Posted on 01/03/2016 1:34:00 AM PST by Windflier
Keep guns out of the hands of a dangerous few? Dangerous to whom?
As a Tea Party conservative Freeper, you mean ME?
"To declare War, grant Letters of Marque and Reprisal, and make Rules concerning Captures on Land and Water; "
Obama is going to tie finances to his gun control measures. He will tie your government check, I.E. social security, SSI, Medicare, Medicade, Military Retirement, Government Employee Retirement, Disability, etc. He will tell people who get any of these, that if they do not turn in their guns by a certain date, then you will have these suspended until you do. Look, if I can think this up, don’t you think that they already are tossing this type of stuff around? I am retired military. Thus, I get my military pension; I get VA disability; and I get SS. My wife gets SS. That would in effect, leave us almost broke except for her job pension and 401k. They will also use income taxes, refund checks from IRS, all those also. They will come up with others that I have not though of. They will use everything they can to get what they want. Bet on it.
That was more in line with “The Repo Man” ...
But, all kidding aside, The Second Amendment was crafted to address the free agency of the citizen to affect the means of his own defense, and that of his country. Those means were defined by the term “Arms” - a term confined to a very specific definition, as it was understood by those who wrote the Amendment.
“Arms” would include neither ordinance nor vessels; albeit it is understood that such a vessel may carry “arms” and be fitted with “ordinance,” as such grant by letters of Marque and Reprisal may permit.
Canon and the like were not an instrument of war typically kept in private hands, but rather such was allocated to an armory and maintained for “communal” defense.
I am wont to think that the local authorities would not be pleased to see Captain John Q. Private Citizen casually sailing up the Potomac with his well-fitted Frigate, sporting 24-pounder long guns, 32-pounder carronades; and 24-pounder bow chasers! Might make the common folk a wee bit nervous as to his intentions.
Cant go around confiscatin’ without the list!
There is a fellow in Portola Valley CA named Littlefield who has a rather large collection of tanks. The Army uses him as a library of sorts. He has a SCUD launcher and missile as well.
Yes, but are any of these items in battle working order? IOW, does the owner possess live ordinance that he is able to load and fire from those tanks? Is the SCUD missile able to be fueled and launched? Does it have a live warhead? Or are all of these military pieces decommissioned and rendered inert?
You know know Obama bot rid of far more military leaders than Bush did. He has to have a reason for it. You don’t think it’s so he has as little resistance as possible for when he goes full dictator?
No live ordinance and they have been slightly demilled, but he has 5 full time mechanics...
By “demilled” am I to understand demilitarized - meaning their warheads are rendered inert? And what of the SCUD missile?
Yes, the barrels of the tanks are drilled, the SCUD has no warhead or liquid fuel.
From Wikipedia:
20th century
In December 1941 and the first months of 1942, Goodyear commercial L class blimp Resolute operating out of Moffett Field in Sunnyvale, California, flew anti-submarine patrols. As the civilian crew was armed with a rifle, many thought this made the ship a privateer, and that she and sister commercial blimps were operated under letter of marque until the Navy took over operation.[32] Without congressional authorization, the Navy would not have been able to legally issue any letters of marque.
21st-century American reconsideration of letters of marque
Article 1 of the United States Constitution lists issuing letters of marque and reprisal in Section 8 as one of the enumerated powers of Congress, alongside the power to tax and to declare War. However, since the American Civil War, the United States as a matter of policy has consistently followed the terms of the 1856 Paris Declaration forbidding the practice. The United States has not legally commissioned any privateers since 1815, although the status of submarine-hunting Goodyear airships in the early days of World War II created significant confusion. Various accounts refer to airships Resolute and Volunteer as operating under a “privateer status”, but Congress never authorized a commission, nor did the President sign one.[33]
The issue of marque and reprisal was raised before Congress after the September 11 attacks[34] and again on July 21, 2007, by Congressman Ron Paul. The attacks were defined as acts of “air piracy” and the Marque and Reprisal Act of 2001 was introduced, which would have granted the president the authority to use letters of marque and reprisal against the specific terrorists, instead of warring against a foreign state. The terrorists were compared to pirates in that they are difficult to fight by traditional military means.[35] Paul on April 15, 2009, also advocated the use of letters of marque to address the issue of Somali pirates operating in the Gulf of Aden. However, the bills Paul introduced were not enacted into law.
Former New Mexico Governor and 2012 Libertarian Presidential candidate Gary Johnson quipped in his reddit AMA[36] that letters of marque and reprisal would be an effective way to apprehend Lord’s Resistance Army leader Joseph Kony instead of using US troops.
“It’ll be foreign soldiers in bright blue helmets that have no local connections/family, no sworn duty to protect our great Constitution.”
Targets!
No way they’d try that. We’d overwhelm them in a week.
Thanks for the history - enjoyed reading it.
That’s the way it should be done. Stop risking the lives of innocent LEOs. Send the bottom feeding, commie politicians to take the guns away from WE THE PEOPLE. The world would become “a better place” in a hurry.
Blue helmets are easy targets.
The 17th needs to go as well.
“The second amendment, interpreted properly, means Joe Schmoe can have an Abrams in his garage.”
That is arguably correct. A well ‘regulated’ militia no longer holds the meaning it did when written. Well ‘regulated’ mean’t ‘effective’. And yes, an effective militia would have an Abrams tank.
But that’s the problem. We might all want such things in our garage, but I don’t want a nuclear warhead in my neighbor’s garage. So we need a new amendment to clarify that if the Constitution is to be respected as-written.
Until we clarify the Constitution it will remain a ‘breathing’, evolving play-dough document.
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