Birthplace of the Second Amendment 1765: Second Amendment at risk in Obama's Second Term

Tuesday, July 31, 2012

Second Amendment at risk in Obama's Second Term

By Emily Miller

Democrats just couldn't hold it together. With less than 100 days to go before the election, the left let slip its vision of a second term for President Obama that will be the end for the Second Amendment.

They're riding on an emotional wave created by James Holmes, the suspected Aurora, Colo., movie-theater shooter who was charged with 24 counts of murder on Monday. As the courtroom proceedings in that case unfolded, Sen. Frank Lautenberg, New Jersey Democrat, and Rep. Carolyn McCarthy, New York Democrat, took to New York's city hall to introduce legislation making it much harder for law-abiding citizens nationwide to purchase ammunition.

The liberal duo would restrict ammunition sales to licensed dealers and require buyers to show a photo ID at the time of purchase, effectively banning people from doing their shopping online. Also, the dealer would have to maintain detailed records for each ammunition sale and report anyone purchasing over 1,000 rounds.
This is going back to the bad old days of 1960s-era gun-control laws, which banned mail-order sales of ammo and required logs to be kept. These restrictions did absolutely nothing to help law enforcement, as the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms admitted when Congress repealed those provisions in 1986.

Mr. Lautenberg also wants to turn back the clock with a Senate vote this week reinstating a ban on "high-capacity magazines," which he defines as any that hold over 10 rounds. The New Jersey Democrat wants to attach his bill to pending cybersecurity legislation, but his leader, Sen. Harry Reid, Nevada Democrat, is opposed, knowing the political reality for his vulnerable members.

The Senate's third-ranking leader, Chuck Schumer of New York, couldn't restrain himself from taking to the floor Thursday to plead for more gun control: "Maybe, maybe, maybe we could pass some laws that might, might, might stop some of the unnecessary tragedies that have occurred."

In a statement on his bill, Mr. Lautenberg said Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, among others, "publicly expressed acceptance or support for some form of gun regulation since the Colorado shooting." That's a rather fanciful interpretation of what Justice Scalia said on "Fox News Sunday" this weekend. Justice Scalia, who penned the landmark District of Columbia v. Heller decision striking down the District's 30-year gun ban, said the ruling left open the possibility of limitations on guns.

"What the opinion in Heller said is that it will have to be decided in future cases -- what limitations upon the right to bear arms are permissible," said the justice. "My starting point and ending point probably will be what limitations are within the understood limitations that the society had at the time. They had some limitation on the nature of arms that could be borne. So, we'll see what those limitations are as applied to modern weapons." He gave the example that cannons wouldn't qualify because they aren't carried by hand.

The shape of those future limitations will change should Mr. Obama win his last political election. The switch of a single vote would put Justice Scalia and the originalist interpretation of the scope of the Second Amendment in the minority. Millions of gun owners will have this in mind as November approaches.

Emily Miller is a senior editor for the Opinion pages at The Washington Times.

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It All Started Here . . .

Frontier Mercersburg in 1765 was the "birthplace" of the right we now refer to as "the Second Amendment", or, "the right to bear arms". It was here that individuals for the first time, some would say divinely, embraced the link between "Life and Liberty". . . and struck the first blow for Freedom.

Historically the right to bear arms goes back even before our founding as a nation to the Glorious Revolution of 1689 when William III agreed to the English Bill of Rights. If one can look at revolution like a volcanic eruption in nature, you understand that often from the destruction come the seeds of new human values and beliefs. In this case the independence of the human spirit, the right to know God for oneself, and to trust your conscience was hard won in this revolution of the human soul.

One crucible begets the necessity for another and on the frontier in America the right to defend ones religious beliefs was becoming the right to participate in the decisions of government that impact my "self". Freedom of the soul was becoming freedom of the heart and mind. Smith's Rebellion began as an act they justified under the rubric of defending oneself because government had failed in its obligation to protect Life, Liberty and Property. This was the first assertion of this principle aimed directly at British Military Authority as well as the incompetent government of John Penn - anywhere in the colonies.

In the end, Smith's Rebellion was the first armed resistance against British Military Rule leading up to the American Revolution. It was the first American triumph over the best military force in the world. It was the first time upon defending oneself that Americans had proclaimed we can rule ourselves.

It would be ten years before the battles at Lexington and Concord.

...Let Them Take Arms

The "Right to Bear Arms" . . .or 2nd Amendment is one of the most discussed and contentious of all the amendments of the Bill of Rights. It is, in fact, the only amendment that contains not only the seeds but the actual instruments of the revolution itself. Further, it gives real affirmation to Thomas Jefferson's quote . . .
"God forbid we should ever be twenty years without such a rebellion. The people cannot be all, and always, well informed. The part which is wrong will be discontented, in proportion to the importance of the facts they misconceive. If they remain quiet under such misconceptions, it is lethargy, the forerunner of death to the public liberty. ... And what country can preserve its liberties, if its rulers are not warned from time to time, that this people preserve the spirit of resistance? Let them take arms. The remedy is to set them right as to the facts, pardon and pacify them. What signify a few lives lost in a century or two? The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time, with the blood of patriots and tyrants. It is its natural manure."

It is for this reason, if no other, that the Government and its functionaries vociferously assail and obfuscate the text of this simple assertion. More, it is for this reason, and in the face of the perennial onslaught that its defense and affirmation is essential to the survival of the republic.

Frontier Mercersburg & The Justice William Smith House

The frontier town of Mercersburg, PA. in the 1760's, although typical of many settlements along the Appalachian Mountains played a pivotal role in the creation of what was to become the "Bill of Rights".

Frontiersmen like James Smith and the Black Boys, many of whom were inhabitants of the Mercersburg environs, were early participants in a series of conflicts with the British government that established principles the eventually lead to the inclusion of the "right to bear arms" in the Bill of Rights.

Much of the focus, centers on the domicile (and likely place of business) of Justice William Smith.

Birthplace of the Second Amendment 1765

Pages

Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution - Bill of Rights

Preservation and Proposition

Tuesday, July 31, 2012

Second Amendment at risk in Obama's Second Term

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