Senate website gets 2nd Amendment wrong, critics say

FoxNews ^ | Sept 25, 2013 | Maxim Lott

[Innovative]

Does the Second Amendment guarantee an individual right to own guns?

The Supreme Court has ruled that it does. But you might be confused if you visit the official Senate web page on the Constitution, which says only: "Whether this provision protects the individual's right to own firearms or whether it deals only with the collective right of the people to arm and maintain a militia has long been debated."

That particular wording was posted on the Senate website in 2009, based on archived web pages at The Internet Archive. However, that's one year after the Supreme Court ruled: "The Second Amendment protects an individual right to possess a firearm unconnected with service in a militia, and to use that arm for traditionally lawful purposes, such as self-defense."

Given the court ruling, critics say the Senate site's administrators are just wrong.

[Innovative]

Here is the link to the Senate page, which states the above.

It has the original text and "the explanation" -- which is incorrect, ignoring the Supreme Court ruling.

Write your Senator and ask to have it corrected.

[yldstrk]

“accidentally on purpose” as we used to say as kids

[Gaffer]

I have multiple examples tucked away in my safe and elsewhere that says I don’t need no stinking militia.

[Puppage]

Does the Second Amendment guarantee an individual right to own guns?

I love when libs throw this argument out there. That the 2A is for the govt.

So, we're to believe that our Founding Fathers, in the infinite wisdom, drafted the Bill of Rights...Of The People, for The People, by The People...all of them EXCEPT THAT ONE? Really? Were they just not paying attention on that one?

So, is the 1A so the state can speak freely?

What a load of crap.

[Puppage]

I have multiple examples tucked away in my safe and elsewhere that says I don’t need no stinking militia.

Exactly

And, more to the point...WE are The Militia!

[FlingWingFlyer]

The Founding Fathers considered government a necessary evil and wanted to make sure that it was kept as small as possible. They gave We the People the Bill of Rights to protect themselves from an abusive government. Why in the he!! would they put the Second Amendment in the Bill of Rights to guarantee that the government has the right to form the National Guard? The Bill of Rights was written for the people, not the government. Too many people doing too many drugs these days.

[noprogs]

They get the First Amendment wrong, the Second, Third, Fourth, Fifth, Ninth, Tenth and Eleventh wrong every day they are in session.

[Iron Munro]

Imagine the uproar if they added the same caveat to an explanation of the first amendment.

Or the 13th, the 15th or the 19th.

[Da Coyote]

Always, always remember that political offices were created by God to insure that those with no mental agility, no talent, no creativity, and little morals could manage to have a job.

For every individual who does not match the above description (such as Cruz), there are ten Whorehouse Harrys.

[MeshugeMikey]

this reminds me of when ALGORE....referred people to his website to explain his alleged positions....pages of which were subsequently SCRUBBED

well not an entirely good analogy ..but it’s EARLY.../s

[shego]

"Whether this provision protects the individual's right to own firearms or whether it deals only with the collective right of the people to arm and maintain a militia has long been debated."

This reminds me of the silly creationist tactic of taking some minor uncertainty about the details of evolution out of context and pretending that the entire concept is in doubt.

[pepsionice]

I would make these three observations:

1. A thousand folks would stand up and have a thousand interpretations of the entire Constitution. That’s the sad fact of life over a living document that is continuing on.

2. The original intent was that no state or federal government could walk into your town...task you to hand over your musket to a local arsenal...and release it to you only for hunting purposes. The militia angle was what everyone viewed in the 1770s as part of their local society, and frankly....it worked.

3. If you took most people out of their clean unhostile environment, and put them out into the heartland....towns with crime....rural areas with threatening critters...threats where no cop can react within twenty minutes....then they’d all agree that weapons are a part of life. The mere fact that over 300 million weapons exist in America today....and so few people are killed by them...says a lot. More folks die from overdosing legal and illegal drugs than from gunshot wounds. Hopefully, we grasp the ranking order of the real problems in life.

[TurboZamboni]

The senate wikipedia site says so, so it must be true.

[marktwain]

European Murder Rates Compared to the United States: Demographics vs Guns

http://gunwatch.blogspot.com/2013/01/european-murder-rates-compared-to.html

In the vast majority of the United States, murder rates are similar to those in Europe. The only place they are significantly higher, are in those places that have a high percentage of the population from a culture that does not exist in significant numbers in Europe.

[Robert Burkholder]

Tell them to read Thomas M.Cooley —the General Principles of Constitutional Law, Little Brown and Company ,1880 pp. 270-271
“....”If the right were limited to those enrolled,the purpose of this guarantee might be defeated altogether by the action or neglect to act of the government it was meant to hold in check.The meaning of the provision undoubtedly is that the people, from whom the militia must be taken,shall have the right to keep and bear arms;...” Of course the Senate in my lifetime has earned recognition as being led by a bunch of long eared braying Jacks and other snake oil salesmen like that one from Searchlight.And has made manifest their contempt for and general neglect of our Constitution.

[Bidimus1]

Sent this to web master

The error on your page dealing with the 2nd amendment is quite glaring.

http://www.senate.gov/civics/constitution_item/constitution.htm#amdt_2_(1791)

The “long debate” was a short one historically as the “standard model” held sway for nearly all the history of th republic.

“However, the weight of serious scholarship supports the historical intent of the Second Amendment to protect individual rights and to deter governmental tyranny. From the Federalist Papers to explanations when the Bill of Rights was introduced, it is clear that the purpose of the Second Amendment was to protect individual rights”

Halbrook, Stephen P. (1998). Freedmen, the 14th Amendment, and the Right to Bear Arms, 1866-1876

But even if one takes the rather new debate on the issue started in the 1930’s as “long” it has been resolved with clarity.

The conclusion is thus inescapable that the history, concept, and wording of the second amendment to the Constitution of the United States, as well as its interpretation by every major commentator and court in the first half century after its ratification, indicates that what is protected is an individual right of a private citizen to own and carry firearms in a peaceful manner

97th Congress, Second Session - Subcommittee on the Constitution of the Committee on the Judiciary

For those that believe the US Supreme Court hold absolute authority on the meaning of the constituion the issue is also with out doubt.

DC vs Heller

(1) The Second Amendment protects an individual right to possess a firearm unconnected with service in a militia, and to use that arm for traditionally lawful purposes, such as self-defense within the home. Pp. 2–53.

None of the Court’s precedents forecloses the Court’s interpretation. Neither United States v. Cruikshank, 92 U. S. 542 , nor Presser v. Illinois, 116 U. S. 252 , refutes the individual-rights interpretation. United States v. Miller, 307 U. S. 174 , does not limit the right to keep and bear arms to militia purposes, but rather limits the type of weapon to which the right applies to those used by the militia, i.e., those in common use for lawful purposes.

(a) The Amendment’s prefatory clause announces a purpose, but does not limit or expand the scope of the second part, the operative clause. The operative clause’s text and history demonstrate that it connotes an individual right to keep and bear arms. Pp. 2–22.

Which was then incorporated onto the states by McDonald v. Chicago

I realize you are directed by the present Maj. Leader Sen Reid but I hope the facts will outweigh political favor and you will have this error corrected

[Innovative]

Excellent!!!!!!!!!!!!