Our 2nd Amendment rights may go before the Supreme Court SUPPORT NEEDED

Keep and Bear Arms ^ | 2/13/2003

[2nd_Amendment_Defender]

Silveira v. Lockyer is a current lawsuit that challenges the California semi-auto rifle ban on the basis of Second Amendment protection of our individual right to keep and bear arms. The plaintiffs in the case are represented by California attorney Gary Gorski.

The U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals has already ruled (Hickman) that Americans have no individual right to own and carry guns. A three-judge panel upheld that ruling in Silveira v. Lockyer. Gorski has petitioned for a hearing by the full court. Barring a self-reversal by the full Ninth Circuit, this case WILL be appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court.

Our Decision

The plaintiffs and Mr. Gorski are determined to move this case to the Supreme Court. More importantly, Mr. Gorski’s in-progress petition asking the Supreme Court to hear Silveira v. Lockyer is being expertly constructed. Because of this, Silveira v. Lockyer has a good chance of being heard by the Supreme Court. With your help, Mr. Gorski will have access to all the essential information, expert advice, and first-class preparation necessary for this Supreme Court case. Citizens Of America and KeepAndBearArms.com have spent a great deal of time investigating every nuance of this situation — and have committed to supporting this case financially.

Supreme Court agreement to hear Silveira v. Lockyer means it is imperative that we win, and the time to prepare is right now. We need your immediate help to make certain that the tremendous amount of advance preparation for this case is done thoroughly and on time.

We must settle the “question” of the Second Amendment sooner rather than later. We must restore the free exercise of our right to own and use guns in our lifetime. We will not accept another 10, 20, 30, 40, or 50 years of citizens being harassed, fined, imprisoned, and killed for exercising a constitutionally protected right.

YOU CAN HELP ensure that the best possible Second Amendment case is made by donating to the tax exempt collaborator in this project, Citizens Of America, right now — while we have the most time available to properly prepare.

We will IMMEDIATELY put your donations to work in support of this case.

[phasma proeliator]

bump

[phasma proeliator]

BUMP

[judicial meanz]

Final Post: Example of state militia law and how it can be called into service: ( Virginia Law is cited:)

§ 44-75.1. Militia state active duty.

A. The Governor or his designee may call forth the militia or any part thereof to state active duty for service in any of the following circumstances:

1. In the event of invasion or insurrection or imminent threat of either;

2. When any combination of persons becomes so powerful as to obstruct the execution of laws in any part of this Commonwealth;

3. When the Governor determines that a state agency or agencies having law-enforcement responsibilities are in need of assistance to perform particular law-enforcement functions, which functions he shall specify in his call to the militia;

4. In the event of flood, hurricane, fire or other forms of natural or manmade disaster wherein human life, public or private property, or the environment is imperiled;

5. In emergencies of lesser magnitude than those described in subdivision 4, including but not limited to the disruption of vital public services, wherein the use of militia personnel or equipment would be of assistance to one or more departments, agencies, institutions, or political subdivisions of the Commonwealth;


Calling the State militia into federal service:

§ 44-86. When ordered out for service.

The commander in chief may at any time, in order to execute the law, suppress riots or insurrections, or repel invasion, or aid in any form of disaster wherein the lives or property of citizens are imperiled or may be imperiled, order out the National Guard and the inactive National Guard or any parts thereof, or the whole or any part of the unorganized militia. When the militia of this Commonwealth, or a part thereof, is called forth under the Constitution and laws of the United States, the Governor shall order out for service the National Guard, or such part thereof as may be necessary; and he may likewise order out such a part of the unorganized militia as he may deem necessary. During the absence of organizations of the National Guard in the service of the United States, their state designations shall not be given to new organizations.

How the Federal request for volunteers is channeled through state government:

44-114.1. Orders transmitted to and through the Governor.

All orders from the federal government or any of its officers, agencies or departments to the state militia of Virginia, including the National Guard, the naval militia, and the unorganized militia which relate to the call, induction, drafting of Virginia state troops of any type or description, into the federal service for active duty or otherwise and withdrawing them from the control of the Governor of Virginia shall be first transmitted to and through the Governor of Virginia. The Governor, as commander in chief of the state militia, shall not approve, consent to, or concur in any such order which has not been transmitted as herein required.




State ability to draft into State militia: ( Not the federal draft)

44-89. Draft of unorganized militia.

