Protecting the Second Amendment – Why all Americans Should Be Concerned

[RichL025]

Originally Posted by Box

The narrative never really fits - mass murders only happen in the USA and it is only done with semi-automatic assault weapons.
...except for when it isnt

Do you know what a straw man argument is? While I'm sure there are many liberals out there saying stupid things, most of the criticism I hear in the news is that the US is the only place where mass shootings happen regularly.

No one (making an allowance for the truly stupid) is saying that they never happen in other countries.

Originally Posted by Box

Thomas Hamilton killed 17 in the UK in 1996 - a place that dont allow the peasants to own guns

Wrong. The UK's stringent laws on pistol ownership (de facto ban) did not take effect until 1997

Originally Posted by Box

But that isn't the truth that Americas governing class and mobster media elites want you to know.... ...
It isnt poor reporting, or politicians and activists mis-speaking - it is people simply telling lies about the truth to avoid the root problem and pursue an agenda.

Which is why I am pointing out these gross errors to you.

[Box]

For the record...

Everything I post is firmly rooted in the questionable value of straw man arguments.
I buy my bandwagon tickets in bulk.
My criticism of FLEA's has no loyal partisan motivation - I follow the left for my cues on distrust of "the man"
I dont deal in decent evidence - I prefer indecent evidence since it is more fun and gets better ratings.
I place the same value on statistical validity as my left-leaning counterparts of equal or lesser value.
Making any allowance for the truly stupid is EXACTLY the same as saying "never"
The UK doesn't allow civilians free ownership of guns - and they celebrate their royalty - anyone that disagrees with that is a denier
...plus, they had a cab driver kill 12 people armed with a shotgun and a .22 rifle in 2010
I dont pay attention to gross errors nor do I keep track of net errors.
I never, EVER resort to hyperbole when making a point.



Semantics and facts are negotiable when discussing socially sensitive topics across the internet...

[sinjefe]

Originally Posted by RichL025

Do you know what a straw man argument is? While I'm sure there are many liberals out there saying stupid things, most of the criticism I hear in the news is that the US is the only place where mass shootings happen regularly.

No one (making an allowance for the truly stupid) is saying that they never happen in other countries.



Wrong. The UK's stringent laws on pistol ownership (de facto ban) did not take effect until 1997



Which is why I am pointing out these gross errors to you.

Lighten up Francis. If you have been on this board long enough you should know that Box speaks tongue in cheek.

[RichL025]

Originally Posted by Box

For the record...

Everything I post is firmly rooted in the questionable value of straw man arguments.
I buy my bandwagon tickets in bulk.
My criticism of FLEA's has no loyal partisan motivation - I follow the left for my cues on distrust of "the man"
I dont deal in decent evidence - I prefer indecent evidence since it is more fun and gets better ratings.
I place the same value on statistical validity as my left-leaning counterparts of equal or lesser value.
Making any allowance for the truly stupid is EXACTLY the same as saying "never"
The UK doesn't allow civilians free ownership of guns - and they celebrate their royalty - anyone that disagrees with that is a denier
...plus, they had a cab driver kill 12 people armed with a shotgun and a .22 rifle in 2010
I dont pay attention to gross errors nor do I keep track of net errors.
I never, EVER resort to hyperbole when making a point.



Semantics and facts are negotiable when discussing socially sensitive topics across the internet...

Well-played, sir, well-played

[RichL025]

Originally Posted by sinjefe

Take it easy Francis. If you have been on this board long enough you should know that Box speaks tongue in cheek.

And DON'T call me Francis....

[tonyz]

The Baltimore effect: What gun-grabbers don’t want to debate
What creates the most dangerous cities in the country? Hint: It isn’t allowing guns.
Posted February 22, 2018
by Daniel Horowitz
Conservative Review

Substance is not the strong suit of the Left. Leftists tend to isolate one component of a policy issue, ignore the broader context, history, and consequences of the larger issue, and use and abuse a national tragedy to exploit their agenda. Using political human shields is the cherry on top. This is why they never want to discuss the broader history of gun violence and gun laws in America but instead keep a myopic focus on school shootings while hiding behind the victims.

