How the NRA Rewrote the Second Amendment

Very good - thanks.

I know the gun folks will say that’s an underpowered pop-gun

That's ok. Don't shoot at me with it. .22 and .38 have put paid to plenty of folks. I'd rather not be one.

It is cool to get a nice piece of workmanship, isn't it? I feel the same about grandmother's .38 snubby.

Clean as a whistle, and great furniture.

/johnny

Tell your liberal friend who says guns are scary...

“A fear of weapons is a sign of retarded sexual and emotional maturity.”
—Sigmund Freud, General Introduction to Psychoanalysis (1952)

“The Founders never intended to create an unregulated individual right to a gun.”

Says you, *sshole.

But, of course, you’re a snotty, little Liberal, so you know better than the USSC.

Federalist/Anti-Federalist ping.

My first gun was a S&W .38 Special. They are great guns: tragic to lose mine a few years ago in a boating accident . . .

Unfortunately this author never bothered to actually see what the founders actually said and wrote about it.

“A free people ought to be armed.”
- George Washington

“No free man shall ever be debarred the use of arms.”
- Thomas Jefferson

Is this a real quote?:

“The laws that forbid the carrying of arms are laws of such a nature. They disarm only those who are neither inclined nor determined to commit crimes.... Such laws make things worse for the assaulted and better for the assailants; they serve rather to encourage than to prevent homicides, for an unarmed man may be attacked with greater confidence than an armed man.”
- Thomas Jefferson (quoting 18th century criminologist Cesare Beccaria)

“Arms in the hands of citizens may be used at individual discretion in private self defense.”
- John Adams

“To disarm the people is the most effectual way to enslave them.”
- George Mason

“I ask sir, what is the militia? It is the whole people except for a few politicians.”
- George Mason (father of the Bill of Rights and The Virginia Declaration of Rights)

“Before a standing army can rule, the people must be disarmed, as they are in almost every country in Europe.”
- Noah Webster

Lost in the gun rights debate, much to the detriment of American freedom, is the fact that the Second Amendment is in fact an “AMENDMENT”. No “Articles in Amendment” to the Constitution, more commonly referred to as the Bill of Rights, stand alone and each can only be properly understood with reference to what it is that each Article in Amendment amended in the body of the original Constitution. It should not be new knowledge to any American the Constitution was first submitted to Congress on September 17, 1787 WITHOUT ANY AMENDMENTS. After much debate, it was determined that the States would not adopt the Constitution as originally submitted until “further declamatory and restrictive clauses should be added” “in order to prevent misconstruction or abuse of its (the Constitutions) powers”. (This quote is from the Preamble to the Amendments, which was adopted along with the Amendments but is mysteriously missing from nearly all modern copies.) The first ten Amendments were not ratified and added to the Constitution until December 15, 1791.

In this Light:

“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.” What provisions of the original Constitution is it that the Second Amendment is designed to “amended”?

THE SECOND AMENDMENT IS AMENDING THE PROVISIONS IN THE ORIGINAL CONSTITUTION APPLYING TO THE “MILITIA”. The States were not satisfied with the powers granted to the “militia” as defined in the original Constitution and required an amendment to “prevent misconstruction or abuse of its powers. “(Again quoting from the Preamble to the Amendments.)

What was it about the original Constitutional provisions concerning the “Militia” that was so offensive to the States?

First understand that the word “militia” was used with more than one meaning at the time of the penning of the Constitution. One popular definition used then was one often quoted today, that the “Militia” was every able bodied man owning a gun. As true as this definition is, it only confuses the meaning of the word “militia” as used in the original Constitution that required the Second Amendment to correct. The only definition of “Militia” that had any meaning to the States demanding Amendments is the definition used in the original Constitution. What offended the States then should offend “People” today:

“Militia” in the original Constitution as amended by the Second Amendment is first found in Article 1, Section 8, clause 15, where Congress is granted the power:

“To provide for the calling forth the MILITIA to execute the Laws of the Union, suppress Insurrection and repel Invasions.” Article 1, Section 8, Clause 16 further empowers Congress:

“To provide for the organizing, arming, and disciplining, the MILITIA, and for governing such Part of them as may be employed in the Service of the United States, reserving to the States respectively, the Appointment of the Officers, according to the discipline prescribed by Congress;” Any “patriot” out there still want to be called a member of the “MILITIA” as defined by the original Constitution?

Article 2, Section 2, Clause 1 empowers: “The President shall be Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy of the United States, and of the MILITIA of the several States, when called into the actual Service of the United States;” The only way the States would accept the “MILITIA” as defined in the original Constitution was that the Federal “MILITIA” be “WELL REGULATED”. The States realized that “THE SECURITY OF A FREE STATE” required that the “MILITIA” as originally created in the Constitution be “WELL REGULATED” by a “restrictive clause.” How did the States decide to insure that the Constitutional “MILITIA” be “WELL REGULATED”? By demanding that “restrictive clause two” better know as the “Second Amendment” be added to the original Constitution providing:

“THE RIGHT OF THE PEOPLE TO KEEP AND BEAR ARMS SHALL NOT BE INFRINGED.” The States knew that “PEOPLE” with “ARMS” would “WELL REGULATE” the Federal “MILITIA”!

