Posted on 11/30/2007 6:31:14 AM PST by rface
Written in an age in which minutemen rose to dress and fight at a moment’s notice, the Second Amendment was no doubt motivated by a young nation’s concern for its own safety and stability. But now, when the United States is protected by the most powerful security forces on the globe, the Second Amendment is neither relevant nor useful. Rather, it has become an impediment to vital public policy, and it should be repealed and replaced with nuanced federal legislation.
Despite the controversy surrounding the Second Amendment, arguments about its relevancy have not surfaced in the Supreme Court since 1939, when the justices merely touched upon the issue in United States v. Miller. But early this month, the Supreme Court agreed to take on the case of District of Columbia v. Heller, in which the central consideration is the right of an individual to own a firearm as protected under the Second Amendment. The case specifically addresses private handgun ownership in the District of Columbia. But while legalistic arguments—the phrasing of the amendment itself and the framers’ intent—will be at the center of the debate, no matter what the justices ultimately decide, we believe that a constitutional protection of an individual right to bear arms is detrimental to the country. Instead, the Second Amendment should be replaced with federal statues designed to tightly regulate gun ownership.
The high level of violence in the United States as compared to other developed countries, if not directly related to the culture of gun ownership and distribution, is at least a strong argument that the Second Amendment is preventing aggressive federal gun regulation. According to the Centers for Disease Control, in 2005, 68 percent of the 14,860 homicides in the United States were gun-related. Given the pervasiveness of gun violence that occurs in this country every year, this sort of uneven gun control is unacceptable, especially when it comes to handguns. Unlike rifles and shotguns, a handgun has little use in hunting: It is a military and police weapon, built expressly to kill another human being. Yet little is done to prevent its distribution: In Virginia, any person over the age of 18 can buy a handgun, and if a handgun is purchased at a gun show, there is no background check required.
Supporters of a constitutionally enshrined individual right to bear arms argue that state gun control laws have “reinterpreted” the right to gun ownership. These limitations on gun ownership, they say, demonstrate that gun ownership itself is not linked to increased violence. But in the wake of the expiration of the Federal Assault Weapon Ban in 2004, gun control remains relatively lax in many states, especially when it comes to handguns, which are responsible for many, if not most, gun-related murders. Gun advocates claim the need for handguns in self-defense, but such considerations are moot when weighed against the number of lives that might be saved by making the weapons illegal.
In the context of today’s society, the Second Amendment is outdated. Constitutional debates over its interpretation stand in the way of the implementation of pressing public policy. Instead of wasting time attempting to fix this anachronism, we should repeal this amendment and focus our efforts on legislation that will actually protect the “security of a free state”—a charge explicit in the Second Amendment.
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Capital letters were changed and an additional comma was added as the states concidered ratification:
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.
Thats what we need, trust fund babies at the Crimson telling us what our rights should be and include....(eyes rolling)
This is what passes for higher education today?
“In the context of today’s society, the Second Amendment is outdated. “
Hm, why didn’t the Russians invade the U.S.? What’s to stop a police state from forming if only the police and military have guns but the citizenry does not?
Any ask the “braintrusts” at Harvard that?
What a great irony that the Crimson Staff is only a few miles from where “the shot heard round the world” took place, when the Britich Government Authority (Redcoats) marched to confiscate guns and ammunition from the citizens.
Where’s the barf alert?
Harvard is irrelevent.
This is where the debate should be, I think, because this argument implicitly acknowledges that the Second Amendment protects an individual right to bear arms.
Let’s start from that premise and have the debate. I’m fine with that, but once the issue is decided, it ought to be firmly settled, and for the foreseeable future. Both sides should accept that going in.
Once again.... just do a web search on the New England states constitutions. There’s nothing mentioned about hunting or target practice...it’s all about personal self defense. You get a very clear picture as to what those people meant when writing it.
They really don't get it. The 2nd Amendment is not about US citizens fighting off a Chinese invasion. Yes, we have the military for that task. The 2nd Amendment is so that we can fight our own government, when it gets out of hand.
These folks seem to think that the redcoats came over from a foreign country and tried to conquer us. It was the "most powerful security forces on the globe" -- our own military -- that we were fighting at Lexington and Concord. That's why we have the 2nd Amendment.
Ahhhh... the time tested lies and subtle bleating of the undergraduate pseudo-intellectual.
I think it’s interesting that people still hold to the “guns cause violence” mantra. The violence in Finland brought some light to the fact that there is roughly one firearm for every two people in the country, and they don’t have huge problems with violence. In the UK, where harsh gun control has been in place for a number of years, use of firearms in crimes is on the rise.
Go ahead and try to repeal it, jerks. I doubt you’ll get more than 3 or 4 state legislatures on board.
But we all know that what you’ll really try to do is “judicially” repeal it by the interpretation of elitist judges.
Interesting to see that this is the standard of historical scholarship among Harvard undergrads now.
The Second Amendment was written in the post-Minutemen period for a Constitution that already contemplated a United States that would maintain a standing army with a central command structure and a Congress fully empowered to levy as many taxes as required to fund and equip it.
The historical context of the 2A's composition obviously gives the lie to the Crimson's cheap and uninformed analysis, and recourse to the records of the ratifying conventions demonstrates that the right to bear arms was not advocated as a national security measure, but as a security for the rights of the citizenry.
Idiots.
well it’s also about fighting the illegals, something the federal govt doesn’t want to do
As long as the Second Amendment is considered outdated, we may as well toss all the other ones out the window, too.
Don't laugh, folks . . . it's pretty astonishing how many people right here on FreeRepublic are openly supporting a presidential candidate with a pathological hostility to at least four of the ten amendments in the original Bill of Rights.
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