That article about made my nose bleed it was so ignorant, and in so many offhand and ridiculous ways. It could almost be called “humor/parody”.
Some of the most glaring boffos:
A gunfight at 60 yards? 180 feet? That doesn’t even work on TV, because of camera lens focus.
Second, the Old West very frequently had shooting inquests, and almost certainly when lawmen were involved. This is why we know so much about western history, because they were careful to document many of these events. Far more reliable than newspapers.
Much of modern American criminal law comes from the Old West, especially a deep concern about “real” justice instead of “letter of the law” justice. Western juries, when convinced of justifiable mitigation, were very forthright in acquittal, and not prone to convict someone who was just unpleasant or ugly. The vast majority were also not racist.
Third, lawlessness *never* prevailed for long in the Old West, as it was a priority for settlers to create and maintain as much civility as possible for as long as possible. Most gunfights only happened between “bad people” in “the bad part of town”, much as today.
Justice of the Peace Roy Bean, in his entire career, only sentenced two men to hang, one of which escaped before hanging.
At times there were mercenary hired guns, it is true, but unlike driving off “settlers”, the primary dispute was between cattle ranchers and immigrant shepherds. The most prominent of these was the “Pleasant Valley War”, aka “The Graham-Tewksbury Feud”, probably the second most vicious family feud behind the “Hatfield-McCoy Feud”, in West Virginia and Kentucky.
It was believed that one of the sides hired the notorious “lawman, scout, soldier, hired gunman, detective, outlaw and assassin” Tom Horn, as an assassin. Who *may* have killed somebody, or not. In any event, all members of both families were eventually killed off. Tom Horn was hung, likely because he needed hanging.
If anyone killed homesteaders, it was most likely “Native Americans”. And in all fairness, these were warrior tribes who were just as willing to attack Americans as they were to attack other tribes. Much of what the American army did in the Old West was to try and convince the Indians to “stop doing that”.
To put this into perspective, the major tribes of the time could field what amounted to serious and capable armies, and they rapidly adapted to and integrated about every technology they could get their hands on. About the only real advantage the US Army had for a long time was artillery.
In any event, back to the English teacher’s ignorance. He apparently not only doesn’t know history outside of TV, but he doesn’t know the law, either. The “Stand Your Ground” law is only a small portion of the law of self-defense, which has been around since at least the Magna Carta. And in this case isn’t even needed, because the shooting was entirely justified on other grounds.
I cannot take this guy seriously. The quality of the writing is terrible.
The concept - no retreat from where you have a right to be - is clear. The APPLICATION of the concept to everyday situations is not so clear to me, and it's going to take some working out before it is.
The difference between SYG at home and SYG in public is that, at home, it is prima faciae reasonable to presume the home defender is without fault.
In many public situations, this is also true - but not all. If I understand the Florida SYG law, SYG confers immunity from arrest or prosecution. There are many brawls tha happen among ordinary people where "fault" is hard to figure out. It can't be right that if you don't avoid an avoidable fight, and the fight goes against you, that you can end it with a shot.
Discovery of the truth in confused situations belongs, as it has for centuries, to grand and petit juries. This process should not be overridden by across-the-board application of SYG.
Only a liberal would think a person must be the victim of a criminal by having to flee. I noticed only the liberal East Cost States have such laws because they started with the flee requirement in the first place. We here in the West have never had such stupid liberal laws. Only an idiot would think a person must flee a criminal. If criminals don’t want to be beat to sh*t or dead then they had best not attack anyone.
I don't get this. If somebody comes at me with a club I can't defend myself? This is idiotic. Is this what the Prof is saying or am I misunderstanding him?
In Abilene, Ellsworth, Wichita, Dodge City, and Caldwell, for the years from 1870 to 1885, there were only 45 total homicides.
Three homicides per year in five of the "wildest" cow towns in the old cattle drive days. Not three each, three total. Professor McGrath might be better advised to lay off the oaters and pick up a book.
"Professor" McGrath is in favour of thugs raping women, killing men, robbing little children, and doing every other form of felonious misconduct, with impunity.
A guy in Salt Luke City stood his ground and stopped a knife welding lunatic.