Posted on 01/27/2021 5:22:08 AM PST by marktwain
U.S.A. –-(AmmoLand.com)- Iowa is one of 6 states which does not have a state constitutional provision protecting the right to keep and bear arms. A constitutional amendment has been working its way through the legislature for eight years.
The amendment has passed its first hurdle in 2021, an Iowa House subcommittee, with a 2-1 margin.
Amending the Iowa Constitution is a long and difficult process. The first step is for the legislature to pass the amendment. Second, an election must occur. Third, the legislature has to pass the amendment again. Fourth, the amendment must be passed in a referendum. The referendum is at the next election.
If the people approve the amendment, it becomes part of the Iowa Constitution. Here is the amendment. From iowa.gov:
Right to keep and bear arms.
Sec. 1A. The right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed. The sovereign state of Iowa affirms and recognizes this right to be a fundamental individual right. Any and all restrictions of this right shall be subject to strict scrutiny.
The amendment passed the Iowa legislature in November of 2018.
The amendment suffered a severe setback when the Secretary of State, Republican Paul Pate, admitted/discovered the amendment had not been published as required. This meant the amendment had to start the process again. SOS Pate’s current term ends in 2022. Pate apologized profusely for the error in 2018.
Republicans control both houses of the Iowa legislature. There are 32 Republicans and 18 Democrats in the Iowa State Senate. There are 59 Republicans and 41 Democrats
(Excerpt) Read more at ammoland.com ...
Thanks for posting, it is an important effort now. We are doing out part too.
GOA Texas: Constitutional Carry and Other Pro Gun Bills to Watch
https://texas.gunowners.org/pro-gun-bills-to-watch/
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FR Comments: https://freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/3927839/posts
"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, October 7, 1789
Congress have no power to disarm the militia. Their swords, and every other terrible implement of the soldier, are the birth-right of an American ...the unlimited power of the sword is not in the hands of either the federal or state governments, but, where I trust in God it will ever remain, in the hands of the people. -Tench Coxe, 20 Feb 1788
US Constitution - Art 6 para 2
This Constitution, and the Laws of the United States which shall be made in Pursuance thereof; and all Treaties made, or which shall be made, under the Authority of the United States, shall be the supreme Law of the Land; and the Judges in every State shall be bound thereby, any Thing in the Constitution or Laws of any State to the Contrary notwithstanding.
The prohibition is general. No clause in the Constitution could by any rule of construction be conceived to give to 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 - A View of the Constitution of the United States 125--26 1829 (2d ed.)
Based on objective fact, state constitutional provisions to protect the right to keep and bear arms are very much needed.
The states which do not have such provisions have the preponderence of infringements on the right to keep and bear arms.
Consider, they are: California, New York, New Jersey, Minnesota, and Maryland as well as Iowa.
Of those California, New York, New Jersey and Maryland have extreme infringements on the right to keep and bear arms.
This is not a failing of the system as written, it is a failing of the State legislature to follow the damn law.
Those purposing infringements on RKBA in those States should be tried, convicted, and incarcerated/executed via USC Title 18 Sec 242. Deprivation of Rights under color of Law.
Make a few examples and the rest will quit.
Putting a band-aid on a sucking chest wound won't hurt, but it won't help much either.
I understand that a California resident can get a carry license without too much trouble. impossible here in New Jersey.
In rural counties, it is only about 5 times as hard as in most shall issue states (measured by the number of permits issued).
In most urban counties, it is about as hard as New Jersey.
This is great! Almost all 50 state constitutions protect the Right to Keep and Bear Arms.
Fighting this on the state level is the best course of action.
https://conservapedia.com/List_of_state_constitutions_containing_a_RKBA_provision
In the age of progressivism, all 50 state constitutions must have an RKBA provision. The United States Constitution does not repeal any of the declaration of rights in each state constitution.
https://avalon.law.yale.edu/18th_century/debates_912.asp
Mr. SHERMAN, was for securing the rights of the people where requisite. The State Declarations of Rights are not repealed by this Constitution; and being in force are sufficient. There are many cases where juries are proper which can not be discriminated. The Legislature may be safely trusted.
This was said at the actual Constitutional Convention.
Far too many conservatives labor under the belief that the US Constitution makes all of the state constitutions irrelevant and that belief is going to get us killed.
