Okay, I watched it.
He hates Fudds… Yeah that makes sense. They irk the shit out of me too. Old man Ruger was a Fudd no doubt.
1 Like
Bit of trivia, but related, in that “well-regulated” (in addition to being a dependent clause, which is the primary reason) doesn’t mean in the 2A what it sounds like to our 21st century ears, after the “4th branch” of regulatory government grew up in the 1930s.
The phrase “well-regulated” was in common use long before 1789, and remained so for a century thereafter. It referred to the property of something being in proper working order, for example:
1709: "If a liberal Education has formed in us well-regulated Appetites and worthy Inclinations."
1714: "The practice of all well-regulated courts of justice in the world."
1812: "The equation of time ... is the adjustment of the difference of time as shown by a well-regulated clock and a true sun dial."
1848: "A remissness for which I am sure every well-regulated person will blame the Mayor."
1862: "It appeared to her well-regulated mind, like a clandestine proceeding."
1894: "The newspaper, a never wanting adjunct to every well-regulated American embryo city."
Something that was “well-regulated” was calibrated correctly, functioning as expected.
Establishing government oversight of the people’s arms was not only not the intent in using the phrase in the 2nd amendment, it was precisely to render the government powerless to do so that the founders wrote it.
3 Likes
Yes, but it’s at the pleasure of the big company to decentralize - the smaller pieces aren’t running the show. Here, we have states insisting on it and who wouldn’t buy the concept of the Constitution unless the federalism was in place.
Because states (to which the FFs themselves belonged to, don’t forget) said “we got this” - there was no need to make sure individuals were protected from the state. Madison actually initially thought any BOR should apply to the states (even saying so on the House floor) and even proposed forms of amendments that said “no state shall…”. But that language didn’t prevail.
And the larger issue was the Anti-Federalists. Remember they were the ones insisting on a BOR and almost didn’t support ratification because of the lack of one. When it was time to tee up the BOR, as ardent states’ rights advocates, their goal was restricting the federal government. The idea that the common thought was to erect a bunch of new restrictions on what states could and couldn’t do biz a biz their citizens - on a variety of issues, like free speech and freedom of worship, not just gun rights - makes no sense.
The line drawing of the BOR was all about pushing back against the federal government, not agreeing to a universal set of restrictions on all levels of government. There was no general skepticism that citizens needed to be protected from their own states via the US Constitution - states were generally trusted to be the best guardians of a citizen’s civil liberties, and each state had its own constitution that dealt with those rights, and it makes no sense that all the states were coming to the table to enact a BOR to supersede what states were doing on their own re: civil rights.
Imagine all the Anti-Federalists - the ones pining for the BOR - sitting around, vehement states’ righters, saying to themselves, “you know, we too could be dangerous to our own citizens’ civil liberties - this federal bill of rights needs to protect our citizens from us. Let’s go ahead and enact amendments that let’s this new federal government essentially police us in our treatment of our own citizens in the area of civil rights.”
You think that is a plausible explanation of what transpired? You’d have to, if you think it was supposed to be a universal right from the get go.
If that was the mission, though, the Anti-Federalist factions and the states they controlled would have not signed up for the Constitution.
Respectfully, I think this new theory is a kind of libertarian revisionism - now that we have ample reason to think (know) that states can violate all kinds of civil rights, there is this urge to say in the beginning, we enshrined these universal rights as protected against all levels of government and its always been that way. Problem is, as I opened with the incorporation doctrine stuff, it just ain’t so.
See above.
That’s more suggestive that the right is tied to military service, right?
I’m pressed for time, I will reply with more later.
I tried to make this point last time, and was linked an op-ed about how that wasn’t true, written by someone who obviously didn’t care for civilians being armed… So I decided to avoid that this time around, because when someone thinks an op-ed is proof of point I really don’t know what to say to it.
1 Like
"The use of the [term ‘well-regulated’] is especially significant, since the king’s soldiers and sailors were called “regulars” in the eighteenth century. The militias, too, were “regular,” existing under rules (regulae). They did not boast a lesser discipline, just a right to continual upkeep of themselves and their equipment. Adam Smith took regulated to mean, principally, “regimented”—divided into bodies of troops.
