Hey, I'm over here - once you get through beating that straw man let me know.
When have I or anyone else on this thread ever said that the Constitution was not the supreme law of the land? Never. The Bill of Rights were considered limits only on federal power.
jwalsh, maybe I'm just not wording something well here. I remember discussing incorporation with you in the past. Do you have anything to add that might help make this more clear to those that deny Barron v Baltimore?
Wrong.
The prohibition is general. No clause in the constitution could by any rule of construction be conceived to give congress a power to disarm the people. Such a flagitious attempt could only be made under some general pretence by a state legislature. But if in any blind pursuit of inordinate power, either should attempt it, this amendment may be appealed to as a restraint on both. William Rawle 1829.
The next amendment is: "A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed."
The importance of this article will scarcely be doubted by any persons, who have duly reflected upon the subject. The militia is the natural defence of a free country against sudden foreign invasions, domestic insurrections, and domestic usurpations of power by rulers. It is against sound policy for a free people to keep up large military establishments and standing armies in time of peace, both from the enormous expenses, with which they are attended, and the facile means, which they afford to ambitious and unprincipled rulers, to subvert the government, or trample upon the rights of the people. The right of the citizens to keep and bear arms has justly been considered, as the palladium of the liberties of a republic; since it offers a strong moral check against the usurpation and arbitrary power of rulers; and will generally, even if these are successful in the first instance, enable the people to resist and triumph over them. James Madison 1833.
The right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed, and this without any qualification as to their condition or degree, as is the case in the British government. St. George Tucker. 1803
"The whole of the Bill [of Rights] 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 of the New York Historical Society, October 7, 1789
"It had become an universal and almost uncontroverted position in the several States, that the purposes of society do not require a surrender of all our rights to our ordinary governors; that there are certain portions of right not necessary to enable them to carry on an effective government, and which experience has nevertheless proved they will be constantly encroaching on, if submitted to them; that there are also certain fences which experience has proved peculiarly efficacious against wrong, and rarely obstructive of right, which yet the governing powers have ever shown a disposition to weaken and remove. Of the first kind, for instance, is freedom of religion; of the second, trial by jury, habeas corpus laws, free presses." --Thomas Jefferson to Noah Webster, 1790. ME 8:112
"Were [a right] to be refused, or to be so shackled by regulations, not necessary for... peace and safety... as to render its use impracticable,... it would then be an injury, of which we should be entitled to demand redress." --Thomas Jefferson: Report on Navigation of the Mississippi, 1792. ME 3:178
"What is true of every member of the society, individually, is true of them all collectively; since the rights of the whole can be no more than the sum of the rights of the individuals." --Thomas Jefferson to James Madison, 1789. ME 7:455, Papers 15:393
The supremacy clause says that the Constitution/Amendments and laws "made in pursuance thereof" are the supreme law of the land.
When have I or anyone else on this thread ever said that the Constitution was not the supreme law of the land? Never.
Specious. By denying that Amendments are "limits only on federal power", you deny they are part of our "Law of the Land".
The Bill of Rights were considered limits only on federal power.
--- maybe I'm just not wording something well here.
It's called cognitive dissonance. You simply cannot understand [for political reasons?], -- that your individual rights are protected by both your State constitution -- and the US Constitution.