Right to carry arms

Our Supreme Court is again going to decide the fate of the intent of the Second amendment. A first impression?


SECOND AMENDMENT -- ARMS
"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,"
It has often been stated that we have a Constitutional
right to buy and keep weapons. And then these same citizens
misquote the Second amendment to prove their statement.
There it is - up there. The complete amendment.
It is a matter of English grammar and sentence
construction. The Framers of our Constitution used it well.
They felt that a short paragraph would be less apt to stress
the mentality with respect to intent. How wrong they were!
Our Framers did not intend that all of the people had
the right to keep arms. Far from it! As was written, they
stated that "a well regulated militia" --is the "people" who
have the "right" - "to keep and bear arms.".
It was always the intent of the Framers, representatives
from the then recognized "States", to assure that the RIGHT
to maintain a "peoples" army in each "State" --- shall not be
"infringed" by the Federal Government.
The Second Amendment refers to the "State" militia,--
the military reserve -- the "peoples" army. THEY have the
right "to keep and bear arms" This right is as important
today as it was at the time of the Minutemen in the
Revolutionary War. When we refer to Article 1, Section 8
Paragraph 15 we find that Congress is responsible for the
financial and arms support of the Military in each of the
United States. The leadership; however, is appointed by the
governments of the separate States. This is to assure that
the peace time military strength of the country rests with
the States - not with a Central Government.
The authority which may determine possession of arms
(weapons) for all civilians (non-military) is most properly
that of the Central Government. Each respective State is
Constitutionally guaranteed the right to provide and
authorize its reserves "to keep and bear arms".

WASH

It says "the right of the people" not "the right of the militia". I would assume they meant that a well-regulated militia was necessary for the security of a free state, and therefore citizens will not be prevented from keeping and bearing arms, since this would prevent them from forming an effective militia.

The Constitution shall never be construed to authorize Congress to prevent the people of the United States, who are peaceable citizens, from keeping their own arms. -- Samuel Adams, Debates and Proceedings in the Convention of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, 86-87 (Pearce and Hale, eds., Boston, 1850)

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When firearms go, all goes - we need them every hour. -- George Washington.

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Oppressors can tyrannize only when they achieve a standing army, an enslaved press, and a disarmed populace. -- James Madison
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Our tenet ever was . . . that Congress had not unlimited powers to provide for the general welfare, but were restrained to those specifically enumerated; and that, as it was never meant that they should provide for that welfare but by the exercise of the enumerated powers, so it could not have been meant they should raise money for purposes which the enumeration did not place under their action.
Tomas Jefferson

The supreme court will decide that it is constitutional for the residents of the city of Chicago to keep handguns in their homes. Making that illegal back in the 1980's was clearly unconstitutional.

We're done here

"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"

If I was an American, I would ask four questions about that statement. Firstly, is a well regulated militia any longer necessary to the Security of a free State? Secondly, is that what gun owners use their Arms for? Thirdly, does 'Arms' mean 'firearms'? And finally, does "shall not be infringed" mean the same thing as "shall be protected" - i.e. if a state decided to ban firearms, could the federal government overturn the decision? If the answer to all of these is 'yes', I think a repeal should be considered so that individual states could decide on the issue.

However, I am not an American and I don't know the full ins and outs of the US constitution, so I don't know how pertinent these questions really are.

The short answer to all the questions you posed, from a liberal pinko homosexual, is yes.

The law will be repealed.
And, for the record, I agree.

One thing crosses my mind.
The USA seems almost alone in it's gun-culture, and holds that that ensures the freedom of it's citizens.
I cast no aspersions on that outlook, but look at the price it pays in human deaths and suffering for that "freedom".
The fact that the population is largely unarmed doesn't seem to reduce the freedom of the citizens of the other democracies a great deal, and at least WE are far less likely to cop a bullet in our daily lives, not a small detail from where I sit.

WTF has being a homosexual got to do with the answer to his questions?

I wonder, how many gun crimes are committed by people who legally obtained and registered their firearms anyaway?

That's a liberal, pinko, homosexual.. And as such, conservatives would assume that I would be for strong gun control. In fact, I'm a strong supporter of the NRA and the second amendment.

While you make a good point, it's a rather grey area. It depends on how you define a gun-crime really.
Here guns are strictly controlled, you can possess them but the conditions and regulations make it difficult, and they can't be kept readily accessible.
Look at all the people shot by mistake, the children killed by a moments carelessness, the shootings that needn't have happened but for the ready access to firearms, family disputes, minor burglaries gone wrong etc, I would call a lot of that "criminal".
How many times every single year in America does a drunk grab a gun and do something stupid?
If you weigh it all up, well, I personally think the price is too high, but that's me, and I don't live there, so it's only an outsiders opinion.

Okay, that's a good point. It's hard to do the 'gun control' thing without discriminating. Sadly, it's the no common sense (but that's a different thread) people that need to not have guns. For example, last year, a man was cleaning his gun and 'just to be funny' put the barrel up against his 6 year old daughter's forehead and pulled the trigger. Imagine his surprise when, instead of hearing a click, he heard an explosion. Can't remember right off what he was convicted of, but such a person should not have a gun.

IMHO A very good question that makes a very good point . All of my fire arms are legal , And not one of them have ever been involved in any illegal activity. But I'm just one American gun owner and am not speaking for anyone but myself and my fire arms.

Dammit that's F**ked up s*it ! I hope he was convicted to the full extent of the law. Such a person as that would do any 'just to be funny' anything with a firearm shouldn't be allowed to breed or own firearms. IMO

I must confess here, I'm a gun-lover, and in my youth acquired some convictions for fire-arms offenses, plus I've been shot at a few times, once successfully, ouch.
That was before the reg's came in, my guns were mostly legal and even though I was extremely sensible and careful, I still nearly shot my pregnant wife!
She ducked, dammit!
Maybe not the best subject for joking about, but that experience lead to me disposing of them, kids and guns just don't mix, IMO.