Not at all. However, the prohibition in the 2A DOES apply against the States as this is declared as a "right of the people"... The very misconception about the 2A's primacy is the wedge anti-gunners use to come up with crap like "incorporation against the States".
That was a 14th P&I argument that 2A never should have been a part of.
"As civil rulers, not having their duty to the people duly before them, may attempt to tyrannize, and as the military forces which must be occasionally raised to defend our country, might pervert their power to the injury of their fellow-citizens, the people are confirmed by the next article in their right to keep and bear their private arms." - Tenche Coxe (introduction to his discussion, and support, of the 2nd Amend) "Remarks on the First Part of the Amendments to the Federal Constitution" Philadelphia Federal Gazette, 18 June 1789, pg.2
"But though the scheme of disciplining the whole nation must be abandoned as mischievous or impracticable; yet it is a matter of the utmost importance that a well-digested plan should, as soon as possible, be adopted for the proper establishment of the militia. The attention of the government ought particularly to be directed to the formation of a select corps of moderate extent, upon such principles as will really fit them for service in case of need. By thus circumscribing the plan, it will be possible to have an excellent body of well-trained militia, ready to take the field whenever the defense of the State shall require it. This will not only lessen the call for military establishments, but if circumstances should at any time oblige the government to form an army of any magnitude that army can never be formidable to the liberties of the people while there is a large body of citizens, little, if at all, inferior to them in discipline and the use of arms, who stand ready to defend their own rights and those of their fellow-citizens. This appears to me the only substitute that can be devised for a standing army, and the best possible security against it, if it should exist."
Concerning the Militia
Independent Journal
Wednesday, January 9, 1788
[Alexander Hamilton]
... and then there is the language in the Constitution itself...
The First 10 Amendments to the Constitution as Ratified by the States December 15, 1791
Preamble
Congress OF THE United States begun and held at the City of New York, on Wednesday the Fourth of March, one thousand seven hundred and eighty nine.
THE Conventions of a number of the States having at the time of their adopting the Constitution, expressed a desire, in order to prevent misconstruction or abuse of its powers, that further declaratory and restrictive clauses should be added: And as extending the ground of public confidence in the Government, will best insure the beneficent ends of its institution
RESOLVED by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America, in Congress assembled, two thirds of both Houses concurring, that the following Articles be proposed to the Legislatures of the several States, as Amendments to the Constitution of the United States, all or any of which Articles, when ratified by three fourths of the said Legislatures, to be valid to all intents and purposes, as part of the said Constitution; viz.:
ARTICLES in addition to, and Amendment of the Constitution of the United States of America, proposed by Congress, and ratified by the Legislatures of the several States, pursuant to the fifth Article of the original Constitution.
... and here...
Art 6 para 2
This Constitution, and the Laws of the United States which shall be made in Pursuance thereof; and all Treaties made, or which shall be made, under the Authority of the United States, shall be the supreme Law of the Land; and the Judges in every State shall be bound thereby, any Thing in the Constitution or Laws of any State to the Contrary notwithstanding.
My major concern with welding on RKBA after all of this is that it very well could give State legislatures "wiggle room" to say... "Yes, we protected RKBA here... BUT... we included all this other licensing and limitations crap that wouldn't fly under the original US Constitution's protection if we actually followed it".
Well said....
My daughter and fiance live in Orange county. If I understood him correctly, BF got a carry permit...but I will double check.
“This is not a failing of the system as written, it is a failing of the State legislature to follow the damn law.”
If a state constitution affirms the right, it becomes difficult for state law makers to restrict the right.
For many years the MO constitution affirmed the right to firearms with the caveat that the state could still prohibit concealed carry of firearms. The process took decades, but finally that clause was eliminated and MO became a “shall-issue” state. A few more years passed and now we enjoy “Constitutional Carry”.
Only if you accept the unconstitutional actions of judicial activism. Iowans are trying to protect themselves probably from an influx of Californians. I don't blame them. Californians are destroying everything everywhere. We're fighting them here in my state too. Should Iowan gun grabbers come around doing things in Iowa, the Second Amendment isn't for that purpose. They desperately need state-level protections from state-level actions and currently they have none.
Even as late as Cruikshank the courts were following a, to coin a phrase, wall of separation between state bills of rights and the federal bill of rights.
All of this "against" weaponization of the Bill of Rights - that's still a relatively new phenomena. Its a Federal Bill of Rights and nothing more.
