Posted on 07/13/2006 12:51:11 AM PDT by neverdem
The public education system has tremendous influence in shaping the views of millions of young Americans. In many cases, the public school system is the only exposure that many children have to the Bill of the Rights. It is imperative, therefore, to ensure that our nation's teachers are enlightening our young people and teaching them correctly about our rights and the meaning behind them. Unfortunately, the overwhelming majority of educators in the United States appear to promote an anti-gun agenda or, at the very least, prefer not to teach the Second Amendment in its true light. We base this opinion, in part, on the fact that the United States Parent-Teacher Association and the National Education Association are both openly anti-gun organizations. We further base our opinion on the fact that the public education system at large seems aligned with the left-leaning socialist agenda that also dominates the dinosaur media and the Democractic Party. These are organizations and individuals who side with the enemy during wartime, attack Christian expression while simultaneously supporting public, other-than-Christian religious expression, and support the licensing and registration of guns while secretly conniving to confiscate every one of them.
These are the same people who try to deny that the Second Amendment applies to you and me, but applies to the National Guard instead. These are the same people who conjured up the term, "assault rifle" in an effort to ban semi-automatic rifles. They claim that when the Constitution was written, the Founding Fathers never intended it to apply to the types of firearm technology available today.
Any red-blooded, patriotic American who understands the true meaning of the Second Amendment is closer in spirit to our Founding Fathers than the sniveling, whiners who call themselves intellectuals. As such, we know that the right to keep and bear arms applies to the American people and is not restricted to muskets. We can further prove the intent of the Founding Fathers by observing how they lived and by reading many of the supporting articles and letters that outline their philosophy on the symbiotic relationship between an armed populace and a government that serves its people.
It is time to demand that our nation's education system duly recognize our Bill of Rights and teach the Second Amendment according to its true intent. You can start by talking to your child and asking them if they are learning about the Constitution in school. If so, take a look at their textbook and see if the Second Amendment is accurately reported. If there is a problem with the textbook or if the Second Amendment is not being taught at all, you may want to talk to your child's principal. You may also want to team up with other parents who share the same views. Teachers have a responsibility to our children and we have a responsibility to see that our nation's teachers are doing their jobs properly.
Jennifer Freeman is Executive Director and co-founder of Liberty Belles, a grass-roots organization dedicated to restoring and preserving the Second Amendment.
http://www.libertybelles.org
jennifer@libertybelles.org
[RKBA's] "Unalienable? No.
An individual right secured by the states, yes."
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
DC:
-- he never gives up.
He's either a "true believer" in the New World Order, or he's a Brady Troll.
He's a troll, convinced that admittedly "individual rights" can be 'alienated', abridged, deprived, or infringed upon by States.
Too bad really. We could use such a tenacious mind on the Founding Intent/Natural Rights side of the fence.
Catch 22. Such tenaciousness is a product of unreasoning zealotry to 'the cause'. -- And the cause is anti-constitutional statism. -- It's a gulf, not a fence.
I'm more inclined to believe he's part of the beltway regulatory royalty protecting his turf.
Which seems to give folks like you the fits.
Sorry about that, but you'd better learn to deal with it.
Among the natural rights of the Colonists are these: First, a right to life; Secondly, to liberty; 'thirdly, to property; together with the right to support and defend them in the best manner they can. - Samuel Adams, 'Rights of the Colonists," Nov. 1772
The Citizens of the United States of America have a right to applaud themselves for giving to Mankind examples of an enlarged and liberal policy: a policy worthy of imitation. All possess alike liberty of conscience and immunities of citizenship. It is now no more that toleration is spoken of, as if it was by the indulgence of one class of people that another enjoyed the exercise of their inherent natural rights. For happily the Government of the United States, which gives to bigotry no sanction, to persecution no assistance, requires only that they who live under its protection should demean themselves as good citizens in giving it on all occasions their effectual support. May the Children of the Stock of Abraham, who dwell in this land, continue to merit and enjoy the good will of the other Inhabitants; while every one shall sit under his own vine and fig tree, and there shall be none to make him afraid. - George Washington, Letter to the Hebrew Congregation of Newport, Rhode Island (1790)
"The second amendment to the federal constitution, as well as the constitutions of many of the states, guaranty to the people the right to bear arms. This is a natural right, not created or granted by the constitutions." Henry Campbell Black, Handbook of American Constitutional Law, 1895.