Baltimore, my hometown, is a living repudiation of the essence of the gun-grabbing premise. Baltimore is now considered the most dangerous city in the country. And it’s spilling over to the suburbs. In my neighborhood, people are too scared to walk outside at night to throw out the trash because of the rampant burglaries, muggings, and carjackings. And no, they are not allowed to carry a gun, which is part of the problem.

Here are the three points the Left wants to ignore that broadly explain the Baltimore effect.

Violent crime and murder have dropped precipitously, almost miraculously, since 1993. This is probably the only positive social trend we’ve enjoyed in recent years. This period coincided directly with the trend of loosening of gun laws in most states, particularly right-to-carry laws. In 1993, less than 30 percent of Americans lived in right-to-carry states; now that number has grown to 70 percent. There are now 16.3 million people who hold concealed carry permits, a 256 percent increase since 2007. Violent crime got cut in half while the number of guns owned has nearly doubled since the early ’90s. While this doesn’t categorically prove that more guns equal less crime, it certainly refutes the thesis of the Left that more gun control is the answer.

Over the past few years, after two decades of a steady decline in murder, violent crime has risen in some major liberal cities directly after they enacted stricter licensing and background checks, “assault weapons” bans, and magazine capacity limitations. Meanwhile, most other jurisdictions continue to experience a drop in crime. Yes, some of the rise in certain cities is the Ferguson effect of handcuffing the police and more lenient sentencing (which in itself is a refutation of other liberal policies they don’t want to discuss), but once again it’s hard to demonstrate a gun emergency when it is the places with the strictest laws that not only have more shootings but are bucking the two-decade trajectory of plummeting crime rates across the nation.

While mass shootings have been on the rise, they are quite a recent phenomenon and did not begin anywhere near the timing of loosening of gun laws the way blue city crime increasedimmediately after enactment of gun control laws.

Which brings me back to Baltimore. Not only is concealed carry prohibited in Maryland (except for rare exceptions) as of October 1, 2013, anyone desiring to even purchase a handgun must obtain a handgun qualification license (HQL). This entails paying several hundred dollars for four hours of instruction, getting fingerprinted, and being monitored like a criminal by the state police. Only after that process does one enjoy the privilege of waiting potentially weeks to hear back from the police to even embark on purchasing a firearm for home defense. In addition, following Sandy Hook, Maryland enacted a ban on magazines that hold more than 10 rounds and banned the sale of 45 commonly owned semi-automatic rifles that have been used in some of these mass shootings.

The results are clear as day. Crime is way up. And stripped of the right to carry a weapon, the citizens around Baltimore are defenseless. After all, the criminals aren’t exactly concerned with anti-carry laws, much as they don’t obey gun-free zones on their way to shooting someone.

The reality is that liberals don’t care about murder and shootings when it doesn’t promote their agenda, which is why they never want to talk about Baltimore.

Liberals cannot answer this incontrovertible refutation to their thesis that controlling guns controls crime, so they seek to exclude any debate on the topic and focus solely on school shootings. Rather than focus on the cultural source of the problem and local school security precautions, they seek to make it a federal public policy issue about guns. But no serious person, even one who subscribes to the liberal view on guns, can contend that the rights-gutting remedies they are proposing will stop any of this. Banning bump stocks and putting more bureaucracy into background checks will not stop shootings.

Remember, Maryland requires a full license, not just a background check, just to own a gun in one’s home and not carry it. Yet gun violence in Maryland is soaring. The reality is that incontrovertible evidence demonstrates that more gun laws only serve to deter the very law-abiding citizens who could stop evil people, who will obtain guns anyway. There is a good case to be made that the rising crime stems from the Ferguson and Freddie Gray effects. But one cannot credibly assert that gun laws are the answer, given the data.

Unfortunately, Democrats and the media have the ability to focus national attention on whatever they desire because Republicans are pathetic and have no counter-narrative. They refuse to raise the issue of Democrats letting gun felons out of jail (and even agree with them on that), loosening sentencing, handcuffing the police, sanctuary cities, MS-13 gangs, and the drug crisis resulting from open borders. The criminal alien issue is 100 percent political and the result of bad public policy, not culture, because criminal aliens can and should be deported anyway. Yet Republicans agree with Democrats on the fundamentals of the issue and allow them to chain the national debate exclusively to school shootings and AR-15s.

