The 2nd Amendment is on the clock
The DC showdown. For interested parties.
Comments:
They will take my telescope from me when they pry it from my.....<br><br>....wait a minute, this has nothing to do with astronomy, professional, amatuer or otherwise. 8O <br><br><br><br>
Isn't is interesting how some of the more violent, intolerant and "paternal" posts have all come from what appears to be the "anti" gun crowd
Bill, Its nice to see a fellow member of the bar chime in. You're right,the 2nd Amendment has never been incorporated to the States via the 14th Amendment. What is completely lost on the populace is the clear distinction between individual rights, such as the right to counsel or to be free from unreasonable searches and seizures and collective rights that belong to the "people en masse". Whenever the Framers intended a right to be specific to an individual, they used terms such as Persons such as in the 4th Amendment "The right of the people to be secure in their persons..." or with the 5th Amendment "No person shall be held to answer for a capital. . ." However when speaking of collective rights, the Framers were equally clear that they were not referring to individual rights but rights belonging to the people's representatives. The very terms of the 2nd Amendment make it clear that the right to bear arms was intended to be only for the people's representatives: 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. Had the Framers intended that the right to arm be an individual liberty the amendment would have be written fundamentally differently. For another spin,the 2nd Amendment was less than 10 years old when Geo. Washington answered the question decisively by sending federal troops to disarm the "Whiskey Rebellion." <br><br>Les
Bill, I wish I could take credit for the analysis. Its the same one thats been applied by constit. scholars the last 100yrs, none of which BTW have concluded that the right was individual. I believe the Roberts Court is intellectually honest enough to make the right decision. What keeps me awake at night is the thought of the unwashed masses who will vehemently defend a specious right to arm themselves while ignoring the wholesale assault on actual, real, rights that have taken place daily the last 20 yrs. Can you imagine John Adam's response to a warrantless presumption by Geo. III to read his private correspondence (aka email)or listen in on his long distance foreplay with Abigail (international phone calls)? Or what about the notion that the Boston Massacre mob should be tried by English military tribunals? <br><br>Les <br><br><br><blockquote class="blockquote"><div class="italic"><i>William Green said:</i><br><br>Hi, Les,<br><br>Your textual analysis is very, very interesting, and something that I had not thought of. I'm not a constitutional lawyer per se, but I am a longtime staff attorney at Texas' highest criminal court, and we get lots of constitutional- and statutory-interpretation cases. Lay people haven't a clue as to how legal analysis really works.<br><br>Bill</div></blockquote>
If you are saying the "persons" aren't included in the 2nd amendment, then how do we the "persons" stop the government when it decides to become oppressive? Don't say it can never happen.
Could someone please explain to me what this has to do with our love of the night sky and astronomy? There are plenty of wonderful websites and blogs for just this type of discouse. <br>Sorry folks. Just trying to "keep it real".<br>John
I agree....with all the "other" rules here...one would think the discussion of non-astronomy would be regulated? I can get this stuff on Dr Phil or any number of other venue's.<br><br><blockquote class="blockquote"><div class="italic"><i>John Stephany said:</i><br><br>Could someone please explain to me what this has to do with our love of the night sky and astronomy? There are plenty of wonderful websites and blogs for just this type of discouse. <br>Sorry folks. Just trying to "keep it real".<br>John</div></blockquote>
I think it is time to get back to Astronomy and let you "Gun Nuts" cry about not having the right to blow away anyone or anything you feel threatend by (and it does happen)to other venues.
I know it may not seem related. It may not seem germaine. But, astronomy requires going outside in the dark late at night and possibly in a remote location with all sorts of dangerous animals:<br><br>(My local criminals) http://www.atlantapd.org/index.asp?nav=mw <br>(bears) http://www.bear.org/website/<br>(mountain lions) http://tchester.org/sgm/lists/lion_attacks.html<br>(snakes) http://www.trailquest.net/SNpoi.html<br>(dangerous dogs) http://www.dogbitelaw.com/PAGES/statistics.html<br>(very dangerous dogs) http://www.dogexpert.com/FatalDogAttacks/fataldogattacks.html<br><br>and just maybe even beings like this... <br>http://www.bfro.net/ (Bigfoot) <img class='' src='http://new.astromart.com/astromart/javascripts/sceditor/emoticons/wink.png' alt='wink' title='wink'/> <br><br>So, it's not totally surprising that some astronomers would be interested in the Second Amendment. <img class='' src='http://new.astromart.com/astromart/javascripts/sceditor/emoticons/wink.png' alt='wink' title='wink'/>
And if you should happen to really be threatened? Better to have a gun and not need it, than to need one and not have it. And I am not a "nut", thank you very much, but a believer in the Constitution and a hunter and shooter from age 6. 49 now. Here's hoping that you and others that think like you never find yourself in need. <br>Doug
The display of the handgun and an <b>excerpt</b> from the Second Amendment in front of the flag is as disingenuous as it is disgusting.<br><br>Why does the National Paranoid Association <b>never</b> quote the full text of the Second Amendment? Verbatim: "<i>A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State,</i> the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed."<br><br>Let me hear it, NPA member -- <b>Why</b> did the framers <b>not</b> write it the way you quote it: "The right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed?" <b>What is</b> the meaning of the clause "A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State...?"<br><br>You know what the framers meant -- that the Federal Government has the right to maintain armed forces, and, to the extent it applies to states, it means that they have the right to maintain what we now call National Guard forces. The framers weren't perfect. I have no doubt that this amendment would have been worded differently if the framers had envisioned bands of armed neo-Nazis like the so-called Minutemen waiting at the border to murder anyone whose skin is of the wrong color, or whose English is not like theirs.<br><br>If anyone outside the NPA thought that the Second Amendment guaranteed an absolute right to bear arms, then arms could not be banned anywhere -- high-schoolers could legally carry guns to school, anyone could take one aboard a commercial aircraft, into a court room, prisoners would be allowed to have guns in jail. The law has <b>always</b> treated the bearing arms as a revocable privilege.<br><br>David<br><br>"This is not about hunting or target shooting. It's about protecting ourselves when the UN moves in to take over. They've already begun to move forces in." --National Rifle Association officer, directly to me, circa 2002. In other words, it's about paranoia.
