A Liberal Case for Gun Rights Sways Judiciary

[Urbane Guerrilla]

We've not answered because we're not certain, not legally anyway. There's been no firm legal precedent.

One of the Acts I quoted puts National Guard women in among the militia -- but not National Guard men. The National Guard is the US Army's and Air Force's reserve component. The US Navy has something quite the same, which they call the Naval Reserves.

[xoxoxoBruce]

Both the structure of the armed forces and womens rights have changed considerably in 200 years.

[Happy Monkey]

For that matter, so has the destructive power of handheld weaponry.

[Aliantha]

Originally Posted by Urbane Guerrilla

We've not answered because we're not certain, not legally anyway. There's been no firm legal precedent.

This was the point I was getting at. People use the militia argument like it's the be all and end all of the subject, but it's not because there's really no clear definition as to who should actually be in a militia except to say that you have to be male and over 17. Oh hang on, that's a pretty clear definition, cept it doesn't mention that you have to be of sound mind or anything important like that.

If you can't defend the words as they're written, then surely you can't use the argument, regardless of the fact that the culture of American society has changed somewhat during the last 200 yrs or not. For example, let's suppose a dictator somehow came into power (hmmm or is in power) and decided to enforce that act as written because he had an adjenda that was sexist. Where would all the "I stand by our constitution because it's for the good of the country" people be then? Would you think it's worth changing or would you just say, "well that's what it says, so get back in the kitchen you women".

I also don't buy the argument about it being a free country. If it were free, people living there wouldn't be feeling oppressed. It's free for some.

[xoxoxoBruce]

I don't buy UGs line of reasoning on the second amendment. I don't think its a popular opinion.

[Urbane Guerrilla]

Originally Posted by Happy Monkey

For that matter, so has the destructive power of handheld weaponry.

Which as we progunners never tire of pointing out, and which certain fatuists equally refuse to hear, the principle the Second Amendment supports is that the citizenry were to be trusted with being armed at least comparably to the best equipped armies of the time. Being a principle, it has the property of remaining unchanged with time. Single shot or repeater, fixed cartridge or no, it really doesn't change much when all parties possess them. It's when there is a great disparity that you run into trouble.

I'm not greatly troubled by the fatuists as long as their numbers can be kept minuscule and their notions laughed at by people more sensible (more anti-crime, etc.) than they.

In the 19th century, the government did start regulating crew-served artillery more closely.

In this Republic, as I've said before, the ultimate political power source is the people, the electorate. The electorate's total power is broadcast throughout its numbers, equally portioned out -- dilute, if you like. If any republic reduce the power of the electorate over public matters, it is on the road to becoming something not a republic -- a dictatorship or an oligarchy, and there goes legitimacy by the board. The citizen militia comes in as both a repository and a stronghold of the electorate's power, and makes the staffers of the government -- most of whom are also militia themselves, which seems fair enough -- accountable to the electorate for their actions with their lives and/or livelihoods. With the electorate armed, there is force available. Here is a most effectual check and balance on the State's insensate power. Power in politics is ultimately force, and we consider that the use of such coercive function, such force, be carefully hedged about with safeguards -- including a counterforce, however amorphous, however nebulous -- it's still there.

Against this desire to keep power in check, and what gives us problems both in the old times and now, is that work in the government always will attract those with a cast of mind to rule -- to exert force. Bureaucracy and the state being what they are, this habit of force tends to concentrate and increase, at least slowly, from generation to generation.

Founding father Thomas Jefferson (the President on the rarely seen US $2 bill) foresaw this. About the only solution to it he could see was to have more or less periodic revolutions -- to reset things, as it were. We American libertarians hope, though I don't think we exactly see how, to accomplish similar results by downsizing all government apparatus, at all levels, across the board. Federal-level bureaucracy gets the most attention on this score -- we'd like to reverse what we think Franklin D. Roosevelt did too much of.

Bruce: and the Militia Acts have changed also with time. Note they dropped specification on arms and equipment, such as the Act of 1792 laid out.

[Happy Monkey]

Originally Posted by Urbane Guerrilla

Which as we progunners never tire of pointing out, and which certain fatuists equally refuse to hear, the principle the Second Amendment supports is that the citizenry were to be trusted with being armed at least comparably to the best equipped armies of the time. Being a principle, it has the property of remaining unchanged with time.

Anything available to the military should be available to civilians? Including nukes?

[xoxoxoBruce]

Bruce: and the Militia Acts have changed also with time. Note they dropped specification on arms and equipment, such as the Act of 1792 laid out.