General discussion of regulation concentrated on three matters: composition of the bands, arming (which included financing) them, and disciplining them. These three concerns are reflected in the Constitution’s militia clause, which speaks of a congressional power “to provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining the militia” (Article I, Section 8, Clause 16).
To organize a militia, the most basic question is: Who should belong to it? The answer, prompted by reliance of the militia ideology on classical republicanism, was “the people.” […] As we shall see, the meaning of “the people” is different at differing periods, but at no time preceding the passage of the Second Amendment could any man be considered a militia member just by picking up his gun and proclaiming himself one.
The arming of the militia was a delicate matter, since that meant financing it—its wages, supplies, equipment, training facilities. Royal money could not be accepted, since permanent militia costs would give the king a claim upon permanent revenues. […] To this concern we owe the Third Amendment, which is as solely (and anachronistically) military in focus as is the Second Amendment. A fear of “taking the King’s pence” lay behind the objections of Patrick Henry and others to federal financing of the militias. Yet that became the law of the land under the Constitution. All authorized militias under our government have been financed by the central government, which also establishes their code of discipline.
Discipline was the third item of concern for eighteenth-century defenders of militias. No one was a member of the militia who had not joined an authorized “trained band” and been trained. So important is proper training that we often find “well-regulated” followed by an epexegetic phrase, spelling out the meaning of the term: “a well regulated militia, trained to arms” was the form Elbridge Gerry preferred for the Second Amendment. More expansively the Virginia ratifying convention suggested “a well-regulated militia, composed of the body of the people trained to arms.”
http://www.nybooks.com/articles/1995/09/21/to-keep-and-bear-arms/
Edited to reduce the size of the wall of text
All you have to do is wait and someone will cut-and-paste some pablum, don’t worry.
Nope, as sighted above your post, there it is… From such an impartial and objective man that penned a letter about someone’s haircut.
Yes, obviously a man whom’s interpretation of language won’t be swayed by unnerving bias… He writes about POTUS’s fuckign hair…
Jesus H at what passes for critical source material around here.
The term ad hominem gets thrown around a lot, usually incorrectly. However, this is a textbook case of exactly what constitutes an ad hominem argument.
lmao… Like I’m going to take the time to even listen to someone who thinks it’s worth his effort to pen an actual article in a publication that isn’t Mad Magazine about a haircut, let alone take the effort to attack anything other than the person.
Read that again. He wrote, and they published an article about his god damn hair cut.
a hair cut
HAIR
And you expect me to take him serious and actually spend time reading an op-ed trashing the 2nd because he doesn’t like civilian gun ownership?
This isn’t The Onion.
Hey a guy who compares guns to Moloch (a pagan demon) has to be a reliable historical source on the 2A.
1 Like
It’s not an Op-Ed. And no, I didn’t expect you to read it.
Yes it is. Just because they didn’t put it in the op-ed section, and it confirms your bias doesn’t make it not an op-ed. How you can read the opening paragraphs and not read the bias oozing out of it surprises me, you seem able to actually pick up on things.
I’ve read it. It fails any test of objectivity long before it even gets into pertinent detail. Which is expected from a man whom would go on to write an entire “article” about POTUS’s hair.
You’re getting balled up on irrelevant stuff - ok, make itthe “biggest”. Make it for the safety of construction workers on the jobsite, and say the right of all employees to wear a hard hat. Does anyone read that to mean construction company accountants and sales people have the right to wear hardhats back at company headquarters in an office building, and not on the jobsite?
The point was to show how prefatory clauses and the application of common sense modify the operative clause. But apparently when it comes to “the gunz”, common sense gets to thrown out the window.
Nope, just practicing the ancient but trusty technique of reading sentences in their entirety, with context, to ascertain meaning.
Wow…
What a steaming pile of… Modern “journalism”.
1 Like
Wouldn’t any paper that takes a position on the 2A ‘fail the test of objectivity’? And if this is the case, doesn’t it follow that no such paper–regardless of its position–is worth reading?
1 Like
So does this establish a right to eat junk food and anything that isn’t properly nutritious? If yes, then why have the prefatory clause in there in the first place?
If you - you, Beans, knowing what you know about types of food (all types, good and junk, proteins and sweets, etc.) - wanted to establish a right to eat whatever you wanted, good or bad, wouldn’t you simply write “The right to eat food shall not be infringed.”…?
