Posted on 11/26/2005 12:43:07 PM PST by pabianice
In November, the Massachusetts House of Representatives moved favorably from committee H. 2125, which brings the state one step closer to its goal of the confiscation of privately owned firearms.
Under this bill, all private owners of handguns would have to register each handgun with the police and have a separate $ 250,000 liability insurance policy on each handgun or have that handgun confiscated (insurance professionals: care to estimate the cost of such a policy to the holder?). Each such insurance policy must cover the potential theft and unlawful use of the gun. If the policy is inadequate to cover any subsequent court judgment against the lawful gunowner, he will be thrown in jail for five years for each offense. In cases where a finding of fact and guilt is to be made, one member of any such committee must be a member of Stop Handgun Violence, Inc.
There's more. Anyone who sells someone more than one gun a month shall be imprisoned for up to life. However, this law will not apply to anyone under the age of 18.
Most disgustingly, this bill is being crammed through the Legislature under Homeland Security measures.
I have read the Federalist Papers and a lot more. We are not talking about nuclear arms... we are talking about antipersonnel armaments that are suitable to take down a government without making the territory uninhabitable.
Your attempt to carry the discussion to absurd levels does not address the issue. An individual citizen cannot operate a battleship or service and maintain a jet fighter by himself... but a well regulated militia of many citizens could. The individuals who comprise that militia would be responsible for owning and maintaining their own private arms... military arms... and jointly owning and maintaining the larger weaponry.
If you believe that, you're just a nut
a kid who just turned 18, or an emotionally unbalanced man with a death wish
I think you are naive.
and nobody but a insane fanatic would ever think they did
Me thinks thou dost protesteth too much.
So:
Freedom is either 100% or 0%, there is no in between,
Wrong. The "in between" is our Constitution, as written.
(which, BTW, was exactly what the founders were fighting for, a balance between totalitarianism and anarchy, a balance between the rights of the individual and the rights of the community)
Wrong. Communities have no rights, they are delegated powers by our State Constitutions, which are subject to, and must support our Law of the Land, the US Constitution. [see Art. VI]
You really ought to try reading, say, the Federalist Papers, or one of the many books about the Constitutional Convention.
Most of us have, -- and very few have imagined they have found any "community rights" enumerated in those documents.
If you think the founders were extremist libertarians, you've got another thing coming.
If you think the founders were even mild communitarians, you've got another thing coming.
"The court 'says' a LOT of things. Their opinions are not always correct"
Really, then why do certain States infringe on the rights of the people trying to buy a fire arm? It seems the US Supreme Court has a huge amount of influence on us by the rulings they dish out on the "interpretation" of the Constitution.
Right now it's up to the States on how they infringe on gun owners, some posters agree with this stance, not I but it is reality at the moment.
Affiliation:NAZI PARTY
PING!!!!!!!!!!!!!
And we see the result of such misguided court decisions.
State & local governments use democratic 'majority rule' to overturn the Constitutional rule of law.
I don't agree [with Cruikshank] but that's the way it is. The State can infringe on the rights of the people in regard to the 2nd Amendment.
Why? Because the Supreme Court said so.
Why put blame on the USSC? -- Most agree because they want States to have the power to control other people and admit it. No disgrace to support majority rule.. Many here do..
Really, then why do certain States infringe on the rights of the people trying to buy a fire arm?
Because those States are controlled [unconstitutionally] by majority rule politics.
It seems the US Supreme Court has a huge amount of influence on us by the rulings they dish out on the "interpretation" of the Constitution. Right now it's up to the States on how they infringe on gun owners,
Yes, and this is encouraged by those who cite Cruikshank as being 'the law' that must be obeyed.
some posters agree with this stance, not I but it is reality at the moment.
Yep, it's a reality, - due to misguided zeal for 'states rights', and those who say the 2nd must be incorporated before it applies to States.
It may surprise you to know that prior to Alito at least 5 justices on the Rehnquist court have asserted the individual right theory or concurred with others who have asserted such.
I think it is probable that the SCOTUS with Alito would affirm the individual right while also affirming the power of states to regulate same. However, I think that same court would strike this particular Massachusetts law and the Supreme Court of Mass should as well based on their own Constitituion.
