2nd Amendment Victory

[tieguy]

Originally Posted by browndevil

According SF Attorney general Dennis Herrera all same sex marriage performed now will be upheld if same sex marriage laws are overturned November. My question is how can granting persons equal protection under the law go to the voters? A vote wasn't cast when interacial marriage was lifted in Ca. in 1948 or nationwide in 1967.Moreluck I would love to have a spirited conversation with you regarding this issue. I still have your email. All the best

I believe its the judicials branchs job to determine the validity of the laws. If not then minorities may never have gotten equal rights in some southern states.

[Jones]

A little more detail:click

In addition handguns can't be taken out of the house, and must be stored unloaded and disassembled or with a triggerlock. They are basically trying to make it as big a pain in the ass as possible to own a handgun in D.C.

[Jones]

Originally Posted by tieguy

I believe its the judicials branchs job to determine the validity of the laws. If not then minorities may never have gotten equal rights in some southern states.

Hmmm....you sure you're in the right thread?

[over9five]

Originally Posted by Jones

A little more detail:click

In addition handguns can't be taken out of the house, and must be stored unloaded and disassembled or with a triggerlock. They are basically trying to make it as big a pain in the ass as possible to own a handgun in D.C.

Agree on the PIA. I look forward to continuing lawsuits against DC that will straighten this situation out. Unbelievable what these local politicians are doing. Disassembled! "get the toolkit honey, someones breaking in!"

DC, the capitol of violent crime in America. Why the fool residents don't vote that bum mayor and city council out? "...protecting the safety of our residents." For YEARS, DC has protected criminals by refusing to allow residents the right of self protection.

These are new times DC politicians. Better come to grips with it or look for employment elsewhere!

[big_arrow_up]

Originally Posted by over9five

Agree on the PIA. I look forward to continuing lawsuits against DC that will straighten this situation out. Unbelievable what these local politicians are doing. Disassembled! "get the toolkit honey, someones breaking in!"

DC, the capitol of violent crime in America. Why the fool residents don't vote that bum mayor and city council out? "...protecting the safety of our residents." For YEARS, DC has protected criminals by refusing to allow residents the right of self protection.

These are new times DC politicians. Better come to grips with it or look for employment elsewhere!

Oh Over9five.....guns are for the militia only. LOL!

[Jones]

Originally Posted by over9five

Agree on the PIA. I look forward to continuing lawsuits against DC that will straighten this situation out. Unbelievable what these local politicians are doing. Disassembled! "get the toolkit honey, someones breaking in!"

DC, the capitol of violent crime in America. Why the fool residents don't vote that bum mayor and city council out? "...protecting the safety of our residents." For YEARS, DC has protected criminals by refusing to allow residents the right of self protection.

These are new times DC politicians. Better come to grips with it or look for employment elsewhere!

You have to remember that D.C. pretty much set the benchmark for mayoral corruption, vice and municipal mismanagement during the Marion Barry administration. Current mayor Adrian Fenty is a huge improvement, even if his gun policy is wrongheaded.

[satellitedriver]

Someone correct me if I am wrong.
D.C. had some of the strongest gun control laws in the nation, but it also had one of the highest rate of gun violence in the nation.
It seems gun prohibition only serves those who are willing to break the law.

[tourists24]

Originally Posted by satellitedriver

Someone correct me if I am wrong.
D.C. had some of the strongest gun control laws in the nation, but it also had one of the highest rate of gun violence in the nation.
It seems gun prohibition only serves those who are willing to break the law.

Funny how gun prohibition works out huh? take away the guns and the only people left with them are the criminals.... hmmm

[Jagger]

Justice Scalia’s Methodology Of Constitutional Interpretation Is Just An Excuse For His Judicial Activism


In the excerpt below, from the U. S. Supreme Court's opinion in the case of Heller v. D. C, authored by a notorious judicial activist, Justice Scalia, announces his intention to follow a rule of constitutional construction which dictates that the words of the Constitution should be understood in the sense they were normally and ordinarily used by ordinary citizens of the founding generation.