Even as it relates to domestic crime, Republicans refuse to put Democrats on defense for the broader issue. Even with the devastation of school shootings over the past few years, the rash of blue city murders and handguns and knives are a much bigger issue than school shooters and semi-auto rifles on a national scale. Yes, it is a great national horror when we see 17 people killed in a school. But shouldn’t there at least be some focus when the same number of people are killed in a few days in places like Baltimore and Chicago – partly by draconian gun laws?

In reality, even with the rise in school shootings, 374 people were killed in 2016 by criminals wielding rifles, 116 of whom were killed in mass shooting events. Yet almost 11,000 others were killed in our streets by gun violence, mainly by handguns and most prominently in jurisdictions with tough gun laws. Moreover, five times as many people were killed by knives than by rifles in 2016. And while our political elites, the same folks peddling the gun control agenda, obsesses over every other measure of racial disparity, they don’t want to discuss the fact that 7,881 black people were victims of homicides in 2016. In other words, 1,305 more black people were killed than white people in 2016. That is simply an astounding statistic given that black people compose just 13 percent of the population. Some of this is due to culture, some of it is due to liberal crime laws, but none of it can be pinned on lack of background checks for purchasing guns. You need to go through a two-month licensing process just to own a gun in one’s home in Maryland, yet Baltimore is the king of homicide.

<snip> Complete article at link below:

https://www.conservativereview.com/a...t-want-debate/

[Badger52]

Thanks for that.

Originally Posted by tonyz

The reality is that liberals don’t care about murder and shootings when it doesn’t promote their agenda, which is why they never want to talk about Baltimore.

Exactly what I mentioned in the Parkland, FL thread - they don't want the issue to go away - it's necessary to their goals. An in-ground pool's volume in children's blood is what they need periodically; you can tell because they spend so much time projecting that characteristic onto others.

Originally Posted by also from tonyz's article

A sane Republican Party would make a push against gangs, sanctuary cities, amnesty, and drug smugglers, while simultaneously eliminating gun-free zones and barriers to concealed carry.

Since Bush-I signed the gun-free zone legislation many cities saw their homicide trend go the wrong direction. This article takes a look at Chicago and makes a pretty good case that - shock - looking at the bigger picture is necessary to an understanding of the scope of the problem. In places like Chicago, shootings aren't down; homicide stats go down to a large extent because of the sheer number of Level-I trauma centers available. First-responders & ER staff changing the numbers, like introducing Medevac & FST's to the battlespace. Yet Tiny Dancer would have you believe one small aspect of his policies is responsible for any positive trend, and the NRA & Deplorables are responsible for the opposite (so far nearly 70 year-to-date). You will not get a rational response from someone who wasn't rationally moved to their position in the first place. Cui bono?

[tonyz]

The ‘Nice Girl’ Who Saved the Second Amendment
By JOHN J. MILLER
March 29, 2018 10:34 AM
National Review

For Heller, thank the scholarship of Joyce Lee Malcolm

Arlington, Va.– In the hours after February’s school massacre in Parkland, Fla., Joyce Lee Malcolm watched the response with growing annoyance:

“Everybody seemed to leap upon it, looking for a political benefit, rather than allowing for a cooling-off period.” As a historian, Malcolm prefers to take the long view. As a leading scholar of the Second Amendment, however, she is also expected to have snap opinions on gun rights, and in fact she often has engaged in the news-driven debates about violence and firearms. “Something deep inside of me says that people never should be victims,” she says. “And they never should be put in the position of being disarmed by their government.”

Malcolm looks nothing like a hardened veteran of the gun-control wars. Small, slender, and bookish, she’s a wisp of a woman who enjoys plunging into archives and sitting through panel discussions at academic conferences. Her favorite topic is 17th- and 18th-century Anglo-American history, from the causes of the English Civil War to the meaning of the American Revolution. Her latest book, due in May, is The Tragedy of Benedict Arnold, a biography of the infamous general. She doesn’t belong to the National Rifle Association, nor does she hunt. She admits to owning an old shotgun, but she’s unsure about the make or model. “I’ve taken it out a couple of times, but the clay targets fall safely to earth,” she says in an interview at George Mason University’s Antonin Scalia Law School in Virginia, where she’s a professor who teaches courses on constitutional history as well as on war and law.

She is also the lady who saved the Second Amendment — a scholar whose work helped make possible the Supreme Court’s landmark Heller decision, which in 2008 recognized an individual right to possess a firearm. “People used to ask, ‘How did a nice girl like you get into a subject like this?’” she says. “I’m not asked that anymore.” She smiles, a little mischievously. “Maybe they don’t think I’m a nice girl anymore.”

Back when Malcolm was a girl, she lived in Utica, N.Y. A state scholarship sent her to Barnard, the women’s college tied to Columbia University, where she majored in history. “It was a process of elimination,” she says. “I took calculus and chemistry, but history seemed the least narrow. You could study the history of math or the history of science. It had the widest scope.” She got married as an undergraduate — “people did that in those days” — and by the time she was 23, she was both a college graduate and a mom.

Malcolm wanted to continue her education. Living outside Boston, she applied to graduate school at Brandeis University, thinking that she might attend part-time. Administrators, however, talked her into the normal, full-time option. So she launched into a Ph.D. program, focusing on England in the early modern era. “I really liked the period,” she says. “It was wonderfully complex, with divisions between the rights of the state and the rights of individuals.” For her dissertation, she moved to Oxford and Cambridge, with children in tow. Now separated from her husband, she was a single mother. “It took some balancing. I’m not sure I was the best parent I could have been, but my kids grew up seeing what you can do when you put your mind to working.” (One of them is Mark Johnson, a Pulitzer Prize–winning health and science journalist at the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.) In Britain, she met a Scotsman who became her second husband. She brought him back to the United States and took his surname.

Malcolm’s doctoral dissertation focused on King Charles I and the problem of loyalty in the 1640s, and much of her scholarship has flowed from this initial work. The Royal Historical Society published her first book, and she edited a pair of volumes for the Liberty Fund, totaling more than 1,000 pages, on political tracts in 17th-century England. As she researched and wrote on the period, she noticed something peculiar. “During the English Civil War, the king would summon the local militia to turn out with their best weapons,” she says. “Then he would relieve them of their best weapons. He confiscated them. Obviously, he didn’t trust his subjects.”

At a time when armies were marching around England, ordinary people became anxious about surrendering guns. Then, in 1689, the English Bill of Rights responded by granting Protestants the right to “have Arms for their Defence.” Malcolm wasn’t the first person to notice this, of course, but as an American who had studied political loyalty in England, she approached the topic from a fresh angle. “The English felt a need to put this in writing because the king had been disarming his political opponents,” she says. “This is the origin of our Second Amendment. It’s an individual right.”

As she researched, Malcolm taught at several schools and worked for the National Park Service. In 1988, she took a post near Boston, at Bentley College, a school best known for business education (and now called Bentley University). Fellowships allowed her to pursue her interest in how the right to bear arms migrated across the ocean and took root in colonial America. “The subject hadn’t been done from the English side because it’s an American question, and American constitutional scholars didn’t know the English material very well,” she says. Some Americans even resisted looking to English sources because they wanted to stress their country’s uniqueness. Moreover, law-school textbooks and courses skimmed over the Second Amendment. “The subject was poorly covered.”

Her research led to a groundbreaking book on the history of gun rights, To Keep and Bear Arms. Before it went to print, however, she faced something she had not expected: political resistance. “I had a hard time finding a publisher,” she says. After several years in limbo, To Keep and Bear Arms came out in 1994, from Harvard University Press — an excellent result for any scholar in the peer-reviewed world of publish-or-perish professionalism. “The problem was that I had come up with an answer that a lot of people didn’t like.”

The Second Amendment, she insisted, recognizes an individual right to gun ownership as an essential feature of limited government. In her book’s preface, she called this the “least understood of those liberties secured by Englishmen and bequeathed to their American colonists.” Confusion reigned: “The language of the Second Amendment, considered perfectly clear by the framers and their contemporaries, is no longer clear.” The right to keep and bear arms, Malcolm warned, “is a right in decline.”