Yes, what I was saying is I don't subscribe to the notion that the second amendment says the people can bear arms to make them available for the militia. That would preclude anyone not eligible for Militia duty, which is not the case. Every 13/14 year old boy was familiar with guns and many if not most had the use of one at will, if not their own. The majority of rural women were familiar too.

[Urbane Guerrilla]

Mhm.

I don't subscribe to that notion either, having learned that the 2nd's language does not grant the right to keep and bear arms, but acknowledges that the right inheres in being a human (falls in line with John Locke -- on second thought, in line with Thomas Hobbes), and rather incidentally and in part, a citizen.

[Urbane Guerrilla]

Originally Posted by Happy Monkey

Anything available to the military should be available to civilians? Including nukes?

And somebody predictably always tries to slippery-slope me on this point. Wearisome, really, in its rhetorical transparency. Nobody ever comes up with something original.

In actual real-world effect, this means sidearms. Selective fire should not be forbidden, as indeed it is not, merely restricted to what I think is an undue degree.

I draw the line at nuclear weapons. Now somewhere on the other side of the line would be my neighbor having a surface-to-air missile battery all his own. I don't have a problem with that unless he tries taking my roof off with it. He's quite crossed the line then.

The reason I draw the line is rather a philosophical one: many weapons may be used as designed and intended in a moral manner. Point weapons, with a small area of effect, may be used, even lethally, in a moral manner. By contrast, a nuclear weapon is an area weapon. It is exceedingly hard to make use of a nuclear weapon as designed and intended in a fully moral manner. At best, look at the pollution problems you get. Not good, is it?

This consideration is also why the fliers of old warbird bombers and fighter planes aren't allowed to drop ordnance, either inert or simulated. Conking the innocent isn't good.

[Happy Monkey]

Originally Posted by Urbane Guerrilla

And somebody predictably always tries to slippery-slope me on this point.

That's because it's a stupid point to try to make. You said that citizens should be able to be armed comparably to the best-equipped militaries. That includes everything from nukes, to MOABs, to conventional missiles, to warships, to fighter jets, down to the handheld weapons. Your claim was that it doesn't matter that newer weapons are more powerful as long as all parties possess them.

In actual real-world effect, this means sidearms. Selective fire should not be forbidden, as indeed it is not, merely restricted to what I think is an undue degree.

That's the distinction that xoxoxoBruce made a while back- handheld weapons that you can "bear" rather than "operate" (Which is why I made the point that the destructive power of handheld weapons is always increasing). Of sourse, SAMs don't realy meet this distinction.

I draw the line at nuclear weapons. Now somewhere on the other side of the line would be my neighbor having a surface-to-air missile battery all his own. I don't have a problem with that unless he tries taking my roof off with it. He's quite crossed the line then.

So private ownership of missiles would be OK, as long as they aren't nuclear.

The reason I draw the line is rather a philosophical one: many weapons may be used as designed and intended in a moral manner. Point weapons, with a small area of effect, may be used, even lethally, in a moral manner. By contrast, a nuclear weapon is an area weapon.

How big of an area is too big? Conventional missiles and bombs are also area effect weapons.

There's nothing in the second amendment separating area-effect weapons from point weapons, so it looks to me like you decided that there is a level of destructive power that, outside of the wording of the Constitution, would not be safe to leave in the hands of civilians. I contend that almost everyone makes that decision, and the only disagreement is what that power level is. High-minded pronouncements about principles unchanged by time fall flat.

[Urbane Guerrilla]

Well, those disposed to deny the principle in question will claim they fall flat. Neither I nor the philosophers I read are so inclined.

Here's a philosophical point to consider: while the firepower(s) controlled by States have become greatly magnified over the centuries, should they be kept so disproportionate to the firepower(s) in private hands, or should a nearer approach to parity be the guiding idea instead?

[xoxoxoBruce]

(A) We have a philosophical position.
(B) We have a legal/Constitutional position.
(C) We have a practical position.

When losing ground on the (A) jump to (B) or (C).
Getting beat up in (B)? Jump to (A) or (C).
Dead end in (C)? Drag out (A) or (B).

I'd rate them (B), (C) then (A), in order of importance, but I'll bet many people don't agree. In any case, how can you reach agreement, when they are sometimes conflicting, without establishing a pecking order?

B is all that matters.

[Happy Monkey]

Originally Posted by Urbane Guerrilla

Well, those disposed to deny the principle in question will claim they fall flat. Neither I nor the philosophers I read are so inclined.

No, you're so inclined. You sacrificed the principle when it came to nukes. The practical results of upholding the principle changed over time with the advance of technology. A weapon was invented that cannot be safely left in unsupervised hands. The argument is no longer that people should be allowed to own any weapon; it is now that people should be allowed to own the most powerful weapons that it is safe to allow, and any disagreement is over the safety level.