The Second Amendment provides: “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.” In interpreting this text, we are guided by the
principle that “[t]he Constitution was written to be understood
by the voters; its words and phrases were used in
their normal and ordinary as distinguished from technical
meaning.” United States v. Sprague, 282 U. S. 716, 731
(1931); see also Gibbons v. Ogden, 9 Wheat. 1, 188 (1824).
Normal meaning may of course include an idiomatic
meaning, but it excludes secret or technical meanings that
would not have been known to ordinary citizens in the
founding generation.

Scalia is mistaken. The meaning of the constitution must be ascertained by the application of such rules of interpretation as were understood and recognized as just and valid, at the time the constitution was framed and adopted. At the time the Constitution was made, the well established common law rules of construction didn't include any rule which dictated that a legal instrument was to be understood according the the normal and ordinary use of words by ordinary citizens of the generation that produced the instrument.

Scalia is an activist. He doesn't want to be bound by the rules of construction as were understood and recognized as just and valid, at the time the constitution was framed and adopted, because they won't produce results that square with his personal views.he wants. So, he digs up some nonsense he found in the dicta of an 1930's judicial opinion.

He does this merely to have a pretext to substitute his personal opinions for the will of the lawmakers at the time they made the Second Amendment, in the name of the normal and ordinary use of words by ordinary citizens.

[brett636]

Originally Posted by Jones

A little more detail:click

In addition handguns can't be taken out of the house, and must be stored unloaded and disassembled or with a triggerlock. They are basically trying to make it as big a pain in the ass as possible to own a handgun in D.C.

If I am not mistaken that is in direct violation of the court's orders. They could still require registration, but cannot dictate trigger locks or that the gun be disassembled.

[ZEB]

Best thing I can say is " My Guns Have Killed Less People Then Ted Kennedy's Car"

[over9five]

Originally Posted by brett636

If I am not mistaken that is in direct violation of the court's orders. They could still require registration, but cannot dictate trigger locks or that the gun be disassembled.

It IS in direct violation, but they are doing it anyway. Why this city won't let its citizens have the right of self defense is beyond me.

The NRA and Heller are taking the city back to court. See:

http://www.nraila.org/legislation/read.aspx?id=4118

DC is wasting millions of taxpayer dollars. They can't possibly think they are above the Supreme Court, can they?

[Jagger]

Originally Posted by over9five

It IS in direct violation, but they are doing it anyway. Why this city won't let its citizens have the right of self defense is beyond me.

The NRA and Heller are taking the city back to court. See:

http://www.nraila.org/legislation/read.aspx?id=4118

DC is wasting millions of taxpayer dollars. They can't possibly think they are above the Supreme Court, can they?

There's no right to self defense in the Constitution.

[tourists24]

Originally Posted by Jagger

There's no right to self defense in the Constitution.

well I guess you could use your guns as paperweights but me thinks they are a pretty good way of self defense. Hence, right to own guns. You go ahead and negotiate with the criminal; me I'll take my chances with my paperweight

[Jagger]

The methodology of interpretation used by Justice Antonin Scalia in the Heller opinion is probably not that which the lawmakers intended for him to use. Scalia states that he will interpret the text of the Second Amendment according to the "normal and ordinary" meanings that would been given it by "ordinary citizens in the founding generation."

Anyone knowledgeable of the common law in America in the late 1700's knows that it was well established law that the goal or object of interpreting laws was "the will of the legislator", not the understanding of "ordinary citizens." (See Blackstone's commentary on the "interpretation of laws" in his famous Commentaries on the Laws of England.)

Thomas Jefferson was a lawyer and would have known what the object of interpreting a law was when the Second Amendment was made. He was preaching it in 1812 to the Governor of Virginia.

The... maxims of the bench, to seek the will of the legislator and his words only, are proper... for judicial government.

--Thomas Jefferson to James Barbour, 1812. ME 13:128

[av8torntn]

"The constitutions of most of our States assert that all power is inherent in the people; that... it is their right and duty to be at all times armed."
--Thomas Jefferson to John Cartwright, 1824.