She aimed to revive it at a time when governments at all levels imposed more restrictions on gun ownership than they do today. Many legal scholars claimed that the Second Amendment granted a collective right for states to have militias but not the individual right of citizens to own firearms. With To Keep and Bear Arms, which received favorable reviews and went through several printings, Malcolm joined a small but increasingly influential group of academics with different ideas. Her allies included Robert J. Cottrol, of George Washington University, and Glenn Reynolds, of the University of Tennessee (and best known for his Instapundit website). “I was so naïve,” she says. “I thought the idea of research was that you find information and people say, ‘Good! Now we know the answer!’”

She learned the truth in 1995, when House Republicans invited her to testify before a subcommittee on crime. The subcommittee’s ranking member was Representative Charles Schumer, Democrat of New York (and today’s Senate minority leader). In his opening remarks, Schumer scoffed at Malcolm and other witnesses. “The intellectual content of this hearing is so far off the edge that we ought to declare this an official meeting of the Flat Earth Society,” he said. “Because the pro-gun arguments we will hear today are as flaky as the arguments of the tiny few who still insist that the Earth is flat.”

Malcolm still bristles at those words. “I was a Democrat at the time,” she says. “I was raised a Democrat. I was just there to tell them what I had found out. It wasn’t a political issue for me. But the Democrats were nasty. Schumer was nasty.” After the hearing, Malcolm came to a realization: “For some people, opposition to individual gun rights is an article of faith, and they don’t care about the historical evidence.” Ever since, she has received regular reminders of this fact.

<snip>

Complete article at link below:

https://www.nationalreview.com/magaz...ond-amendment/

[RichL025]

Nice article, thanks for posting.

I recommend to everyone to click on the link & read the full article!

RL

[Badger52]

Originally Posted by tonyz

“For some people, opposition to individual gun rights is an article of faith, and they don’t care about the historical evidence.”

If one takes nothing else, take that.

I recently went through a boatload (admittedly not all) of the email train post-Newton that Bloomberg's GC hatchet-man was on, which had been released pursuant to an information request under NY law. (Included are names from Hollywood they had in a database as supporting their efforts.)

EXSUM: They do not care about childrens' lives, other than as useful props. They do not care about mental health issues other than characterizing individual citizens or other groups of peasants as "nuts" (usually with a perjorative in front of that word). They do not care about anything but disarming their subjects. They have game plans they can haul off the shelf, whether in the wake of a tragedy, or a manufactured one (e.g., Fast & Furious). They will not stop.

[tonyz]

Originally Posted by Badger52

EXSUM: They do not care about childrens' lives, other than as useful props. They do not care about mental health issues other than characterizing individual citizens or other groups of peasants as "nuts" (usually with a perjorative in front of that word). They do not care about anything but disarming their subjects. They have game plans they can haul off the shelf, whether in the wake of a tragedy, or a manufactured one (e.g., Fast & Furious). They will not stop.

Concur. An armed citizenry cannot be easily subjugated - it is the ultimate check on an oppressive government. Yes, government tyranny can happen and the USA is not somehow magically immune. The Founders knew this and provided accordingly.

[bblhead672]

Originally Posted by tonyz

Complete article at link below:

https://www.nationalreview.com/magaz...ond-amendment/

Thank you. Disseminating to other forums.

[Ret10Echo]

I want to preface this by stating that I realize that location in which I live has come to pass due to work availability and life circumstances. Fortunately I live in a country that (for now) allows me to relocate to a place that has a belief system in place more aligned with my own.

So, picture this scenario.

Young student gleefully turns 18 and decides it is time to register to vote. Only challenge is that in order to do so, they must take a 4 hour civics class at a cost of between $65 and $125 and certify that they are able to properly operate an electronic voting machine.

Once successfully completing the civics class, our intrepid student must submit to electronic fingerprints at a cost of $67

Having completed these two essential steps, now the student is able to go online to a state operated website and enter in the verification codes for the class and the fingerprints, complete a series of questions attesting to their past actions and demographics and submit those to the benevolent state....including a $50 "fee" for the privilege.

Now, with somewhere between $182 and $242 spent, our student awaits electronic notification of the successful processing...or perhaps the complete forfeiture of fees and rejection before receiving their voter card in the mail from the state.
As each polling period comes around, our student must present their voter card along with photo identification in order to exercise their Constitutional RIGHT to vote.

What would liberal democrats think of such a process?

The screeching of "Jim Crow laws" impeding the rights of the poor, young, and elderly to exercise their Constitutional right to participate in our system of government.

