Posted on 01/25/2005 3:57:10 PM PST by jonestown
Section 1 of the 21st amendment states, "The eighteenth article of amendment to the Constitution of the United States is hereby repealed."
So, now the power is back with the states and the fed no longer has that authority? Correct?
Wrong.
It took Section 2 to actually remove the power from the federal government, who had the power all along.
"The transportation or importation into any state, territory, or possession of the United States for delivery or use therein of intoxicating liquors, in violation of the laws thereof, is hereby prohibited."
In violation of state law, not federal law.
Cool. What's your source (or sources)? Because I don't normally recognize someone's "feelings" or "emotions" as an authority on the limits of government.
"There is simply no reason not to incorporate the 2nd amendment into the 14th;"
I agree. There is no reason why it shouldn't be. But it isn't. (See what I mean about feelings and emotions?)
"and the lack of "incorporation" is more about statist control"
Is that how you feel about it or do you have something, like a fact or two, to back that up? It could be that the USSC is waiting for the right case (hey, it took well over 100 years to incorporate what we already have incorporated).
Or it could be that the second amendment is not capable of being incorporated -- depending on the meaning assigned to it. To date, the second amendment has been interpreted by most lower courts as protecting the right of the state to form a state militia consisting of an armed people from federal infringement.
So, incorporating that amendment would prohibit the state from infringing on the right of the state to form a militia? Uh-huh.
So far, only one lower court in one case (Emerson) has ruled that the second amendment refers to an individual right. Not real good odds when it comes to actual case law.
So yeah. Let's hurry up and force the USSC to rule once and for all on the definition of the second amendment. Be careful what you wish for. You may get it.
"Cool. What's your source (or sources)? Because I don't normally recognize someone's "feelings" or "emotions" as an authority on the limits of government."
Eugene Vokloh's writings on many legal topics, including the second amendment, are very illuminating. He is a professor of law at UCLA, and a respected scholar who has written many law review articles on Constitutional Law.
Of incorporation, he writes, "[T]the Second Amendment claim to Fourteenth Amendment protection is historically stronger than any other federal right save speech and jury trial."
You can go to his webpage, link here: http://www1.law.ucla.edu/~volokh/ and see his sources for this assertion.
The Second *is* an individual right, just like the rest of the Bill of Rights. The phrase "the people" doesn't mean anything different in that amendment than it does in any other, gun grabber arguments to the contrary notwithstanding. We really don't need the Supremes to rule on the issue; with 200 million plus firearms out there, we can secure our own rights.
There you go. That's much more efficient than that messy old "voting" thing.
"The Second *is* an individual right, just like the rest of the Bill of Rights."
That may very well be true. But that argument is best for another day. My point was, as confirmed by you and now by Eugene Vokloh, that "the Second Amendment, whatever it may mean, operates to restrict only the power of the federal government."
Your quote is from the Time article, not from Eugene Vokloh; it appears you are trying to mislead by attributing it to him.
The quote is one author's opinion; Constitutional scholars have differing opinions on the meaning of the 2nd amendment, which was put into the constitution in case that messy old "voting" thing didn't work to restrain government.
Well then, I did a pi$$ poor job of it, didn't I?
That may very well be true. But how many insist that the second amendment has been incorporated and applies to the states?
Fear NOT! Election is over and the DEAD have gone back to bed.
You want those bums dictating 'morals' to your kids? You want the courts backing them up in that assumed 'power'?"
Yes, I do believe that state and local governments have a right to legislate for health, safety, and morals under the so called "police power", as it has come to be known.
This is why we have laws against (among other things) obscenity, incest, selling tainted food, having bonfires in your backyard in the middle of a hot dry summer, etc.
Should these things be regulated? That is a subject for debate.
But the fact that states and local governments do have the constitutional power to regulate such things (provided that the Bill of Rights is respected) is not a matter of debate among Constitutional scholars.
That is exactly the argument used by the State of Calif to justify their 'regulations' of assault weapons. 'Banning guns is for health & safety of the children', they cry.
I don't know anyone on this site who would agree with California's position on the 2nd amendment; it's just plain wrong.
Well, now you've met one of the worse.. There are quite a few more.
Even the most die hard "states' rights" types understand that the Federal Constitution places limits on the states.
Welcome to the strange world of "States Rights", where our US Constitution is reviled for its actual words upholding individual rights, -- while 'interpretations' of it that can be used to control 'immoral acts', and prohibit 'evil objects', -- are applauded.
robertpaulsen touts:
"The Second Amendment right to bear arms, however, has never been incorporated by the Court into the Fourteenth Amendment.
The result is that today the Second Amendment, whatever it may mean, operates to restrict only the power of the federal government.
The states remain unfettered by the Amendment's limitations.
They remain essentially free to regulate arms and the right to bear them as they choose, in the absence of strictures in their own state constitutions and laws."
-- time.com, Alain Sanders
The Gun Zone RKBA -- Time Magazine's Anti-gun Agenda
Address:http://www.thegunzone.com/rkba/rkba-time.html
And then we codify it into law for the idiots who aren't bright enough not to target shoot in the living room of their apartment.
Funny you should mention that since you absolutely refuse to admit that there is any limitation at all in the Constitution.
Funny, there is a qualifier at the beginning of the First Amendment: Congress shall pass no law. I see no such qualifier at the beginning of the Second Amendment, and instead it closes with very absolute, clear language: shall not be infringed. I don't see any mention that this only applies to Congress or the federal government. All I see is shall not be infringed - PERIOD.
So this guy is blowing smoke out his tailpipe. I do agree that it took the 14th Amendment to apply the 1st Amendment to the states. But no such action is needed for the 2nd - it applies across the board because of the way it is written. No SCOTUS action required - and that is something both the Justice Department and even liberal Constitutional scholars such as Lawrence Tribe agree upon.
"But how many insist that the second amendment has been incorporated and applies to the states?"
I don't know. But I do know that the Framers intended the 2nd as an individual right, that it is an individual right, and I couldn't care less what a bunch of ConLaw scholars say about "incorporation". We don't need incorporation for the 2nd to apply to the states.
jonestown,
Do you have a link to the report? I'm interested in reading it.
It worked for FDR, didn't it?
WHETHER THE SECOND AMENDMENT SECURES AN INDIVIDUAL RIGHT
Address:http://www.usdoj.gov/olc/secondamendment2.htm
If anything in the above is incorrect, or biased, or even misleading, let's hear it.
You wanna shoot the messenger and think to yourself that you've done a fine job at rebuttal, go for it.
But with no honest reply to the above, you just look petty and foolish.
I see. So it is a fact that, with the obvious exception of the first amendment, the Bill of Rights, as originally written by the Founding Fathers and ratified by the states, applied to the federal government AND the states? This is the way the Bill of Rights has been treated since 1789?
Or, are you saying that this is your opinion?
Lawrence Tribe believes that the second amendment applies to the states? I don't think so.
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