You might want to educate yourself on the intentions of our founding fathers. To wit:<br><br>Noah Webster, of Pennsylvania:<br><br>"Before a standing army can rule, the people must be disarmed; as they are in almost every kingdom in Europe. The supreme power in America cannot enforce unjust laws by the sword; because the whole body of the people are armed, and constitute a force superior to any band of regular troops that can be, on any pretence, raised in the United States. A military force, at the command of Congress, can execute no laws, but such as the people perceive to be just and constitutional; for they will possess the power." -- An Examination of The Leading Principles of the Federal Constitution, Philadelphia, 1787 <br><br>There is more enlightenment available here:<br><br>http://www.nraila.org/Issues/FactSheets/Read.aspx?ID=53<br>
<blockquote class="blockquote"><div class="italic"><i>David Illig said:</i><br><br>Why does the National Paranoid Association <b>never</b> quote the full text of the Second Amendment? Verbatim: "<i>A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State,</i> the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed."<br><br>Let me hear it, NPA member -- Why did the framers not write it the way you quote it: "The right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed?" <b>What is</b> the meaning of the clause "A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State...?"<br></div></blockquote><br>The preamble of the second amendment is not a clause. It is an ablative absolute. <br><br>"[An ablative absolute] indicates the time, condition, or attending circumstances of an action being described in the main sentence."<br>http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Latin_grammar#Ablative_absolute<br><br>Yes, that's right, the founders would occasionally borrow pages from latin grammar. The right of the people to keep and bear arms is not dependent on their enrollment in any state militia, the preamble simply describes the rationale, not a condition on the right. Furthermore, both versions mentioned here are wrong in terms of punctuation. That is what you see in the parchment copy, but that punctuation is not found in any other official document or certified copy of the time. Every single certified copy of the amendment, used in all official documents until about 1876, contains only one comma. This is also true of the version that was ratified by the states. It should read:<br><br>"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." <br><br>The Senate Journal, the Annals of Congress, The Debates and Proceedings in the Congress of the United States all show the one comma version. The version agreed upon by the house and senate also had just one comma. The extraneous commas were introduced by William Lambert, a Clerk of the House who put the amendment to parchment where it was signed by the Speaker and Vice President. That is the version that hangs in the National Archives, but it is not the version that was passed or ratified.<br><br>What is disingenuous is the notion that an individual right to bear arms is mutually exclusive with reasonable regulation. Why should the first amendment be subject to reasonable regulations but not the second? You can't yell fire in a crowded theater, you can't give false testimony, you can't threaten to murder someone, and you can't carry a gun as a high schooler - none of these things will change, even if an individual right to firearms is affirmed. <br><br>As a side note David, can you prove your inflammatory accusation that the minutemen are racist murderers?
People like you are why fascism and communism live on even to this day. And the Minutemen are not about racism, which is all your kind think everything is about, but about helping secure the border, which you would know, if you weren't drinking liberal propaganda kool-aid. And the framers were intending for the populace to be armed, to guard against imperial aspirations by the federal and state governments. Would you really willingly choose to have everyone but the police, criminals, and military be armed? Rather short sighted view, and glad I am that your type still aren't in charge yet. As I have stated elsewhere, better to have it and not need it, than not have it, and need it.<br>Doug
And thankful for that, I am. It's that kind of thinking that loses us our freedoms. And despite all the legalese I am hearing, the phrase " the right of the people" does not mean their reps, but the people, i.e., us. I have never understood why it is that anyone could even argue the point. And yet, our right to keep and bear arms is infringed all the time, particularly in locales run by the leftward leaning. Which unfortunately, means most large cities. Who, incidentally, have also been shown to have the highest drop-out rates from high school. Might explain a few things.
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