Now read for the first time with the full brightness of the Light of truth:

“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.”

For those still overcome by propaganda:

The Second Amendment declares by implication that if the “MILITIA” is not “WELL REGULATED” by “PEOPLE” keeping and bearing arms, the “MILITIA” becomes a threat to the “SECURITY OF A FREE STATE.”

The “MILITIA” has no “RIGHT TO KEEP AND BEAR ARMS” in the Second Amendment, rather it is only “THE RIGHT OF THE “”PEOPLE”” TO KEEP AND BEAR ARMS (that) SHALL NOT BE INFRINGED.”

"A fraud on the American public.” That’s how former Chief Justice Warren Burger described the idea that the Second Amendment gives an unfettered individual right to a gun. When he spoke these words to PBS in 1990, the rock-ribbed conservative appointed by Richard Nixon was expressing the longtime consensus of historians and judges across the political spectrum.

How a presumably educated Chief Justice could say that with a straight face any time in the last 210 years is mind-boggling.
English is not that complicated, nor has it changed that much during that time.

Yes, the Second Amendment has been rewritten, but certainly not by the NRA.

Something about

...But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.— Such has been the patient sufferance of... ...repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States...

And

The Second Amendment was based partially on the right to keep and bear arms in English common-law and was influenced by the English Bill of Rights of 1689. Sir William Blackstone described this right as an auxiliary right, supporting the natural rights of self-defense, resistance to oppression, and the civic duty to act in concert in defense of the state.

In United States v. Cruikshank (1876), the Supreme Court of the United States ruled that, "The right to bear arms is not granted by the Constitution; neither is it in any manner dependent upon that instrument for its existence" and limited the applicability of the Second Amendment to the federal government.

It comes as no surprise to realize that many many laws have been perverted and applied totally as the reverse of what was originally intended. The best example is the Environmental Quality Act, whose primary objective was the quality of human existence; today, many widely quoted "wise (insane?)" men are actually quoted as asserting that "the world would be a better, if not perfect place without humans on it." Never mind that in such a state any cognitive, conscious awareness would be meaningless.

Nobody who has read any American history will believe this garbage. It’s just more of the leftist/IslamoNazi/”progressivist” Big Lie control technique: to rewrite the past as outlandishly or ridiculously as necessary to support their agenda to seize and maintain power in their hands. To transform Amerika today and tomorrow, they don’t hesitate fir a moment trying to transform our history, too. Liars, liars, pants on fire .. We caught you this time

THANK you!

I thought I was going to fall out of my chair when I read: "the rock-ribbed conservative appointed by Richard Nixon"

In what way was Earl Warren "conservative"?

In fact I always confuse the two liberal kooks, and often think of them as Earl Warren Burger.

No discernible difference.

The American Revolution began when the British tried to disarm the American Colonists.

“Rewrote” would imply that the NRA, well, rewrote it. It’s the same language it’s always been.

Just purchased (last week) a low-miles S&W model 10 chambered in .38 special. I know the gun folks will say that’s an underpowered pop-gun, but damn the workmanship is nice. A work of art.

That's a fine gun. Congrats!

(I have 8 Model 10s)

Hubert H. Humphrey ?

Molon Labe, b*tches.

"In 1938, Congress again undertook to regulate firearms by passing the Federal Firearms Act ("FFA"), which regulated interstate commerce in firearms and prohibited possession of firearms by felons where an interstate nexus could be demonstrated. This legislation, since it primarily regulated only interstate commerce in firearms by requiring licenses and recordkeeping by manufacturers and dealers, was far less controversial than the NFA. Despite the lesser controversy surrounding the FFA, questions were nonetheless raised as to the constitutionality of federal regulation of firearms.

Addressing these constitutional questions on the Senate floor, Senator William H. King, a Utah Democrat, stated to Senator Copeland, the chief sponsor, that "we have a constitutional provision that right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed ... [and that he] was wondering if this bill was not in contravention of the constitutional provision." Denying that the FFA was in contravention of the Second Amendment, Senator Copeland argued that the provisions of the Second Amendment must be read together, and that "[t]he part relating to militia is important ... [as (p.615)that part is], of course, in the first part of the constitutional provision." Senator McKellar responded that, "while [the Second Amendment] refers to the militia, the provision is all-inclusive and provides that the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall remain inviolate."

The constitutional issue was not pursued further, however, apparently because the bill was designed as a regulation of interstate commerce. Moreover, the bill did not operate upon individual firearms owners, other than felons who received firearms in interstate commerce. A Senate committee explained the bill as follows:

The bill under consideration ... is designed to regulate the manufacture of and the shipment through interstate commerce of all firearms.

