Time to End Gun Control, Part 2--Can the States Negate A Constitutional Right?

There is big news this evening from the blogosphere. I'm sure that anyone reading this will be astounded to know that the Bill of Rights affirms and protects no individual rights! Well, at least that is the viewpoint of one blogger I read. The problem is that this point of view is not so unusual. In many sectors of our society today, it is THE politically correct point of view, at least as it applies to the 2nd amendment to the Constitution. I have been informed that there are Harvard Law professors who advocate the very same viewpoint.

Here is the way the argument goes. The 2nd amendment to the U.S. Constitution does only one thing and one thing alone--establish a militia. There is no guarantee whatsoever of an individual's right to keep and bear arms, period...or so the argument goes. Are you with me so far? In the BILL OF RIGHTS, which are designed to delineate the individual rights of citizens in this country, I am not guaranteed the right to keep and bear arms. So, I am afforded the right to what, exactly? A militia? How is that an individual right?

No matter. Stay with me here. Remember that one has to engage in suspension of disbelief in order to understand this horrid fiction.

The argument further maintains that the individual States have the power to regulate, limit, and restrict whatever supposed rights that are guaranteed in the BILL OF RIGHTS. In other words, the States can override and negate Constitutionally protected rights.

Remember, I never said this argument was rational....

This, according to those who advocate this point of view, can mean that any State can enact any law it chooses to take away the supposed right of any citizen to own firearms. After all, since the Bill of Rights do not protect any individual rights, the States are free to pass whatever laws they wish, including confiscation of firearms. In fact, the particular blogger I mentioned earlier stated that the Bill of Rights applies to the Federal government only and NOT to the individual States. HUH? Since all U.S. citizens live in one State or another, then why have a U.S. Constitution at all if it has no authority?

Now it's my turn.

Let's take this argument and apply it to some other rights as delineated in the Constitution. Can your State shut down a newspaper because it consistently prints editorials that are in opposition to the State Government? What do you think would happen if it attempted to do so? This is not rocket science here. We all know full well what would happen, and we all know the legal argument that would ensue in support of that newspaper, i.e., that the U.S. Constitution guarantees the protection of the freedom of the press, AS STATED CLEARLY IN THE 1st AMENDMENT IN THE BILL OF RIGHTS! And the anti-gun bigots would be the very first in line raising howls of protests, citing the 1st amendment to the Constitution as their justification. It is amazing as to how this all changes by the time we get to the 2nd amendment in the Bill of Rights! The States must abide by the principles of the 1st amendment, but not the 2nd?

Methinks that someone has taken leave of their brain cells!

Here's another example. Can your State decide that it wishes to return to segregation? Why not? By what legal standard can we make the claim that a State does NOT have this power? The answer is Constitutional law. The States do not have the power to enact or enforce laws that stand in opposition to the principles of the U. S. Constitution.

I am still waiting for these self-proclaimed experts in Constitutional law to apply the same standard to the 1st amendment that they apply to the 2nd amendment. Undoubtedly, I am in for a very long wait.

The 2nd amendment to the U.S. Constitution, contained in a section known as the BILL OF RIGHTS, is a two-fold statement--one, that a militia is necessary for the defense of life and property, and two, that the right of the people, the individual citizens, to keep and bear arms shall not be abridged. From a historical perspective, the line of reasoning was that since a militia was needed to be ready at a moment's notice to defend this Republic, the right of the citizens to own and use guns would not be squelched since the government depended upon these citizens for its defense.

Is there historical justification for this view? One need look no further than Thomas Jefferson, Alexander Hamilton, or Benjamin Franklin to find that it was their assumption that the citizens would be armed. The notion of an unarmed citizenry was totally outside their frame of reference. So why, then, are these latter day revisionists attempting to claim that there is no such right that is protected in the Constitution? Hamilton certainly believed it did. So did Jefferson and Franklin and all the rest.

The fact of the matter is the revisionist anti-gun bigots wish to disarm the citizens of this country. They wish to make you defenseless against intruders into your home. They wish to render you impotent in keeping a home invader from killing your spouse or children. They believe that this somehow makes the world safer, that in confiscating your guns we will not have school shootings such as the one in Lancaster, Pennsylvania. They do not realize it, but this is slap in the face to the 80 million LAW-ABIDING gun owners in America...to be lumped in together with the likes of a lunatic child killer that goes on a shooting spree. This kind of thinking is demented at best.

The thing that would have prevented the killings in Lancaster would be for the teachers to be armed and trained to use those firearms. The would-be child killer would have been dead before he got off a single shot. However, due to the brainwashing of the politically correct anti-gun bigots, the only person around in the school building that day who was armed was the murderer himself.