, rather than as a conditional. In programming parlance, the first phrase is obviously a comment, because it "doesn't do anything". The second phrase is what "performs an action".

[DaveTN]

Yep a modern reader would tend to read the second phrase "not semantically dependent" on the first phrase. Though many modern readers do see them semantically connected, either thru honest opinion or wishful thinking.

Dunno how it would be commonly read near 250 years ago. Maybe not semantically connected back then as well.

I can't help but read the first phrase as an explanation of the second phrase, rather than as a conditional. In programming parlance, the first phrase is obviously a comment, because it "doesn't do anything". The second phrase is what "performs an action".

For my entire life (and before) the argument has been the wording, punctuation and intent.

If the intent was to allow people to be armed for any reason, the 2nd amendment would read “The right of the people to keep and bear Arms shall not be infringed.”

However, the 2nd amendment could be gone with the next Constitutional Convention. But my right to defend myself would not be gone. So I choose not to use the 2nd as justification to keep and bear arms.

What the 2nd amendment does at this time is to keep the Feds from disarming Police or National Guard as they have done in England.

[leroy]

Lester:  I like this...

 

....I can't help but read the first phrase as an explanation of the second phrase, rather than as a conditional. In programming parlance, the first phrase is obviously a comment, because it "doesn't do anything". The second phrase is what "performs an action". ....

 

Bingo!!

 

Keep up the good work,

leroy

[bersaguy]

When the state of Colorado's elected officials over stepped their authority and wrote laws that were deemed unconstitutional the people of Colorado  took a non violent legal stance through the proper channels and recalled those law makers and removed them. That is what should have been done in CT but instead they bowed down to them and kiss their elected butts..................jmho

[Oh Shoot]

When the state of Colorado's elected officials over stepped their authority and wrote laws that were deemed unconstitutional the people of Colorado  took a non violent legal stance through the proper channels and recalled those law makers and removed them. That is what should have been done in CT but instead they bowed down to them and kiss their elected butts..................jmho

 

Didn't change the restrictive laws themselves, however. Any number of rabidly left state legislators may be continually willing to fall on their swords as long as their monuments to repression remain as their legacy.

 

- OS

[RobertNashville]

Didn't change the restrictive laws themselves, however. Any number of rabidly left state legislators may be continually willing to fall on their swords as long as their monuments to repression remain as their legacy.

 

- OS

Yuup...about all we can say so far for the effort of firearm owners in CO who took action is that they've made a good first step. However, they haven't really changed anything so far and unless they can get the laws overturned their actions are, unfortunately, empty.

 

In a way, what has happened, especially in CO (which was much like TN politically in the not so distant past) is that it's shown the importance of acting BEFORE gun-hating, reactionary, "we must do it for the children" liberal/socialists/communists gain power. If there were enough right-minded folks in Colorado to recall the pinheads that spearheaded their horrible, anti-firearm legislation then there should have been enough of them to have kept them from being elected in the first place. We could most certainly face the same danger in TN because guess where a lot of NE liberals are moving to bringing their NE liberal social mindset/values with them???

Edited January 5, 2014 by RobertNashville

[bersaguy]

I realize that what they did in Colorado didn't get the laws changed but they got rid of the law makers and at least that may get the liberals thinking and realizing that it will be harder to get elected in that state now and get other state liberals a message that is they do anything that stupid they might or could get recalled or fired by We the People so if they get elected and want to keep their jobs they will steer clear of gun laws. I figure you have to begin somewhere and they began in Colorado............jmho