If the unorganized militia is ordered out by draft, the Governor shall designate the persons in each county and city to make the draft, and prescribe rules and regulations for conducting the same.

[firewalk]

Bttt

[Ancesthntr]

Thanks much for all of the information. I knew some of this already, but certainly not all of it.

It is all a good argument for making certain that the ultimate reserve force, the unorganized militia, has both arms and the ability to train with them.

[judicial meanz]

Absolutely-Glad I could help.

Anything else you need, let me know.

[Mikey]

"I wonder why the Supreme Court or other courts have never reviewed the US Militia laws thoroughly before they render decisions on this garbage. "

Heres one reason why all these draconian laws get passed, the Constitution and Bill of rights be damned.
It's an old article, but a good reminder

Gunning Against Guns Transparency at the United Nations.

Mr. Kopel is research director at the Independence Institute. August 1, 2001 8:30 a.m.

Editor's note: This is the second installment in an NRO series on the U.N Small Arms Conference. For Part I, see (Score One for Bush).

At the Small Arms Conference, one of the buzzwords of gun-prohibition advocates was the need for "transparency" in small arms. This was shorthand for saying that there should be no privacy regarding gun ownership. Every government ought to have a list of every gun owner and every gun in the country .

Registration has been used to facilitate gun confiscation in the United Kingdom, Australia, Jamaica, California, New York City, Nazi-occupied Europe, Soviet-occupied Europe, the Philippines, Bermuda, and many other places. Registration as an important preliminary step to total handgun prohibition.

Pete Shields, the founder of America's largest gun-prohibition movement (originally called the National Council to Control Handguns; later, Handgun Control, Inc.; currently, the Brady Campaign) explained his three-step program for handgun prohibition in the July 26, 1976 New Yorker:

"The first problem," Shields explained, "is to slow down the increasing number of handguns being produced and sold in this country." Solving this "problem" was high on the U.N. agenda, with many concerns expressed about "excessive" accumulations of small arms. "The second problem," said Shields, "is to get handguns registered." This was Secretary General Kofi Annan's prime hope for the conference, to create a worldwide system of gun registration. "Our ultimate goal," Shields continued, "is to make the possession of all handguns and all handgun ammunition--except for the military, policemen, licensed security guards, licensed sporting clubs, and licensed gun collectors — totally illegal."

As the U.N. pushed for global gun registration, the Washington Post and many other newspapers fumed that there was nothing on the U.N. agenda which would infringe anyone's Second Amendment rights. To the Washington Post editorial page, this statement was plainly correct, since the Post believes that individual Americans have no Second Amendment rights.

Other newspapers, appeared to recognize an individual Second Amendment right, but insisted that nobody's hunting guns were in danger. If a U.N. treaty were to require governments to register the ownership of every book (or every political book) in a country, would these same newspapers insist that there was no danger to freedom of the press?

A United Nations press release touted mandatory gun registration for every (non-government) firearm anywhere in the world, but said that a U.N.-controlled registry was "premature" — not that a U.N. registry was a bad idea, just "premature" in light of current political realities.

The Canadian government, having sunk almost three-quarters of a billion (Canadian) dollars into domestic gun registry — at the expense of police on the streets and the health-care system — pushed hard for international registration mandates. Apparently the Canadian government's failed registration scheme would look less foolish if other governments followed suit.

"Transparency for thee, but not for me" could be the U.N. motto. While pushing to abolish privacy for gun owners, the U.N. barred the press from the debate and deliberation on the official program of action. Americans would be appalled if Congress threw the press out of the Capitol while debating a gun law. But that is precisely what the U.N. did.

"Transparency" for small arms also requires, in the U.N.'s view, abolition of Internet privacy. The U.N. complains that part of the small arms trade conducted by e-commerce "is frequently encoded or encrypted, thus placing an extra burden on the law enforcement institutions to detect it."

To the extent that gun "transparency" can actual help track down how criminals and terrorists get their guns, the world's responsible firearms manufacturers already provide it. Since the Gun Control Act of 1968, all guns manufactured in or imported into the United States must have serial numbers, and markings indicated the identity of the manufacturer and place of manufacture. In conjunction with the U.N. Conference, the world's firearms manufacturers, working through their World Forum on the Future of Sport Shooting Activities, signed an agreement with the Eminent Persons Group (a collection of 23 anti-gun politicians) to provide similar markings on all their firearms.

Such identification has never been objectionable to the manufacturers. At a previous international conference, the only reason that a binding agreement on markings was not achieved was that China objected.

At the U.N. Small Arms Conference, the U.S. again supported firearms identification — provided that the language clearly did not open the door for registration of gun owners. That's good enough for legitimate investigations — but not good enough for prohibition groups who wanted to use the trade in illicit arms as a pretext for destroying the privacy of every (non-government) gun owner in the world.

* All emphasis is mine.

We can scream and holler until the cows come home and it wouldn't do squat. We can go to court again an again an again an it'll do no good.
We the people of these united States must get rid of the UNITED NATIONS . We must get the UNITED NATIONS off our soil.

We continue to fight against the wrong enemy.

I'm not saying we shouldn't join groups like, GOA, etc., but they must turn their attention to the real enemy. If we don't we'll continue to win these little battles but, we'll lose the war.

[Travis McGee]

One thing I don't believe we will ever see is the president or congress passing out surplus rifles. It's just not in their nature, because they don't trust the peasants with firearms. They only want federal agents and soldiers under their direct chain of command to be armed, witness how they resisted arming pilots, who are 90% ex-military! Their true position was that they would prefer to shoot down airliners with fighter pilots in their chain of command than see civilian pilots armed. And that was under a Republican president!

The fact that we have any semi-automatic rifles left at all is a "legacy problem" that they are working steadily to erase from the books, as they have done in Kali, NJ, NY etc.

We are one "super Columbine" away from the total banning of all semi-auto rifles. One Dunblane or Tasmania and they could be banned out right. That's the plot of my novel.

[judicial meanz]

No doubt!

I guess you have to remove American ability to defend itself before we submit to some globalist nightmare.

Good point!

[aruanan]

It's just not in their nature, because they don't trust the peasants with firearms.

And this goes all the way back to the first days of the Republic.

[Shooter 2.5]

I don't believe this is the time to advance a suit to the Supreme Court until at least one of the leftist Justices is replaced. It's a big mistake to gamble on a 5 to 4 ruling.

We waited forty years and I think we can wait just a little longer.

[Travis McGee]

The Bill of Rights was truly a radical document, a miracle in human history.

[Mikey]

"I guess you have to remove American ability to defend itself before we submit to some globalist nightmare. "

Exactly. We can quote the 2ed Amendment a zillion times. We can quote our forefathers. We can keep fighting all the liberals (AKA communists. Which are nothing more then UN minions whether they know it or not).
We can go on & on & on but, in the end we all lose.

(Declaration of Independence from the United Nations)

[Travis McGee]

"Only UNamericans put the UN before America!"

[phasma proeliator]

book bump

[The_Macallan]

Military-style firearms ("assault weapons" included) are specifically protected by the 2nd Amendment according to the U.S. Supreme Court opinions written in U.S. v. Miller (1939) and Lewis v. U.S. (1980).

* In the Miller decision the Supreme Court stated, "In the absence of any evidence tending to show that [a particular gun] 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".

* In the Lewis decision, the Supreme Court stated, "the Second Amendment guarantees no right to keep and bear a firearm that does not have 'some reasonable relationship to the preservation or efficiency of a well-regulated militia'".


Clearly, "assault rifles" have "some reasonable relationship to the preservation or effeciency of a well-regulated militia" since they are civilian versions of the same weapons issued to current US military personel.

Thus, according to the U.S. Supreme Court, "military-style" firearms are EXACTLY the type of firearms that are protected by the 2nd Amendment.




It's Not Just A Gun...

It's My "HOMELAND DEFENSE RIFLE"!!

[patton]

Did you get my check?

And where's my friggin' book?

[SevenDaysInMay]

SCOTUS can read our Constitution, our Bill of Rights, our Article II of our Bill of Rights, tea leaves, and citizens' cold eyes to the soul. Our God given, Constitutionally affirrmed right to keep and bear arms shall return to we, the people, because blackrobes with the American fascist class don't have the manpower to Ruby Ridge - Waco the entire nation and keep their own back gates closed.

[Stopislamnow]

In order to take our guns, they have to come for them.

Until then, I'll keep giving to the NRA and keep practicing at the range so that when they do come for my guns, alot less of them will be going home.

[Travis McGee]

Oh damn. Yes and on my computer.