Yet when this exact process exists to deny and discourage legal gun ownership within a state, those same liberal democrats remain silent. In fact those who represent the poor and underprivileged within the state would be shrilling from the highest tower, decrying this abomination if it were placed upon any OTHER right granted in the U.S. Constitution BUT the Second Amendment.

But it wouldn't fit their agenda.

It's not about rights. It's about removing the threat of resistance to a system of government that has forgotten where it came from and whom it serves.

It's about a voter base that has become nothing more than an echo chamber to party apparatchik as they build their own cages like the ignorant drones that they are.


“Besides the advantage of being armed, which the Americans possess over the people of almost every other nation, the existence of subordinate governments, to which the people are attached, and by which the militia officers are appointed, forms a barrier against the enterprises of ambition, more insurmountable than any which a simple government of any form can admit of. Notwithstanding the military establishments in the several kingdoms of Europe, which are carried as far as the public resources will bear, the governments are afraid to trust the people with arms.”

James Madison

[Ret10Echo]

"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."


In the first place, it is important to pay attention to the structure of the statement and the use of punctuation in it's forming. That matters. But what does this mean to us, and what did it mean to them? A really good place to look would be in contemporary writings of the time where the authors of the Constitution were working very hard to convince the citizenry of the new nation that a Constitution was essential element to their collective future and that the establishment of a central, federal government was one of the few ways in which future security could be attained. Security in this respect was in having a method of holding the union together without the states becoming fragmented or being overtaken by some external force (British or otherwise).

As can be expected in this period there was a great deal of hesitancy by the population in creating a national government, or at least a national government that had any power or strength. Having just come from a war to detach themselves from a tyrannical government it is completely understandable that this would be the prevailing opinion. Why, after throwing off the yoke of England and the king would they want to put in place another government that could do the exact same thing?
Beyond the legislative reasons to not want a central government (taxation, land management trade tariffs...etc...) having an ARMED central government was even more concerning. In 1789 the standing Army in the United States consisted of one Regiment. Estimate that to be around 700 Men. There was no Navy at this point. That was IT, 700 men to defend the nation. The concept of the time was that the individual state militias would provide the forces necessary to defend the country, or at least defend their state (there was little motivation at this point to defend some other state).

So what guarantees would be put in place to ensure this new federal system of government did not come to oppress the people of the individual states? The simple answer is “the militia” but let's really look at the Constitutional text. It does not say “the right of the state to have an armed militia” (which people want to read it to so state). It is saying that there must be a militia (for security) and that militia is possible because INDIVIDUAL CITIZENS are armed.

Or as James Madison wrote: “The only refuge left for those who prophesy the downfall of the State governments is the visionary supposition that the federal government may previously accumulate a military force for the projects of ambition.”

So what of those contemporary writings to get to this conclusion where the PEOPLE would be able to ensure a federal government military would not usurp their rights..

Federalist #46....


First off, if you have never read the Federalist Papers there is now way for you to clearly understand the framers' position and the sense of the public during this period of our history. It's pretty amazing work composed by some incredibly intelligent men (Alexander Hamilton, James Madison and John Jay). I suggest before arguing about what the Constitution means on ANY topic, that you educate yourself. It's worth the effort.

Federalist 46 was written by James Madison (the previous quote being in 46)

So how is this argument presented to the people that the federal government military would not pose a threat to the State governments and citizens?

Madison states: Let a regular army, fully equal to the resources of the country, be formed; and let it be entirely at the devotion of the federal government; still it would not be going too far to say, that the State governments, with the people on their side, would be able to repel the danger.

State government with the PEOPLE on their side would be able to repel the danger. This is saying that the people of the STATE would be able to fight off and defeat the standing army.

Seriously? (Think about that in today's United States.....)

But what of the term used here “militia”? Well, this is another area where there must be some historical context understood. First, there is no such thing as our modern “National Guard” in existence at this time. The Guard may trace their lineage back to some point where a militia company or regiment was formed, but it was a very different thing. The militias within the states were formed through various laws passed by federal government authorizing militias and state governments as well.

SECOND CONGRESS
STATUTE I. May 2, 1792. CHAP. XXVIII.-An Act to provide for calling forth the Militia to execute the laws of the Union, suppress insurrections and repel invasions.

