Posted on 07/31/2007 11:09:50 AM PDT by neverdem
The only problem I have, and let me say, I hate gun control, but.......have you ever been to DC? Would you want those people to be carrying around guns?
Are you saying that black people shouldn’t have guns?
I certainly hope not.
Because the DC residents who shouldn’t have guns, already have them. And those who need them most don’t have them.
Poor black people would live safer lives if they tended not to be disarmed by gun control.
This has more to do with “Organized Militia” service than “unorganized”. The code was changed within the last few years as this used to be exclusively stated,
I guess I should have added the sarcasm tag to my original post...duh!
My point is...the 2nd amendment applies to the people of DC and their rights have been infringed upon for all these years by not being allowed to own firearms...
Er... no. Sorry.
The whole of the Bill is a declaration of the right of the people at large or considered as individuals... It establishes some rights of the individual as unalienable and which consequently, no majority has a right to deprive them of. Albert Gallatin
The writings in the Debates for ratification and the 1st Congress uphold the "protects individual Rights" interpretation. Art 6 Para 2 and Amendments 9/10 make it pretty clear that such infringements were not legal anywhere with the Union.
Thanks for the link.
Well Duh the bad people already are carrying around firearms. I have been to these places and would never be so foolish to go there again unarmed.
The individuals whose rights they sought to protect were State Citizens. No thought was given to those who might in the future be DC citizens.
"Art 6 Para 2 and Amendments 9/10 make it pretty clear that such infringements were not legal anywhere with the Union."
Amendment 9 refers to the people, but at that time State Citizens were The People. I am suggesting DC, not being a State, later attracting citizens of its own, is a place where its people are not considered The People. Further, the kind of citizens DC has is not the same kind the States has. DC's citizens are a degraded citizen, more like a subject. If you don't believe it a citation from 40 Cal 311 is on my about page.
Amendment 10:The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.
OK, again a restriction against the United States government in DC from usurping powers of States and their people. The United States government can take any action it wants against DC residents and citizens---there is nothing in the Constitution preventing that---DC is not a State, it is a federal district, and its occupants have no political power. The whole thing was designed this way.
This mentality that the bill of rights just protects everyone wherever they are is idealistic and nice, but we were warned there would be those who would try to separate us from our liberties, and they have done it. The DC residents are in bad enough situation but it is understandable considering where they live. The real abomination is that being geographically remote from DC doesn't matter anymore, everyone checks that box U.S. citizen and places himself under the jurisdiction of DC that wasn't meant to be any bigger than 100 square miles or a square 10 miles per side and lets lapse any real form of State Citizenship. It is this going into business for citizenship that Congress was able to do away with "in Pursuance thereof;" in Art 6 2nd paragraph. Now with evreyone a U.S. citizen, we all can be treated the way DC citizens are treated.
There are two classes of citizen. One rightfully called citizen and the other also called citizen but should be called subject. 40 Cal 311, People v. De La Guerra will confirm this. It was when I read a citiation from this case that my view changed.
I disagree that the term "the security of a free state" refers only to the states of the union. Our nation has a "Secretary of State" who represents the interests of our nation when it must speak with one voice.
As an example, the United States of Mexico lacks a protected "right of the people to keep and bear arms", it lacks a "well-regulated Militia", and it suffers from vice and corruption which renders it insecure, as indicated by the violence just south of the border. The Second Amendment militia clause is a general statement of the need for a militia, not a reference to specific militias.
You said: "Our nation has a "Secretary of State" who represents the interests of our nation when it must speak with one voice."
You are 1/2 right, we do the one voice thing for nations outside the contiguous, Hawaii, Alaska, but internally, we are separate, so separate that DC can have gun control and the States not (though they are working to change that by altering our thinking to think the US is one superstate with the federal government at the apex, it is this we must avert)
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" Our Union in its foreign relations presents itself with all its states and territories as one and indivisible; a garment without a seam; BUT at home we are separate sovereign states of the union. Within the limits of the states, the government of the United States has no powers but those that have been delegated to it."
George Bancroft
"We have in our political system a government of the United States and a government of each of the several states. Each one of these governments is distinct from the others, and each has citizens of its own who owe it allegiance, and whose rights, within its jurisdiction, it must protect. The same person may be at the same time a citizen of the United States and a citizen of a state, but his rights of citizenship under one of these governments will be different from those he has under the other."
U. S. v. Cruikshank, 92 U.S. 542 (1875).
We are now watching our citizeship in the United States being overemphasized while our citizenship of our state is deemphasized and reduced to mere resident. It is through this reorganization we will find ourselves with the rights of people of DC. We had better know what rights they have and don't have or we will find ourselves with the same gun control they have and it will be legal. Or we need to revive our state citizenship in a big way. I prefer the latter option.
This mentality that the bill of rights just protects everyone wherever they are is idealistic and nice, but we were warned there would be those who would try to separate us from our liberties, and they have done it.
Agreed. However, they have done so by using YOUR reasoning, not mine and the Founders.
So the whole “freedom of association” thing has to go?
This thread is about the attempt to push the federal government back into its proper role. At this moment in time, the DC gun ban IS illegal. The burden is on DC to convince the Supreme Court that the DC Circuit is mistaken.
Is there some aspect of the Parker decision that you disagree with, or do you believe that the Supreme Court should hear the case and affirm unanimously?