If your goal is to establish a right to eat any kind of food you want, why on God’s green earth would you take the extra step to include a prefatory clause about well-balanced meals and the necessity of proper nutrition?
2 Likes
Sorry. I should have specified that it(the Constitution of the United States of America) does not “generally” govern the States. It does prohibit the States from doing some things:
No State shall enter into any Treaty, Alliance, or Confederation; grant Letters of Marque and Reprisal; coin Money; emit Bills of Credit; make any Thing but gold and silver Coin a Tender in Payment of Debts; pass any Bill of Attainder, ex post facto Law, or Law impairing the Obligation of Contracts, or grant any Title of Nobility.
No State shall, without the Consent of the Congress, lay any Imposts or Duties on Imports or Exports, except what may be absolutely necessary for executing it’s inspection Laws: and the net Produce of all Duties and Imposts, laid by any State on Imports or Exports, shall be for the Use of the Treasury of the United States; and all such Laws shall be subject to the Revision and Controul of the Congress.
No State shall, without the Consent of Congress, lay any Duty of Tonnage, keep Troops, or Ships of War in time of Peace, enter into any Agreement or Compact with another State, or with a foreign Power, or engage in War, unless actually invaded, or in such imminent Danger as will not admit of delay.
And you’re poo-pooing relevant “stuff” over and over again.
You’re still language that isn’t analogous to the 2nd.
Again, the prefatory clause uses collective language and still speaks about the broad citizenry, as the definition of militia matters. The operative uses language that is individual in nature and applies to ALL individuals. They did not, as you keep doing, limit the operative to “just employees from the prefatory clause” the used “the people”.
Why do you continuously deny that use of language is “irrelevant” but somehow every single possible letter and it’s never ending possible meaning matters when it comes to the prefatory?
Why did they say “keep and bear”?
Why didn’t they say “militia” instead of “the people”?
They could have specified in the operative that it only applies as noted in the prefatory but didn’t. I’ve listed out a couple other examples that maybe you’re replying to now, but who knows…
Agreed, you’re jumping through some pretty amazing hoops to try and make your “analogy” where you specify in the operative, when the 2nd doesn’t specify in the operative.
#stillhepersisted
Well now that I’ve come around on the idea: to establish “gun culture”.
What’s the first thing a tyrant is going to do? Strike the 2nd via constitutional amendment. So what do free people need to understand?
A well regulated militia - being able to fight
necessary to the security of a free state - people need to fight for their rights from tyrants
He who controls the guns controls the food, and he who controls the food controls the people.
Okay, let’s change the parameters then:
A Sufficiently sedating number of calories, being necessary for survival, the right of the people to keep and eat food, shall not be infringed.
lol, this is half a joke but don’t you read legal documents for a living (or at least a significant hobby)?
I mean, the pains lawyers go through to describe the most simple concepts in something as simple as a partnership agreement is maddening. I would never be chosen to write something like an amendment to the Constitution.
Given what passes for “journalist” these days? Yeah likely. But not necessarily. Use of emotive language right off the bat is a rather large tell that objectivity wasn’t the main goal of an article. If he started off descriptive, then went on to make his case, with more neutral language, and subjective ending with a position would be much more convincing. But that isn’t what he does.
Most aren’t, no. Most are confirmation bias for each respective camp.
It’s not hard to look up the militia laws of the individual colonies themselves. I don’t know how to post a link with my cell, but if you go to the website flintriflesmith.com he has a section with the Militia laws of Virginia. Virginia specified who made up the militia, every free man over the age of 16, later 16-60, and stated that they had to maintain their own firearm, carry so many charges of powder, etc. In the acts of 1755 they stated that If they could not afford to purchase their own, the county would send to England for a musket, which was to be marked as belonging to the county, but was to be kept in the man’s home, and if the man moved out of the county or died it was to be turned in to the Captain of the Militia for that County.
It stated that every foot man enlisted into the militia, which was every free man had 12 months to purchase his arms which was firearm and ammunition, and a cutlass and if promoted to officer had twelve months to purchase his sword. Further, it states that these arms were exempt from seizure for any reason, and than men going to and returning from muster were exempt from being arrested or served with any civil suits.