Oops, guess I'd better get rid of mine...IF I had any, of course...
Posted on 04/16/2007 7:42:32 AM PDT by Lazamataz
Why can't I own nuclear weapons? The Second Amendment guarantees it!
This argument comes up from time to time during gun control arguments. An anti-gun person who intends to use it as a strawman argument usually offers it facetiously or sarcastically. A strawman is a logical fallacy in which a debater exaggerates an opponent's position, directs arguments at this exaggerated position, and claims to have defeated the opponent's real argument.
The Second Amendment guarantees individual citizens the right to keep and bear arms. Even professors who can only be described as extremely left-wing have come to this conclusion. For example, the prominent law professor Laurence Tribe, has reluctantly concluded that this Amendment explicitly upholds the right of citizens to keep and bear arms. The writings of our Founding Fathers reveal that there were two sociological reasons to uphold this natural right: To prevent crime, and to defend against a rogue domestic government. As example of the Founders thoughts on the crime-deterrent effect of civilian firearms possession, I give you Thomas Jefferson:
And as an example of how the Founders felt about civilian firearms possession as regards keeping our government 'honest and upright', I give you, again, Thomas Jefferson, who warns:
And from John Adams:
"The laws that forbid the carrying of arms ... disarm only those who are neither inclined nor determined to commit crimes. Can it be supposed that those who have the courage to violate the most sacred laws of humanity ... will respect the less important and arbitrary ones ... Such laws make things worse for the assaulted and better for the assailants, they serve rather to encourage than to prevent homicides, for an unarmed man may be attacked with greater confidence than an armed man."
And what country can preserve its liberties, if it's rulers are not warned from time to time, that this people preserve the spirit of resistance? Let them take arms. The remedy is to set them right as to the facts, pardon and pacify them. What signify a few lives lost in a century or two? The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time, with the blood of patriots and tyrants.
To suppose arms in the hands of citizens, to be used at individual discretion, except in private self-defense, or by partial orders of towns, countries or districts of a state, is to demolish every constitution, and lay the laws prostrate, so that liberty can be enjoyed by no man; it is a dissolution of the government. The fundamental law of the militia is, that it be created, directed and commanded by the laws, and ever for the support of the laws.
Therefore, we can reasonably suppose that the Founders intended us to have access to every manner of weapon for defense of home and of liberty. However, therein lies the rub: Does every manner of weapon mean access to nuclear weapons, biological weapons, chemical weapons?
Our Founders were just men, men of proportion. They drew their ideas for our constitution from the writer and philosopher John Locke. Locke puts forth that we own our own bodies, and thusly we have the right to own and control ourselves.
THE RIGHT OF SELF DEFENSE
If you have the right to own, then you also have the right to assert ownership -- otherwise known as "protect" -- that which is yours. The right of self-defense flows naturally from this right, and is enshrined by our Founders as the Bill of Rights, and even is quite prevalent in the Declaration of Independence. If you have the right to self-defense, then it naturally follows you have the right to effective tools to exercise that right. In simple terms, it makes no sense to say you have the right to drive on highways, but then ban automobiles. Again, the learned Mr. Jefferson agrees:
THE RIGHT TO BE UNMOLESTED
Another right flows from John Lockes principles: You also have the right to be undisturbed. You have the right of 'quiet enjoyment' of your belongings, including your body, so long as you do not molest or act aggressively or violently to another. Nor, of course, do you have the right to disturb anothers quiet enjoyment of his or her belongings by molesting, acting aggressively, or acting violently to another person.
Take these two rights together: YOU HAVE THE RIGHT TO SELF DEFENSE (and effective tools to defend yourself), and YOU MAY NOT MOLEST OR ATTACK THOSE WHO ARE NOT ATTACKING YOU FIRST.
Therefore, it is clear that any tool of self defense you choose must be a tool you can direct to be capable of discriminating between an attacker and an innocent. Clearly, the following tools are capable, with a minimum of care, of being directed against an attacker without jeopardizing innocents:
The following tools are slightly more questionable, since they are somewhat less able to be directed with great accuracy, and thusly are less discriminating. They have a larger chance of violating an innocent persons 'quiet enjoyment' of his property during the suppression of a criminal attack:
The following tools are completely indiscriminate, and can harm innocent people decades after their use. These tools are completely inappropriate for your right of self defense, since they will certainly violate an innocent persons right of quiet enjoyment of their property.
Hopefully, this will lay to rest once and for all the straw man offered by so many antigunners. Nuclear weapons are not allowed to be used for self defense by private citizens because they are not sufficiently discriminating.
Strawmen are what the left does best.
You’re pissed? *I* have to get rid of my nuclear hand-grenades!
Oops, guess I'd better get rid of mine...IF I had any, of course...
I have one. Got it on E-Bay. Wanna borrow it for a party?
Can we still use the Holy Hand Grenade of Antioch?
As long as your nuke doesn’t have a pistol grip, it should be fine.
At the time of the revolution, people owned privateering ships with large cannon.
How would those (cannons and armed man-’o-war) figure into your above categories?
Also, I have friends and relations who still own working cannons (we fire them at 4th of July, birthdays, etc.). Apparently these should fall under the 2nd Amendment as well, because they certainly own them and have charges for them.
Sorry, I don’t buy it. There is nothing in the Constitution to prevent me from owning a nuke. At the time, probably the most destructive weapon was a cannon and private people DID own cannons. When they put these cannons on their private ships, they were called privateers.
Or a flash suppressor.
What about photon torpedoes?
Please read this article over, and try again.
You’re pissed? *I* have to get rid of my nuclear hand-grenades!
P.S. Ammendment Ammendment Ammendment Pfffffftt.
—bflr—
I hope that it isn’t evil looking??
If you don't agree with me, I'm detonating this nuke.
I've gotten too old for those. With my shoulder I just can't throw them far enough anymore and am not as fast as I used to be either.
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