From: Michael M. Butler (butler@comp-lib.org)
Date: Wed Oct 11 2000 - 00:15:46 MDT
Hunting is not now and never has been the issue.
If the framers of the Constitution meant one thing when they said "the
people" in the 2nd Amendment, and another thing when they said "the
people" everywhere else, they were on crack.
And I don't think they were. The doctrine of selective incorporation was
a political maneuver by the Supremes. Regardless of your mindreading
claims re the NRA, whom I will neither defend nor attack, Emerson or
another couple of cases currently working will probably make it to the
Supreme Court some time in the next two years; we'll see what they say,
or if they deny cert., and we'll see what happens after that.
Joe Dees wrote:
> >
> The 2nd amendment was meant to keep 'well-regulated militias' armed, to protect the states charged with regulating them against the encroachment of federal power, a protection that was proven useless by the Civil war.
Mr. Dees, kindly show me where the word "State" appears in the Second
Amendment. Or show me where the term "well regulated" explicitly says
where the "regulation" comes from. Or show me that the writings of the
time said "Militia[s] regulated by the State[s]" anywhere in the
Federalist or Anti-Federalist Papers. It's an explanatory clause, not a
restrictive one. Even Laurence Tribe, the noted Constitutional scholar,
now says something like "the prevailing [sic] opinion that the right to
bear arms is only a collective right 'may have been simplistic.'" Gee,
no shit.
> >Stupid laws like the "assault weapon" ban are just incremental gun
> >prohibition - especially if the definition of "assault weapon" continues to
> >mutate, like in California.
> >
> Actually, what mutated were the guns. The manufacturers produced cosmetically altered copycat versions specifically designed to circumvent the ban while retaining the desired rapid-fire characteristics, and the law was amended to cover them.
Partly true; in some cases they just changed the names stamped or forged
into the receivers. But in fact, the criteria were and are still stupid.
I believe the Second Amendment specifically protects military pattern
weapons in the hands of the same "the people" that appears everywhere
else in the Constitution, distinct from "the States" clearly marked out
elsewhere, as indicated in the actual "hot potato" _Miller_ Supreme
Court case that HCI and others love to misinterpret. Have you read that,
by the way?
> I do not subscribe to the slippery slope domino theory, and would not support such action. I do believe that we should all be willing to take responsible measures to keep military-style semiautomatic rifles from flooding the civilian market, while preserving the right of sane and law-abiding adults to purchase shotguns, long guns designed for hunting, and handguns designed for home protection.
Very big of you. But handguns are not designed for home protection, they
are designed to be compact and easily portable. So I expect you'll be
banning them any day now, right?
Let me be clear: I don't think crazies or bad people should have an easy
time hurting others.
I am also aware that it's a common human practice to marginalize people
by calling them crazy and/or bad. I believe there were lives and
property saved by the presence of obvious military pattern weapons in
the hands of the law-abiding in the distant and recent past, and I see
no reason to believe that the near future will be better served by their
absence.
Call me crazy. :)
MMB
"Absolute truth? What's that?"
"It's a five-to-four decision of the Supreme Court."
--Dan O'Neil
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