wowbagger's Journal: 2nd Amendement: it means what it says, and it applies to the states too

In all the typical /. foo-foo-rah over Bilski, they have completely ignored the fact that the Supreme Court also ruled in the McDonald vs. Chicago issue, and have ruled that, curiously enough, the Second Amendment also applies to the states and the local governments, and that amazingly enough, "The Rights Of the People to Keep and Bear Arms Shall Not Be Infringed" - not by the Feds, not by the States, not by the local governments.

Expect many liberals to explode.

Expect many Fourth Of July celebrations!

I'm a liberal

[rthille]

And this seems like a no brainer...

But why are assault rifle bans legal?

What constitutes "Arms"? RPG's ok? Or do we have to stick with muzzle loaders, like they had at the time of the drafting of the Constitution?

Re:

[wowbagger]

"But why are assault rifle bans legal?"

Who says they should be legal? First of all, define, in rigorous terms, what an "assault rifle" is, what makes an "assault rifle" different from any other rifle, why those differences should matter, and how they matter in reference to the role of a private citizen's possession of same with respect to prevention of a tyrannical government.

Having done that, then reconsider the question asked.

"What constitutes "Arms"? RPG's ok? Or do we have to stick with muzzle loaders,

Re:

[644bd346996]

The second amendment only covers ownership and carrying of weapons, not the manufacture or sale of weapons.

Expect many liberals to explode.

[Captain Splendid]

Meh, seems the lefty blogs have enough on their plate - no explosions. I'll keep looking.

You dropped some words

[damn_registrars]

According to the US House of Representatives [house.gov], the text of the second amendment is:

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

Which is far more ambiguous than you asserted in your journal entry. For one, the commas within the statement seem to be separating ideas. Hence are the Arms reserved for service in a Militia? Do "the people" count if they are not in a "well regulated Militia"? Is "the right of the people to keep and bear Arms" important beyond the necessity of "a free State"?

For that matter, at that point the only "people" who could vote were (male) land owners - so is this right afforded to you if you don't own land? What if your property is mortgaged?

In other words, the Second Amendment is not that clear. And I haven't even gotten into the "Arms" part of it...

But nonetheless each amendment to the constitution is supposed to on its own constitute an idea. You posted only half of the amendment, which is not a fair representation of the idea contained within the amendment. Really, an amendment on its own should be used in its entirety or not at all.

Re:

[wowbagger]

First of all, if you want to actually read the Constitution, you will see that it very clearly defines what "the militia" meant at that time. Hint: it did NOT mean the military.

TITLE 10 > Subtitle A > PART I > CHAPTER 13 > 311 311. Militia: composition and classes

(a) The militia of the United States consists of all able-bodied males at least 17 years of age and, except as provided in section 313 of title 32, under 45 years of age who are, or who have made a declaration of intention to become,

Re:

[damn_registrars]

So if you are going to look at the first part of the Second Amendment, and try to use that to justify restricting the ownership of arms to "the military" in some form, you FAIL at reading the Constitution in its entirety.

You're jumping the gun here, quite literally. My point is that if someone wants to use a fraction of the 2nd amendment to justify unlimited ownership of whatever weapons they want, they should pay attention to the full text of the same first.

After all, the part of the same that you have again skipped over - "security of a free state" - is also there. I can honestly say that the guns I own have nothing to do with the security of any free state. And for that matter I have never met anyone who owned guns

Re:

[OverlordQ]

I think Penn & Teller put it best [youtube.com].

Hmmmm, no front page references

[wowbagger]

While I was under no illusions my post would make it to the front page, I do find it interesting that NOTHING about this ruling has made it to the front page, nor even Firehose (at least in my infrequent checks thereof).

Of course, it could be that people like me already know what the slashbot zeitgeist is, and don't bother to submit it.

Don't get yourself all worked up

[damn_registrars]

While I was under no illusions my post would make it to the front page, I do find it interesting that NOTHING about this ruling has made it to the front page

The submission system is terribly and stupendously broken. A lot of good stuff never makes it there because the subsmission system is such an utter piece of catastrophic fail. There is no vast left wing conspiracy at work, I can assure you (just take a look at the politics of the most vocal slashdot programmer if you don't believe me).

I'm not sure that there is any way to submit stories anymore short of emailing them directly to your favorite slashdot editor.

nor even Firehose

I don't know what illusion would cause you