... It is believed that the bill above referred to will go far in the direction we are seeking and will eliminate the gun from the crooks' hands, while interfering as little as possible with the law-abiding citizen from whom protests have been received against any attempt to take from him his means of protection from the outlaws who have rendered living conditions unbearable in the past decade.

Meanwhile, in United States v. Miller, the Supreme Court rendered an equivocal opinion concerning the status of the NFA under the Second Amendment. Miller reached the Supreme Court after a district court had ruled that the NFA was unconstitutional on its face as violative of the Second Amendment. After ruling the NFA unconstitutional, the district court then dismissed an indictment for transporting in interstate commerce a shotgun with a barrel less than eighteen inches without the required tax stamp. The Supreme Court reversed, offering the following reasoning:

In the absence of any evidence tending to show that possession or use of a "shotgun having a barrel of less than eighteen inches in length" at this time has some reasonable relationship to the preservation or efficiency of a well regulated militia, we cannot say that the Second Amendment guarantees the right to keep and bear such an instrument. Certainly it is not within judicial notice that this weapon is any part of the ordinary military equipment or that its use could contribute to the common defense.

Upon reversing, the Court remanded the case to the district court for further proceedings consistent with its opinion. These proceedings would have required hearing evidence about the nature of the shotgun. In the absence of a factual record indicating that a "sawed-off" shotgun could have military uses, the Court did not consider whether the tax and related registration requirements of the NFA violated the Second Amendment. The Court apparently assumed that if the shotgun was a protected firearm under the Second Amendment, the tax and registration requirements may have been unconstitutional. Otherwise the Court could have disposed of the issue without remanding the case.

Furthermore, the Court apparently assumed that the Second Amendment protects all individuals, not just members of an organized force such as the National Guard. The test was not whether the person in possession of the arm was a member of a formal militia unit, but whether the arm "at this time" is "ordinary military equipment" or whether its use could potentially "contribute to the common defense." Consequently, had the Court assumed that the Second Amendment did not protect ordinary persons, it logically would not have remanded the case to determine the factual status of the firearm.

The Court also discussed the meaning of the Second Amendment. Referring to the militia clause of the Constitution, the Court stated that "to assure the continuation and render possible the effectiveness of such forces the declaration and guarantee of the Second Amendment were made." The Court then surveyed colonial and state militia laws to demonstrate that "the Militia comprised all males physically capable of acting in concert for the common defense" and that "these men were expected to appear bearing arms supplied by themselves and of the kind in common use at the time."

The Court in Miller also cited with approval to the commentaries of Justice Joseph Story and Judge Thomas M. Cooley, which articulate the philosophy behind the Second Amendment. In his commentary, Justice Story stated:)

The right of the citizens to keep and bear arms has justly been considered as the palladium of the liberties of a republic; since it offers a strong moral check against the usurpation and arbitrary power of rulers, and will generally, even if these are successful in the first instance, enable the people to resist and triumph over them.

Judge Cooley's commentaries, also cited by the Court in Miller, state that:

Among the other safeguards to liberty should be mentioned the right of the people to keep and bear arms.... The alternative to a standing army is "a well-regulated militia"; but this cannot exist unless the people are trained to bearing arms. The Federal and State constitutions therefore provide that the right of the people to bear arms shall not be infringed ....

Thus, although Miller was somewhat equivocal, it provided little comfort to supporters of registration, for its apparent holding was that registration of military-type arms might be inconsistent with the Second Amendment. Indeed, Miller represents the end of an era, for Congress would soon react to the rise of European police states by reaffirming the Second Amendment and rejecting registration.

In the 1941 legislative effort, shortly before Pearl Harbor, Congress authorized the President to requisition property from the private sector on payment of fair compensation. The Property Requisition Act included the following:

Nothing contained in this Act shall be construed-- (1) to authorize the requisitioning or require the registration of any firearms possessed by any individual for his personal protection or sport (and the possession of which is not prohibited or the registration of which is not required by existing law), ... [or] (2) to impair or infringe in any manner the right of any individual to keep and bear arms ....[12]

Explaining the Property Requisition Act, the House Committee on Military Affairs provided the following statement:

In view of the fact that certain totalitarian and dictatorial nations are now engaged in the willful and wholesale destruction of personal rights and liberties, our committee deems it appropriate for the Congress to expressly state that the proposed legislation shall not be construed to impair or infringe the constitutional right of the people to bear arms.... There is no disposition on the part of this Government to depart from the concepts and principles of personal rights and liberties expressed in our Constitution.

"

CONGRESS INTERPRETS THE SECOND AMENDMENT: DECLARATIONS BY A CO-EQUAL BRANCH ON THE INDIVIDUAL RIGHT TO KEEP AND BEAR ARMS

Liberals will tell you that’s a high-powered assault weapon.

be great to see see the same dissertation re: the “wall of separation”.

The Founders never intended to create an unregulated individual right to a gun.

No, the founders never "created" such a right. It already existed, and the founders took it for granted. They did, however, take care to ensure that it would not be infringed.