The Second Amendment

It is a simple fact that the Second Amendment makes no mention anywhere of "hunting." It makes no mention anywhere of "sport," or "sporting purpose." Unless this is understood, no intelligent conversation can be had about the Second Amendment.

Careful reading reveals that the Second Amendment is exclusively concerned with one thing only -- the guarantee of individual arms FOR SECURITY. It is therefore terribly unfortunate that arms which are most suitable to win conflicts and defeat enemies foreign or domestic are those that gun controllers find most objectionable. The guns protected under the law are first and foremost those that banners love to ban. That is why so much of existing gun law is unconstitutional. What guns ARE most suited to state security, anyway? Ahhh. So you DO know the answer...

If you doubt my premise, please re-read the text of the Second Amendment carefully for comprehension, as if reading it for the first time. You will find no mention of or reference to hunting; no mention of or reference to sport. There was no national guard in 1790, so the only "militia" was the citizenry, ordinary people who used their personal arms to fight, then went home with their guns when the fight was over. The government of the day even gave the citizens MORE of the VERY BEST GUNS AVAILABLE for free (the Brown Bess was one state-of-the-art rifle issued to citizens at the time) to be sure they could WIN when defending themselves and their country.

Therefore, when someone dons a camo vest, shoulders a goose gun and claims to "support your Second Amendment rights," you should rightfully roll your eyeballs, because he doesn't understand what he is talking about. Hunting is another subject altogether. Hunting and sport are good practice, of course, but the second article of the Bill of Rights guarantees there will be no infringment of the use of arms for SECURITY. Hunting has NOTHING to do with the Second Amendment.

Either we have Second Amendment rights, or we don't. If we do, and nearly everyone agrees that we do have such a thing as Second Amendment rights, then the arms protected are arms suitable to win a fight against a human enemy. No one needs to prove his or her gun has any "sporting purpose" or can be utilized for hunting. Such tests are irrelevant and counterproductive.

A politician who will take a gun away from you because it may be too good at winning conflicts, and leave you with a six shooter (or worse, a phone number) to defend your family and your neighborhood against human predators, is not your friend nor the Constitution's friend.

The Second Amendment enunciates a liberty of the people, not of governmental departments. Institutions do not have "liberties." Only people can have liberties and rights. In our country we affirm that "all men are created equal," and that each has inalienable rights. This language informs us that there can be NO special class of citizens, with rights that the others do not have. Law abiding U.S. citizens all have the same liberties. There is no higher level than "U.S. citizen."

All ten articles of the Bill of Rights were written in part to assure us protection against our own government, against "all enemies foreign and domestic." Government may not infringe upon its citizens' ability to defend themselves against it -- because that would be a conflict of interest of the first magnitude, in light of the Constitution. We have gun rights partly to insure the reasonableness of our republic.

The Second Amendment is the law of the land. Liberals wish it were otherwise, but it is the law, and part of the Bill of Rights at that, requiring a constitutional convention to alter. It is among our basic liberties -- the right to arm ourselves against aggressions of all kinds -- that is the constitutional law. This means that if you don't like gun rights, or would like to abridge them, you can't just pass an ordinance. You would FIRST have to repeal the second article of the Bill of Rights -- which protects not just the guns liberals like, but all the guns liberals hate, too. We are not talking about a difference of opinion. We are talking about respecting the Constitution, or undermining it. A gun control advocate hopes to subvert constitutional law -- in collusion with other liberals, sometimes he succeeds. That activist wants to criminalize citizens who have arms he would like to prohibit. You may not like guns, or perhaps freedom of speech or freedom of religion. But they are all protected EQUALLY in the Bill of Rights and stand shoulder to shoulder within it.

Many unconstitutional gun laws are already on the books of course, and those are in need of redress. It has been estimated that there are 40,000 gun laws in the United States. Let me ask: If there were 40,000 laws "regulating" freedom of speech, how large would be the outcry? Answer: Journalists would have taken to the streets long ago. Regularly, federal, state and local laws which attempt to infringe the freedom of speech are struck down. Newspapers proudly quote the First Amendment on many of their editorial pages. They should be able to print the Second Amendment with equal vigor of course, given that it is another clause in the same document. Yet few do. That difference in respect can only be termed hypocritical, schizophrenic double-think.

In the 1960s, a body of law carrying out an unconstitutional doctrine called "separate but equal" was set aside and judged to be a violation of Americans' civil rights. Some day, the body of law which infringes gun rights can, should, and will be set aside by a similar method. If state and local infringement is not to be permitted for the First Amendment, it CANNOT be lawful for the Second. If you know and proclaim the First Amendment is sacrosanct, you recognize the same status for the other, co-equal paragraphs of the Bill of Rights.

Remember, the Second Amendment makes no reference to hunting nor sport. It concerns itself ONLY with protecting arms for security -- security of individuals, their family, and their larger community against other people. Shamefully, those guns most appropriate to win in a seige by other humans bent on your harm are the very guns the gun controllers love most to prohibit. These activists are misguided, and they are patently, objectively and empirically wrong. Arms most appropriate to our defense and security are protected first, not last. Doubters need only read the existing papers and letters of the Founding Fathers to confirm this clear intent. No guesswork needs to be done. No wheel needs to be re-invented. The Founders' intent is clear and the documents confirming this plain fact are plentiful in the Library of Congress.