Plain Meaning Of The 2nd Amendment

www.freepatriot.com ^ | 4 21 04 | Judge Alex Kozinski, Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals

[umgud]

Gun culture in America is so prevalent that anti gun politicos could not kill gun ownership over night even if the 2A didn't exist. So, instead, they chip away incrementally, all the while believing the 2A is not an individual right. We need a reaffirmation from SCOTUS that the 2A is an individual right. Once this is done, all laws should be reviewed and judged on this basis. Then the debate will be whether or not the country wants the 2A ammended.

[Lurker]

It's good to know that judges like this are on the bench.

L

[Condor51]

Judge Alex Kozinski, Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals

Hmmm, with all the wacky decisions coming out of the 9th Circus (sic), I can only surmize that they keep this guy locked up in a broom closet most of the time?

[freepatriot32]

ping

[Abogado]

Ninth Circuit hmmm... Perhaps the majority should have applied their own rules regarding plain language interpretations:
“[i]n the statute at issue, Congress left no gap, no silence, no ambiguity, so ‘we must give effect to the plain language that Congress chose.’" Orca Bay Seafoods v. Northwest Truck Sales, 32 F.3d 433, 437 (9th Cir. 1994).
And,
"It is one thing to construe the statutory language "to see whether one construction makes more sense than the other as a means of attributing a rational purpose to Congress." Longview Fibre Co. v. Rasmussen, 980 F.2d 1307, 1311 (9th Cir. 1992). It is quite another to treat the purpose, and not the operative words of the statute, as the law. ... We would be writing a different statute, not just construing it, by "treating the words as having no meaning and looking instead to the values underlying the language to be construed so that we can create law effectuating those values." United States v. Martinez-Cano, 6 F.3d 1400, 1405 (9th Cir. 1993) (dissent); Ocra Bay at 436.

[NutCrackerBoy]

As Chief Justice Taney well appreciated, the institution of slavery required a class of people who lacked the means to resist. See Dred Scott v. Sandford, 60 U.S. (19 How.) 393, 417 (1857) (finding black citizenship unthinkable because it would give blacks the right to "keep and carry arms wherever they went"). -Judge Alex Kozinski

The majority on this decision (the targets of Kozinski's dissent) might as well be slavers. Impeach them.

[nothingnew]

The sheer ponderousness of the panel's opinion -- the mountain of verbiage it must deploy to explain away these fourteen short words of constitutional text -- refutes its thesis far more convincingly than anything I might say.

"If you can't dazzle them with brilliance, baffle them with bullshit."

How true of many courts and lawyers.

FMCDH

[neverdem]

Thanks for the post. Adios

[moonhawk]

The best argument I have heard yet, in defending the plain language interpretation of the Second Amendment, went something like this:

"The people" who have the right to keep and bear arms, are the same "people" as in "We the people", as in the right of "the people" peaceably to assemble, as in the right of "the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects," etc.

To suggest that only the Militia or the Government has the right to keep and bear arms, is to suggest that only the Govt or the Militia has the right to peaceably assemble, or to be secure in their homes, etc., which even the most liberal Judges would be forced to see as an absurdity.

The rule of parallel construction demands the plain language interpretation.

FWIW

[thackney]

BANG

[BenLurkin]

"It is wrong to use some constitutional provisions as springboards for major social change while treating others like senile relatives to be cooped up in a nursing home until they quit annoying us."

[BenLurkin]

" . . . tyranny thrives best where government need not fear the wrath of an armed people."

[BenLurkin]

"The Second Amendment is a doomsday provision, one designed for those exceptionally rare circumstances where all other rights have failed -- where the government refuses to stand for reelection and silences those who protest; where courts have lost the courage to oppose, or can find no one to enforce their decrees. However improbable these contingencies may seem today, facing them unprepared is a mistake a free people get to make only once. "

Wow!

This Justice understands! The other may also - maybe they dislike the idea of a free people fighting to remain free.

[Travis McGee]

Expanding some to gargantuan proportions while discarding others like a crumpled gum wrapper is not faithfully applying the Constitution; it's using our power as federal judges to constitutionalize our personal preferences.

Man, this guy is a fabulous writer!

[inquest]

Wow! What a perfect quote!

[Ken H]

So, instead, they chip away incrementally, all the while believing the 2A is not an individual right.

Yes, the point needs to be emphasized that the Second Amendment guarantees an individual's RKBA that NO government may infringe.

The Second Amendment applies to State and local governments as well as Federal.

[Larry Lucido]

We need a lot more judges like that.

[Paul Ross]

Ping

[KC_for_Freedom]

The rule of parallel construction demands the plain language interpretation.

It IS plain enough. "shall not be infringed" is very clear. Relying on the introductory phrase to be part of the ammendment and to be a restricting part is not a valid English usage. A similar construction might be:
"The dependence of all living things on photosynthesss being recognized, the right of the people to enjoy the fruits and benefits of photosysthesis shall not be infringed."

In this case it would not matter that all living things don't need photosysthesis, (there are microbes that exist without light). The right to enjoy the benefits of photosynthesis is nevertheless still invoked.