Quote:
Originally Posted by Urban Peasant
I started this thread with a misunderstanding about the phrase "A Well Regulated Militia" that I am sure many others have also made but others here have since corrected me. I actually took in a lot of worthy information I did not know about the amendment and I appreciate it but if you're going to try to argue that I am myopic in my views, then we can end it here.  |
I still love you.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Urban Peasant
Notice the first part says that if a militia is formed, it has to be well regulated which means it ought to be officially sanctioned by the government.
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Whenever you're examining something historically, you need to remove yourself from the "here and now" and put yourself in their time and place.
And you might ask how that is possible. Granted, we have no idea what some Sumerian king was thinking 7,000 years ago.
But we know
exactly what the men who wrote the Constitution and the amendments thereto were thinking.
How do we know?
From their blogs and vlogs and Facepuke pages.
Uh, wut? They didn't have electricity!
They had blogs nonetheless. Back then they were called "diaries."
The men who wrote the Constitution kept diaries of their daily or weekly activities, wrote letters to each other and to other men not even associated with the process of creating the Constitution, and the kept minutes of the meetings their committees held.
And in those written documents they state exactly what they were thinking and feeling.
So we know,
with no uncertainty, exactly what they were thinking and feeling. You just have to read those diaries, letters and meeting minutes to know (and many universities have upper level courses where you will do exactly that).
Historically, a militia was "the body of the people."
A militia never needed to be created by any government at any level, nor did it need to be sanctioned or approved by any government at any level, because, well, it was the body of the people.
In this context, the People and the State (meaning a government of any kind) are separate and distinct entities.
I would also mention another important fact. When the body of the people formed a militia, they never allowed the mentally incompetent to be part of the militia.
You probably heard the term "village idiot."
That was a person who was mildly or profoundly retarded, or profoundly deaf and thus also mute, or who had a mental illness like schizophrenia, schizo-affective disorder, neurosis, psychosis or another mental illness.
Because such persons were unable to communicate effectively, or unable to maintain any livelihood and some experienced auditory, visual or tactile hallucinations they ran around like through the village like, well, an idiot, thus "village idiot."
Such persons were never armed and never allowed to be part of the militia -- the body of the people -- because they could not be trusted, not to mention they often lacked the ability to wield a weapon of any kind.
I mention that because claims that the 2nd Amendment is "absolute" are false. There are limitations and those limitations extend to those who are mentally incompetent because the men who wrote those amendments would never have allowed a mentally incompetent person be part of a militia.
Having said that, it must be taken in context with the 5th and 14th Amendments.
You cannot deprive one of their life or liberty, and the men who wrote the Constitution defined "liberty" as your right to earn a livelihood, your money, and your property, among things, without due process.
Due process is both procedural and substantive.
You cannot take weapons from a person just because you think something is wrong with them.
You need a hearing before an administrative law judge or an actual court where evidence can be presented that a person is mentally incompetent and should not be allowed to possess a firearm and the person can present evidence that they are not mentally incompetent, or that they are mentally incompetent, but should still be allowed to possess a firearm, and then adjudicate the matter.
That is in keeping with the Constitution and its Amendments.
Returning to the 2nd Amendment, note that nowhere does it expressly state or imply that the State should regulate the militia.
It is the people who form the militia that regulate it, not the State.
You might think I'm splitting hairs, because the People and the State are one in the same, but as I pointed out earlier, they are not.
There are some differently twisted interpretations of the 2nd Amendment.
The men chose their words very carefully, and one has the "right to bear arms."
It does not say one has the "right to drag, tow, fly or ride in arms."
From their diaries, letters and meeting minutes, it is crystal clear they were referring to personal weapons. A crew-served weapon is not a personal weapon. A weapons platform is not a personal weapon.
Some might say those things did not exist and those men could not have envisioned them, but they did exist and they did envision them.
If you notice, it does not say Freedom of Speech Whilst Shouting at a Crowd or Freedom of the Printing Press or Freedom of the Printed Press.
Many of the men who wrote the Constitution were inventors or they were what today we would call "scientists."
They liked change, they welcomed change, and they were keenly aware that things would change over time. They knew Speech and Press would change forms over time, although they did not know precisely how, because they discussed it.
They were not as stupid as many people would have us believe.
Which brings us to this:
Quote:
Originally Posted by villageidiot1
No matter how many times I read the second amendment, I can't imagine the Founding Fathers intended that this amendment's intent was, "to protect individuals and their property FROM the government."
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When the body of the people form a militia, it isn't just to fight off foreign invaders roaming the streets or to protect against domestic violence.
It is also to defend against an abusive government or a government that engage in actions which are injurious to the people.
The men who wrote the Constitution did not live in a vacuum.
They were well aware of the abuses of government, having witnessed it and suffered it themselves.
That's why they rejected monarchy and established a republican form of government.
Since a unitary State would fail and be diametrically opposed to the security of the people, they rejected that, and since a confederation was/had failed, they rejected that and wisely adopted federalism.
They created a clever system of Checks & Balances so that neither the Executive, Legislative or Judicial branches could become all powerful.
Even with their clever system, those men
were well aware of the possibility that all 3 branches of government could engage in collusion to oppress the people.
The only way to defend against that is the body of the people forming militias to remove the government and restore order.
B-b-b-b-b-but the Civil War!
What militia commander would be stupid enough to stand on the battlefield and let the federal army slaughter them?
Somebody show me where modern war-fighting styles are used in the Civil War.
Oh, that's right, nobody can.
Had the South been aware of and used Asymmetrical Warfare they would have handily defeated the Union in short order.
The NVA and Viet Cong didn't have an air force, yet they managed to drive the US out of Vietnam.
Better type up a memo and send it to the various Afghan tribes. Maybe you can convince them to all gather in a single place at at once and let the US Air Force bomb them out of existence.
Quote:
Originally Posted by duckriverkid
"On every question of construction, let us carry ourselves back to the time when the Constitution was adopted, recollect the spirit manifested in the debates, and instead of trying what meaning may be squeezed out of the text, or invented against it, conform to the probable one in which it was passed"
Thomas Jefferson.
Seems the framers of the Constitution expected endless debates as to the meaning of the original writings.
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You misunderstand what Jefferson said. What he said was if you have a question, then read the diaries, letters and meeting minutes to see understand the proper interpretation.
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