Oh, for crying out loud. Peoples rights are "endowed by our creator..." and unalienable. They don't derive from some government "tradition".
I think you slightly misread something. Peoples rights endowed by our creator is fine and well. The legal tradition that supports them, and is critical, got a start with the Torah, ran through the New Testament, got a big boost with the Magna Carta, the unwritten English Constitution, English Common Law which came here at Jamestown, and developed as American Law in the States---all tradition---not of a government kind, but legal tradition. If anything government has been supportive or hostile to legal tradition depending on who is running the government. I notice RTKBA clauses painstakingly put in State Constitutions. Why would they be there if gee whiz peoples rights are endowed by our creator? Founders who worked on State constitutions realized the whole unwritten constitution concept had by GB had problems, more arguing over what was in it, etc. So the emphasis was to "get it in writing!" States did just that and what they contained is the accumulated legal tradition. There is legal continuity stretching back through when they were colonies and back to England. The colonials of course had rights, the colonies were chartered by the King, rights were extended, but abused which led to the war. Just as today people cite the federal constitution with their grievances, back then people could cite their state constitutions for their grievances and that made the most sense anyway.
Then comes along the District of Columbia. Very little regarding its management is in the Constitution. Nothing is said about its anticipated citizens. That's the problem. They just declared it "open for business" one day, by fiat, no charter, no history, and no legal tradition, no citizens to speak of. What sense would it have made to have a Declaration of Rights styled in the form of Virginia's as an example for citizens it doesn't have? But this they should have done. We wouldn't be having this argument today if they had.
I'm not telling you that you don't have rights, or that DC citizens don't have rights. Sure they have rights and want rights. What I'm saying is that a government that cannot be trusted, and we know wants to sustain a gun ban, is concealing from you the fact that they are denying you this right on the basis that the right isn't written down for DC. How many times during contract disputes did some party in the most petty manner refuse to perform some task that would make sense to do simply because it wasn't spelled out in the contract? That is what is happening here except the other side is refusing to be forthcoming about why, it just steamrolls, and it can because it controls the justice system.
What I'm saying is that a government that cannot be trusted, and we know wants to sustain a gun ban, is concealing from you the fact that they are denying you this right on the basis that the right isn't written down for DC.
If DC is not a State, then they are a creature of the Federal Government, and therefor most certainly beneficiaries of the Constitution and the BOR. And the 2A is very clear about what the citizens rights are.
No. If DC is not a State, then it is something else. And the something else it is, is a federal district.
"..and therefor most certainly beneficiaries of the Constitution and the BOR.
The seat of government was established by the Constitution. I wouldn't call that a benefit. The BOR, a true benefit to State Citizens, tells the federal government what it cannot do to State Citizens. Nothing is in it to protect DC citizens, who have little more than hope to protect their rights.
"And the 2A is very clear about what the citizens rights are."
There is not this monolithic homogeneous block of citizens. The 2A is very clear about what the [State] (there, fixed it) Citizens rights are. Unfortunately, it is silent about DC citizens, who are more like subjects if you read 40 Cal 311. Even more unfortunately, everyone outside DC buys into U.S. citizenship unaware that it makes them just like DC citizens except they don't live in DC. Then they wonder why the politcians are so awful, but this is why.
I usually leave a quote, here's a good one:
"We have in our political system a government of the United States and a government of each of the several states. Each one of these governments is distinct from the others, and each has citizens of its own who owe it allegiance, and whose rights, within its jurisdiction, it must protect. The same person may be at the same time a citizen of the United States and a citizen of a state, but his rights of citizenship under one of these governments will be different * from those he has under the other."
U. S. v. Cruikshank, 92 U.S. 542 (1875).
* Yes! Very different! To the point that DC citizens don't have the right to keep and bear arms except as a privilege at the pleasure of the people running DC. A real Citizen of a State has the RIGHT. But the State has to see him as a real Citizen and I don't know if they even do that any more, and I don't know if dual State Citizenship and U.S. citizenship will cut it, to sufficiently protect your rights, so overgrown has U.S. citizenship become.
BTW I don't mean to be difficult. I appreciate your replies and giving me the opportunity to dialogue with you. Although you disagree, you are polite and I appreciate that especially because some here call me nuts. I expect most don't read my post, the few who do shrug and dismiss it, I hope someone does read it and understand what I'm writing.
Isn't that what I said? "If DC is not a State, then they are a creature of the Federal Government".
Now, I can't find where the BoR is limited to Citizens of States, as it is a restraint on the FedGov against the rights of Citizens of the U.S. In my reading it also restrains those State governments who agree to become part of the U.S., since the legal contract known as the Constitution of the United States is the supreme law of the land.
"We have in our political system a government of the United States and a government of each of the several states. Each one of these governments is distinct from the others, and each has citizens of its own who owe it allegiance, and whose rights, within its jurisdiction, it must protect. The same person may be at the same time a citizen of the United States and a citizen of a state, but his rights of citizenship under one of these governments will be different * from those he has under the other."
U. S. v. Cruikshank, 92 U.S. 542 (1875).
Um, wasn't that the Jim Crow court that bent over backwards to find a way to agree that blacks could be denied their civil rights by State governments, especially 2A rights? Do you really want to hang your hat on that?
If you see that as legitimate jurisprudence, then the Constitution is little more than toilet paper, the legal contract is broken between the people and the government. Then it follows that the FedGov is no longer a legitimate entity and brute force, tyranny, is all that remains.
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