No, it is exactly what is at issue here.
You were arguing that the 2nd Amendment was absolute, and that by suggesting any restrictions on weapons, I was violating it. By taking that arguement to its logical end (i.e. no weapons whatsoever are restricted), and having you agree that in that case, it wouldn't be, I have proven that it isn't absolute.
Now, we can debate on where to draw the line all day long. But I have proven that the 2nd Amendment doesn't mean what you claimed it meant.
Let me throw out another word for community rights: 'Democracy'
Is there any evidence that the Second Amendment was not meant, at the time of its passage, to allow private citizens to own any and all forms of weaponry available to the military?
If not, then that's what the Second Amendment has always meant.
If you believe that changing circumstances make such a rule obsolete, the proper procedure is to amend the Constitution. The only reason you cite for refusing to do so is a claim that the Second Amendment was not meant to mean what it apparently says. So I must ask again what evidence you have to suggest that the Second Amendment was not meant to apply (among other things) to any and all forms of military weaponry.
A concept which the Founding Fathers regarded as abhorrent when they created the REPUBLIC.
So:
Freedom is either 100% or 0%, there is no in between,
Wrong. The "in between" is our Constitution, as written.
(which, BTW, was exactly what the founders were fighting for, a balance between totalitarianism and anarchy, a balance between the rights of the individual and the rights of the community)
Wrong. Communities have no rights, they are delegated powers by our State Constitutions, which are subject to, and must support our Law of the Land, the US Constitution. [see Art. VI]
You really ought to try reading, say, the Federalist Papers, or one of the many books about the Constitutional Convention.
Most of us have, -- and very few have imagined they have found any "community rights" enumerated in those documents.
Let me throw out another word for community rights: 'Democracy'
Yep, the 'democratic' principle that majority rules.. -- We live under a republican form of government, where our Constitution rules as supreme law.
If you think the founders were extremist libertarians, you've got another thing coming.
If you think the founders were even mild communitarians, you've got another thing coming.
Communities have no rights, they are delegated powers by our State Constitutions, which are subject to, and must support our Law of the Land, the US Constitution. [see Art. VI]
You really ought to try reading, say, the Federalist Papers, or one of the many books about the Constitutional Convention.
Most of us have, -- and very few have imagined they have found any "community rights" enumerated in those documents.
Let me throw out another word for community rights: 'Democracy'
Yep, the 'democratic' principle that majority rules.. -- We live under a republican form of government, where our Constitution rules as supreme law.
Any comments on the controversy as outlined?
"The first principle of republicanism is that the lex majoris partis is the fundamental law of every society of individuals of equal rights; to consider the will of the society enounced by the majority of a single vote as sacred as if unanimous is the first of all lessons in importance, yet the last which is thoroughly learnt. This law once disregarded, no other remains but that of force, which ends necessarily in military despotism."
--Thomas Jefferson
Leftists, such as tpaine, want rule by judicial decree.
"To that union of effort may our citizens ever rally, minorities falling cordially, on the decision of a question, into the ranks of the majority, and bearing always in mind that a nation ceases to be republican only when the will of the majority ceases to be the law."
--Thomas Jefferson
Yep, the 'democratic' principle that majority rules..
However -- We live under a republican form of government, where our Constitution rules as supreme law.
"The first principle of republicanism is that the lex majoris partis is the fundamental law of every society of individuals of equal rights; to consider the will of the society enounced by the majority of a single vote as sacred as if unanimous is the first of all lessons in importance, yet the last which is thoroughly learnt. This law once disregarded, no other remains but that of force, which ends necessarily in military despotism."
--Thomas Jefferson
Gotta love the Jefferson quote game, -- but nothing can be resolved by them unless you establish context.
Jefferson was above all a politician, very adept at writing what his correspondents wanted to hear.
Try again.
Rediculous.
It is true that they didn't want a pure democracy a'la Athens, but to say that they disdained it completely is utterly perposterous. Read the Federalist Papers.
Huh. You hate him as much as you hate the republican principles he espoused.
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