Very interesting, I never knew this. How can anyone dispute the fact that the 2A was put in place to pall citizens to protect themselves from a tyrannical government? With the context put in place by the preamble, it doesn’t seem that there is any question.
Exactly. The Constitution specifically restricts the Feds from having the power to institute restrictions on arms. The 14th Amendment applies that to the States. They can’t repeal it. Not in spirit.It’s not there specifically to allow citizens to defend against a tyrannical government. Bringing out that notion always gets the antis talking about how you can’t fight a modern military blah blah blah.
The issue is the right to defend yourself PERIOD. Against who (or what) isn’t something that it needs to get into. The founders had just lived through being told that all the defense they needed for ANY reason, even on a frontier farm or while traveling colonial wilderness roads, were the red coated fellows in the British army. And on that basis, they forced everyone to give up their personal arms.
The 2A is written to make it clear that the government can’t do that, and (hence the first part of the 2A), even the inevitably necessary existence of a standing professional military can’t be used as an excuse to deny citizens their right to defend themselves, with arms.
It’s not there specifically to allow citizens to defend against a tyrannical government. Bringing out that notion always gets the antis talking about how you can’t fight a modern military blah blah blah.
The issue is the right to defend yourself PERIOD. Against who (or what) isn’t something that it needs to get into. The founders had just lived through being told that all the defense they needed for ANY reason, even on a frontier farm or while traveling colonial wilderness roads, were the red coated fellows in the British army. And on that basis, they forced everyone to give up their personal arms.
The 2A is written to make it clear that the government can’t do that, and (hence the first part of the 2A), even the inevitably necessary existence of a standing professional military can’t be used as an excuse to deny citizens their right to defend themselves, with arms.
Great post JohnnyNice, concise read. It caused me to experience a bit of a revelation.
We know that all rights, like 2A, are not granted by governments. The founders acknowledged that instead they have always existed. That is clear from the debate in the 1780's.
Knowing that rights have always existed, the only logical conclusion is that all rights MUST be vested in individuals. Only individuals have always existed. States, militias, or any other creations of man are transitory. They come and go depending on the needs of human beings at that time. The only thing that has been constant is the human being.
The founders recognized that humans have the right to be secure in the places they inhabit, to speak their minds, to follow their consciences, and so on. They used then-understandable terms like press, arms, persons, houses, and papers, or then-understood concerns like the quartering of troops, and so on, to put meat on the bones of those ideas. IT IS THOSE IDEAS that endure through time, notwithstanding the technology of the day and the words used to exemplify them. That is why the computer is protected by 1A just as the AR-15 is protected by 2A. They live or die by the same principle.
No rights whatsoever are vested in states, militias, newspapers, radio stations, and so forth. Rights are vested in individual human beings. Human beings who join together to create newspapers or militias bring their individual human rights with them to those man-made creations, not the other way around. Even if you are not a part of a militia, or an employee of a newspaper, you still have all of the rights to arms, press, speech, and so forth.
They said "No dude. WTF would we create a federal government, when we JUST finished fighting a war to escape an unjust federal government? ALL federal governments oppress. All federal governments overreach and clamp down on individual liberty. Its inevitable. Its the nature of a centralized gov".
So the other founders said "Wait, what if we PROMISE this government won't suppress people's rights?"
"How can you promise that?"
"What if, before we even get to the constitution, we draw up a prohibitive list? What if, to prevent this fed from ever trampling peoples rights, we enumerate a specific list of authorities this government MAY NEVER HAVE? All those things the old gov did to oppress us, we'll start from square one putting in writing that they may never have the power to do those things."
"Hmmm... Ok. We can live with that. Let's draw up the list of powers this new gov can NOT have, and if we are all satisfied, then we will allow this gov to be formalized and write up the rest of their rules."
GET IT?
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First, yes, just as the article explains, the Bill of Rights does NOT GIVE us any rights. Certain rights just exist, by our very status as free citizens. The BOR doesn't grant them as the Fed Gov never had the authority to grant or not grant these rights in the first place.
All the BOR does is PROTECT those rights, but placing a specific list of restrictions upon the Fed, to ensure that they cannot try to interfere with citizen's rights.
Second, you cannot "repeal" something from the BOR. Yes, the anti gunners will point out how "its a living document" "it was meant to be able to be changed". Yes, the Constitution is, BUT the BOR is a conditional document. The Constitution ONLY EXISTS ON THE CONDITION THAT THE BOR is honored.
Wrong. United States v. CruikshankNo.
Any amendment can be repealed. And the constitution itself can be amended, so for example there are no 3/5 persons anymore.
If they repealed the 2nd it would allow the federal (and state) governments to restrict gun rights however they like. I have no doubt as in Europe, there would be a lot of non- compliance.
Wrong. United States v. Cruikshank
The Bill of Rights is not the government’s to grant. As such, they cannot rescind any of the Amendments in the BoR.
So can any of the Amendments be rescinded or changed if a Constitutional Convention was held (involving all of the states) with two thirds of them agreeing to the proposed changes?
That is the way I’ve understood it.
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All the Amendments but the Bill of Rights. You cannot grant or rescind a right. That is why United States v. Cruikshank is so integral to our argument. Not all Constitutional scholars agree (I am certainly not a Constitutional scholar)
The Eighteenth Amendment (Amendment XVIII) of the United States Constitution effectively established the prohibition of alcoholic beverages in the United States by declaring the production, transport, and sale of alcohol (though not the consumption or private possession) illegal. The separate Volstead Act set down methods for enforcing the Eighteenth Amendment, and defined which "intoxicating liquors" were prohibited, and which were excluded from prohibition (e.g., for medical and religious purposes)...
The Amendment was in effect for the following 13 years. It was repealed in 1933 by ratification of the Twenty-First Amendment. The Twenty-first Amendment was ratified on December 5, 1933. It is unique among the 27 amendments of the U.S. Constitution for being the only one to repeal a prior amendment and to have been ratified by state ratifying conventions...
-- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eighteenth_Amendment_to_the_United_States_Constitution