"The very misconception about the 2A's primacy is the wedge anti-gunners use to come up with crap like "incorporation against the States".
I think we may be more in agreement than not. The Founders did not create a bill of weapons(against the states), it's a bill of rights. Every government needs its own Bill of Rights, at least in America. The word "against" gives the game away in regard to the danger that incorporation presents. None of the Amendments that the Founders gave us is "against". I lived through the age of Obama - 1 bill of rights isn't enough. We need all 51 of them. Government is out to get us, all 51 of them.
The reverse of this would be quite a crime against Americans - the repeal of the 50 Bills of Rights - in every state Constitution.
Why do you think the 9th and 10th Federal amendments have never been incorporated? 9th and 10th never will be. That's because the real point of incorporation isn't to protect you. It's to advance the interests of government.
My major concern with welding on RKBA after all of this is that it very well could give State legislatures "wiggle room" to say... "Yes, we protected RKBA here... BUT... we included all this other licensing and limitations crap that wouldn't fly under the original US Constitution's protection if we actually followed it".
I think this has a lot of merit, however we have to be careful to guard against the danger on the other side. Montesquieu wrote a lot about the failings of big republics and the Founders were well versed in his authored work. One of the reasons the Founders kept the states in place was to preserve locality, not just for the importance of local control itself, but also because big republics don't work. Montesquieu wrote a lot about it and the United States is no different. We need our states to prevent the "one big country" problem.
At the convention Hamilton made comments that were(or at least construed as such) in the nature of abolishing all of the states, and that did not go over well. So if we aren't going to abolish the states, then it must be considered what it looks like to keep them.
It's no accident that as more and more of the country gets nationalized and taken away from the states that the unhappier everybody becomes. We're all fighting and at each other's throats because "I don't want to live the way "they" live over there", wherever "they" and "there" is. Montesquieu would not be shocked in any way to hear that the big republic isn't working if he were alive today. "I told you so", he would say. Tennesseans simply don't have anything to do with what Oregonians are doing over there.
We have to preserve our states, and this statement has huge implications.
Go back and re-read my post. Pay attention to the Bill of Rights Pre-amble and my inclusion of Art 6 para 2.
No “incorporation” is needed for an Amendment. The “judicial activism” comes in from assuming that the ratifying State and Congress both had no clue what they were passing when they voted for the Amendment.
When passed, as there are numerous quotes from various Founders to support, the Right belongs to the People... And no governing body organized under the US Constitution may infringe upon it.
People have spent decades tying the plain meaning of English in knots to try and find ways of justifying exactly what you posted.
They are all, uniformly, wrong. Dead wrong.
Well... no. The Pre-amble gives you the justification and process for application of the following Amendments. There are specific Amendments, such as the First, that stipulate who that applies to or against. Some of which refer to Congress, or Federal actions.
The 2A is also very clear, as were the people who wrote it... The Right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.
Period. Full stop. Doesn't matter where in the US that person is, they have a protected Right to not just keep armaments, but to bear them as well. Hence my quotation of both Rawle and Gallatin as they were both there during ratification and Rawle literally wrote the first "instruction manual" for our Country.
The Supreme Court ruled, in Barron v. Baltimore, that the 5th amendment did not apply to state actions. This court case was one of the reasons for the 14th Amendment.
It was in the middle 1830's the slave states stopped considering if slavery was immoral, and considering a way to gradually eliminate it.
The first laws against concealed carry were in the slave states.
I believe you misunderstood the point of my post. I didn’t say that incorporation was necessary, only that that is how courts have ruled. I’m not saying the courts were right. You could argue that the First Amendment would have to be incorporated since it says “Congress shall make no law...”, while the Second, which reads a more absolute “...shall not be infringed”, shouldn’t have to be.
Rightly or wrongly we live under rules often set by unelected judges/courts. And if Biden/Harris get to pack the courts, we’re not going to like what we get.
All of them apply to federal actions and the courts ruled that way for over 100 years. Most importantly, the Founding-era/Founding-generation courts ruled that way.
Thirteen of the state constitutions pre-date the Federal, making them the original Constitutions/BORs. The Federal Bill of Rights is number 14.
It’s like I said, the reverse of this would be quite a crime against Americans. None of the state Bills of Rights should be subject to repeal at any time and they weren’t subject to such during the Convention.
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