"The right of the people to keep and bear arms has been recognized by the General Government; but the best security of that right after all is, the military spirit, that taste for martial exercises, which has always distinguished the free citizens of these States … Such men form the best barrier to the liberties of America." Gazette of the United States, October 14, 1789
"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 of the New York Historical Society, October 7, 1789
"the powers not delegated to congress by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the states, are reserved to the states respectively, or to the people. What we are about to consider are certainly not delegated to congress, nor are they noticed in the prohibitions to states; they are therefore reserved either to the states or to the people. Their high nature, their necessity to the general security and happiness will be distinctly perceived.
"In the second article, it is declared, that a well regulated militia is necessary to the security of a free state; a proposition from which few will dissent. Although in actual war, in the services of regular troops are confessedly more valuable; yet, while peace prevails, and in the commencement of a war before a regular force can be raised, the militia form the palladium of the country. They are ready to repel invasion, to suppress insurrection, and preserve the good order and peace of government. That they should be well regulated, is judiciously added. A disorderly militia is disgraceful to itself, and dangerous not to the enemy, but to its own country. The duty of the state government is, to adopt such regulations as will tend to make good soldiers with the least interruptions of the ordinary and useful occupations of civil life. In this all the Union has a strong and visible interest. The corollary, from the first position, is that the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.
"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.
"In most of the countries of Europe, this right does not seem to be denied, although it is allowed more or less sparingly, according to circumstances. In England, a country which boasts so much of its freedom, the right was secured to protestant subjects only, on the revolution of 1688; and it is cautiously described to be that of bearing arms for their defence, "suitable to their conditions, and as allowed by law." An arbitrary code for the preservation of game in that country has long disgraced them. A very small proportion of the people being permitted to kill it, though for their own subsistence; a gun or other instrument, used for that purpose by an unqualified person, may be seized and forfeited. Blackstone, in whom we regret that we cannot always trace expanded principles of rational liberty, observes however, on this subject, that the prevention of popular insurrections and resistance to government by disarming the people, is oftener meant than avowed, by the makers of forest and game laws." William Rawle, A View of the Constitution of the United States of America 125-26 (2d ed. 1829). Mr. Rawle was appointed as a U.S. Attorney for Pennsylvania by President George Washington. Mr. Rawle was also Washington's candidate to be the nation's first Attorney General, but Rawle declined. Chapter 10. Whole Book.
Game. Set. Match.
I'm betting he's spent a good deal of his life on the federal payroll.
Seems to me that if they were looking for enough folks to fill out a good sized Militia, they wouldn't have infringed on the inanlienable RKBA of women, blacks, and seniors.
Further, men over 48 can still join the active militia, but are not subject to a militia call-up. Which again, in no way relates to "infringement" of their RKBA.
The state citizens (plural) acting through their delegates (plural) acting collectively in convention wrote the Constitution establishing a Congress (collective body) of representatives (plural) for the people (plural) of the United States collectively.
We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.
America has collectively survived as a nation for centuries and will live on long after the dead corpses of her forgotten anarchist enemies have rotted away.
Poor you.
It's easier for them to invent "facts" out of thin air.
Twist the meaning all you want. It doesn't make you right, correct, or at this point even remotely sane.
The whole of that 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 to Alexander Addison, Oct 7, 1789, MS. in N.Y. Hist. Soc.-A.G. Papers, 2.
Take your socialist/collectivist BS elsewhere.
[C]onceived it to be the privilege of every citizen Note: singular tense, and one of his most essential rights, to bear arms, and to resist every attack upon his liberty or property, by whomsoever made. The particular states, like private citizens, have a right to be armed, and to defend, by force of arms, their rights, when invaded.
Debates in the House of Representatives, ed. Linda Grand De Pauw. (Balt., Johns Hopkins Univ. Press, 1972), 92-3.
Thanks for refuting your own argument You've just admitted that the people of the United States have rights both collectively and individually.
You go, girl!
You're arguing that bearing arms is a privilege?
What next?
The particular states, like private citizens, have a right to be armed,
You are such a transparent retard.
Collective bodies have rights just like individuals?
I don't know what you're hoping to accomplish by the furious fire you're directing at your own foot, but I'm sure enjoying it!
considered as individuals...
Do you have to be such an outright liar?
It establishes some rights of the individual as unalienable
>>>The 2nd amendment is 2nd because it is the 2nd most important right to ensure an enduring democracy...<<<
No. The first 10 amendments were all considered equally important, and were not placed in any particular order. In fact, our current "First Amendment" was originally submitted as the "Third Amendment". The first two amendments failed ratification by the states, so the Third became the First by default.
This is not to say that some of our Founders placed extra value on one amendment or another. Some thought the RKBA the most important; some thought the Freedom of the Press.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.