"No freeman shall be debarred the use of arms (within his own lands or tenements)."
--Thomas Jefferson: Draft Virginia Constitution with (his note added), 1776. Papers, 1:353

"None but an armed nation can dispense with a standing army. To keep ours armed and disciplined is therefore at all times important." --Thomas Jefferson, 1803


"Laws that forbid the carrying of arms… disarm only those who are neither inclined nor determined to commit crimes… Such laws make things worse for the assaulted and better for the assailants…” — Thomas Jefferson in “Commonplace Book,” 1774-1776

"Are we at last brought to such humiliating and debasing degradation, that we cannot be trusted with arms for our defense?"
- Thomas Jefferson

"The best we can hope for concerning the people at large is that they be properly armed."
- Alexander Hamilton, The Federalist Papers

"Americans have the right and advantage of being armed - unlike the citizens of other countries whose governments are afraid to trust the people with arms."
- James Madison, The Federalist Papers

"False is the idea of utility that sacrifices a thousand real advantages for one imaginary or trifling inconvenience; that would take fire from men because it burns, and water because one may drown in it; that has no remedy for evils except destruction. The laws that forbid the carrying of arms are laws of such a nature. They disarm only those who are neither inclined nor determined to commit crime."
- Cesare Beccaria, quoted by Thomas Jefferson

"As to the species of exercise, I advise the gun. While this gives [only] moderate exercise to the body, it gives boldness, enterprise, and independence to the mind. Games played with the ball and others of that nature, are too violent for the body and stamp no character on the mind. Let your gun, therefore, be the constant companion to your walks."
- Thomas Jefferson, letter to his teenaged nephew

"The right of the citizens to keep and bear arms has justly been considered, as the palladium of the liberties of a republic; since it offers a strong moral check against the usurpation and arbitrary power of rulers; and will generally, even if these are successful in the first instance, enable the people to resist and triumph over them."
- Joseph Story, Commentaries on the Constitution (1833)

"What country can preserve its liberties if its rulers are not warned from time to time that their people preserve the spirit of resistance? Let them take arms." --Thomas Jefferson to William Stephens Smith, 1787

[Jagger]

Originally Posted by av8torntn

"The constitutions of most of our States assert that all power is inherent in the people; that... it is their right and duty to be at all times armed."
--Thomas Jefferson to John Cartwright, 1824.

When was that statement added to the Constitution?

[Jagger]

Scalia’s methodology of Constitutional interpretation is dictated by the outcome he desires. He decides what he wants a word, term, phrase or clause to mean, finds a source that defines or uses the language in a way that squares with his desired outcome and then applies whatever rule of construction takes him to that source.

For example:

When interpreting the phrase “right of the people”, in D. C. v. Heller, Scalia ignores the “normal and ordinary meaning” of the words comprising the phrase, and instead relies exclusively on the context of the phrase. That is to say, he considers nothing but the way the phrase, and the word “people” is used in other parts of the Constitution and Bill of Rights. Recall that Scalia in the preceding paragraph, said he was going to construe the Constitution’s words and phrases as they were used in their "normal and ordinary meaning" by "ordinary citizens of the founding generation." Scalia said nothing whatsoever about establishing their meaning from the context.

However, when interpreting the word “arms”, Scalia ignores the context and the "normal and ordinary use" and relies on the way the word was used in a passage from Alexander Pope’s translation of Homer’s Iliad and by Timothy Cunningham in a passage from A new and complete Law Dictionary. Again, recall that Scalia said he was going to construe the Constitution’s words and phrases according to their "normal and ordinary" use by "ordinary citizens of the founding generation." Homer and Timothy Cunningham weren’t ordinary American citizens of the founding generation.

Scalia doesn't even follow his own espoused principle of construction. He uses whatever rule of construction will produce the meaning he wants.

[av8torntn]

Originally Posted by Jagger

When was that statement added to the Constitution?

You might want to re read the quote he does not say that.

[tourists24]

Quote: