Rucker61:
Read the amendment. The words are as clear as the tens of thousands of dead bodies piled up like cord-wood each year in America. Hiding behind the false reality of politicians garbed in jurists' robes does not change the reality of the dead. This is a classic example of how self-delusion trumps reality in American psychosis. More of the amendment is about the militia than about not infringing gun rights.
I've read the amendment. The Second Amendment, like all of the Bill of Rights, is a restriction on government power. It neither defines nor limits the rights of the people.
You know who else read the Second Amendment? The state legislatures who ratified the Bill of Rights. They also ratified their own state constitutions around the same time, and those legislatures affirmed an individual right to self defense in those state constitutions. They certainly understood that a right for an individual to bear arms for self defense existed.
Pennsylvania: 1776: That the people have a right to bear arms for the defence of themselves and the state; and as standing armies in the time of peace are dangerous to liberty, they ought not to be kept up; And that the military should be kept under strict subordination, to, and governed by, the civil power. Declaration of Rights, cl. XIII.
Vermont: That the people have a right to bear arms for the defence of themselves and the State -- and as standing armies in time of peace are dangerous to liberty, they ought not to be kept up; and that the military should be kept under strict subordination to and governed by the civil power. Ch. I, art. 16 (enacted 1777, ch. I, art. 15).
Kentucky: 1792: "That the right of the citizens to bear arms in defense of themselves and the State shall not be questioned." Art. XII, § 23.
Ohio: 1802: "That the people have a right to bear arms for the defence of themselves and the State; and as standing armies, in time of peace, are dangerous to liberty, they shall not be kept up, and that the military shall be kept under strict subordination to the civil power." Art. VIII, § 20.
The 45,000 people who died by guns last year is not an under control situation. That's about how many Americans died in fifteen years in the Vietnam War, but these are dying each year. More delusion and rejection of reality because as Mr. Twain said, "lies, damn lies and statistics", are useful tools of denial.
Where's your denominator? There were 100 million times 365 days of opportunity for a gun related death. 45k is a statically tiny percentage of that number, and most of those deaths were by suicide.
If we get suicides down to 13,000 per year, is that good enough?
Physicians, heal thy selves! Your country's mass psychosis, your job to fix it or adjust your gun laws accordingly to ameliorate it.
Cheers and be well.
Evilroddy.
Until there are 38 blue states, that's not going to happen.
www.salon.com
www.nytimes.com