Many of these early attempts to form militias would fade or fall into disuse requiring new legislation to once again bring forward the need of the armed citizenry and formation of militia units within the respective states.

Looking back to the War of 1812, the Militia Act of January 7, 1812 is an excellent example. The Act required all able bodied white males between the ages of 18 to 45 to be members of the militia (there also were included a list of exclusion categories for militia membership). The Act also directed that the officers and non-commissioned officers of the militia companies ARM THEMSELVES. The state did not provide arms. In fact failure to comply with the act would result in the violators to be fined for NOT being armed.

“who shall not within three months after the passage of this act; and each commissioned officer who may be hereafter appointed under this act, who shall not within three months after such appointment, arm, accoutre and provide himself as directed by the act”


So why would there be an expectation that these men would be able to arm themselves? Even in this early period it was more common and expected.

Madison speaks directly of this in Federalist #46 where it is an ADVANTAGE that Americans possess arms.


“Besides the advantage of being armed, which the Americans possess over the people of almost every other nation, the existence of subordinate governments, to which the people are attached, and by which the militia officers are appointed, forms a barrier against the enterprises of ambition, more insurmountable than any which a simple government of any form can admit of. Notwithstanding the military establishments in the several kingdoms of Europe, which are carried as far as the public resources will bear, the governments are afraid to trust the people with arms.”

AFRAID TO TRUST THE PEOPLE WITH ARMS

Yes, Madison is demonstrating that the military of the European nations are able to drain the resources from the people as much as they want, because the people lack the ability to resist. There is no way to stop a tyrant from doing whatever they want because the people are unable to come against the military that is controlled by the government. Zero threat. The citizens become sheep.

Madison is not talking about only the military having arms or only the “militias” having arms. Madison is also fairly clear that the people of the State be armed. And not only that the people of the State to BE armed, but that those arms carried by the citizens (who form the militia) are on par with the arms carried by the army. They are not to have less capability...they are intended to have equal capability. Being disarmed is not seen as a way to become more secure ( as is glorified today). It was a fact that demonstrated how America was different from and exemplary to other nations and governments. The system by which the people lived under would not be one that was forced upon them, but would be one that was accepted through the assurances of arms, not the promises of elected officials that might turn on them.

So in all this, I continue to be amazed at how well thought out and relevant the words in the Constitution are. Not just the words themselves but the intent of those words. We as Americans miss the point due to our increasing dependence upon the government and the relative peace in which our society lives. We also seem to be infatuated by other societies and nations. Well, they are not the United States, do not have our heritage and were not formed from the same circumstances so I do not hold them in any regard.

Interesting that the majority of our society struggles against the first two amendments of the Constitution. This is not accidental. The establishment clause brings forth those areas that were most egregiously violated in the period when written...and continue to be the most contentious within our society today. The Second amendment is meant to provide the means to ensure the First is not violated or taken away.

My personal opinion is that the current challenges we have in this country today have more to do with our misinterpretation of the First resulting in demands to violate the Second.

[Team Sergeant]

There’s no doubt in my mind that the left-wing/progressives/socialists “leaders” know exactly what the second amendment says and what it means. They’re not even contesting that anymore. What they are doing is through “social” media propaganda is leading the low-IQ liberal sheeple to their interpretation of how the second amendment should viewed by the unwashed socialist masses.

I’ve also no doubts as to their end game, to rule……

Just like Dictator Xi, which now will be china’s leader/dictator for life. (And there’s not a chinaman out there that can stop him.)

They’re not even putting lipstick on the pig anymore, China is a communist dictatorship, no different then north korea.

But before you can rule, you must disarm the people. That’s not going too well for the communist wannabes.

And remember, a bolt gun, three rounds and a plan can change history………..





China's parliament re-elects Xi Jinping as president
Reuters Staff
BEIJING (Reuters) - China’s largely rubber-stamp parliament on Saturday unanimously re-elected Xi Jinping as the country’s president.
he vote was witnessed by journalists inside central Beijing’s Great Hall of the People.
The legislature is packed with delegates loyal to the ruling Communist Party meaning Xi’s re-election was never in doubt. On Sunday parliament voted to amend the constitution to remove presidential term limits, meaning Xi can stay indefinitely.


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