Right to Bear Arms vs Militia vs Standing Army

[No Free Beer]

I was debating a friend of mine via email over 'gun control' and the 2nd Amendment.

I stated quite effectively that the Right of the citizens to bear arms shall no be infringed.

My friend said it had to do with government and not the people. I followed up by commenting on the fallacy of his logic:

"Are you saying that the government put regulations/limits on the weapons/ammunition...on the government?"

We went further into what militia means and how it applies to individual citizens. Also, that the Framers were against a standing army.

He then wrote the following:

You've convinced me;

The founders feared ANY standing army, and favored instead a 'well armed militia' of citizen soldiers.

It is why they wrote:

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.

So my question is, as an originalist, will Paul call for the disbanding of the standing army, navy, air force, marine corp, coast guard and national guard and call instead for the rearming of citizen soldiers militia's as YOU so dramatically stated the founders wanted?

You can't have it both ways!

If you agree we need an armed forces as currently constituted, than the need for well regulated militia's ends and with it the individual right to bear arms.

Remember, the Supreme Court once wrote:

In United States v. Cruikshank, 92 U.S. 542 (1875), the Supreme Court ruled that "[bearing arms for a lawful purpose] is not a right granted by the Constitution".

If a well regulated Militia, IS NO LONGER necessary to the security of a free State, THEN the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, CAN be infringed.

It's an interesting point. What do you think?

[Anti Federalist]

It's an interesting point. What do you think?

That the Second Amendment is designed to protect two rights, just like almost all the other articles in the Bill of Rights, from government infringement.

The right of citizens to form "well regulated", meaning well trained, citizen militias.

The right of the people to keep and bear arms, for any purpose.

State constitutions frequently spell out these rights even more clearly.

[heavenlyboy34]

Ultimately, the constitution is just a document. Unless "The People" can outgun the gov'ment, they can (and will) do anything they damn well please in practice.

[Anti Federalist]

Ultimately, the constitution is just a document. Unless "The People" can outgun the gov'ment, they can (and will) do anything they damn well please in practice.

Borne out in fact.

[phill4paul]

So my question is, as an originalist, will Paul call for the disbanding of the standing army, navy, air force, marine corp, coast guard and national guard and call instead for the rearming of citizen soldiers militia's as YOU so dramatically stated the founders wanted?

Article 1 section 8 enumerated powers:

To raise and support Armies, but no Appropriation of Money to that Use shall be for a longer Term than two Years;
To provide and maintain a Navy;


In United States v. Cruikshank, 92 U.S. 542 (1875), the Supreme Court ruled that "[bearing arms for a lawful purpose] is not a right granted by the Constitution".

The Constitution does not grant any rights. Rights are naturally inherent. The Bill of Rights are restrictions placed on the federal government in recognition of the naturally inherent rights.

[mrsat_98]

The founders feared ANY standing army, and favored instead a 'well armed militia' of citizen soldiers.

It is why they wrote:

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.

So my question is, as an originalist, will Paul call for the disbanding of the standing army, navy, air force, marine corp, coast guard and national guard and call instead for the rearming of citizen soldiers militia's as YOU so dramatically stated the founders wanted?



Depending on the context used definitions of words change. One word I notice no one really keys on in the second amendment is "State" which sometimes means condition of person. Read again with this in mind reas.... being necessary to the security of a free condition of person" . Think about it.

Currently standing army is your LEO's under (war) emergency powers from the bankruptcy in 1933. They vote to continue this puppy every two years. Recall Monica Lewinsky. There was a rather large uproar over emergency powers as it had recently been documented and released among the patriot community.

http://www.barefootsworld.net/war_ep.html

Monicia provided a distraction and these dubious emergency powers didn't get looked into. Do away with this contrived emergency and a lot of our issues will be solved.

[No Free Beer]

bump

[WM_in_MO]

Didnt the militia act make all of us members my default?

[otherone]

You've bumped your topic, so I figure I'll chime in. Ask your friend what an "unalienable" Right is. And instead of parsing constitutional language, ask him what the purpose of gun "control" is.

[pcosmar]

The Constitution does not grant any rights. Rights are naturally inherent. The Bill of Rights are restrictions placed on the federal government in recognition of the naturally inherent rights.

Slight correction.
It was restrictions placed on Government. Any government and all government.
States agreed to these restrictions when they ratified the Constitution.

Warrants,, Trials,, free speech , etc. apply to all. as does the 2nd amendment.

[bolil]

Specious.

[osan]

So my question is, as an originalist, will Paul call for the disbanding of the standing army, navy, air force, marine corp, coast guard and national guard and call instead for the rearming of citizen soldiers militia's as YOU so dramatically stated the founders wanted?

In principle this is so. In reality it will not happen.


You can't have it both ways!

Either/or fallacy. FAIL.

Contradicted by empirical observation. FAIL.

One most certainly can have it both ways. We have it both ways right now as there exists the standing army and hundreds of militias.


If you agree we need an armed forces as currently constituted, than the need for well regulated militia's ends and with it the individual right to bear arms.

Either/or fallacy. FAIL.

The existence of a standing army does not obviate the need for a militia. Indeed, it can be well argued that such a presence in fact increases the need of said militia.

Nonsequitur. FAIL.

The RKBA does not predicate upon the existence of a militia but rather upon the individual right to life, and the rights that derive directly, axiomatically, and apodictically therefrom, most notably the right to private property.

If I hold a claim to my life, then it follows immediately that I hold title to that life as property, for what else could it be? Thereby is the right to private property established. So holding, it follows immediately that I also hold the right to defend that property against violation at the hands of any third party agency. The most obvious agents are other human beings who might attempt to remove life from me, cause me bodily injury, imprison me, or force me to act and/or accept other imposed conditions to which I do not willingly accede.

Other agents would include non-human causes such as fires, earthquakes, lightning strikes, drowning, poisons, being killed or maimed by non-human creatures such as large predatory cats, just to name a very small list of examples.

Our personal claims to life, being equal to those of all other living beings, combined with the inescapable fact that in the very fabric of life there exists this conflict of interest between living individuals (e.g. hungry lion needs to eat other living beings to preserve its life), it follows so very intuitively that if one's life is to continue as desired, then one will likely be called upon to defend himself against aggression against his life. This is plainly observable in every corner of the planet, bar none. There is no place observable where living beings simply surrender their lives to the whim of agents of other species or even their own. Every living thing struggles in its own ways to survive and that struggle constitutes prima facie empirical proof of the existence of the right to defend oneself from violation from any cause whatsoever.

If I am not entitled to defend myself against violation and other harms at the hands of another human being, why then would I be so entitled to do so against the depredation of a mountain lion? Why would I hold the right to avoid being harmed by a boulder rolling down a mountainside as I hiked a trail? Why would I hold the right to take any action whatsoever in defense and preservation of my life? If I hold no right to defend myself from violation at the hands of my fellow human beings, then one becomes hard-pressed to reason how it is I suddenly hold this right in defense against the action and circumstance of non-human agents.

If we take the premise that we have no right to self defense against violation to its logically absurd conclusion, then we have no right to forage for food as this is an action in defense of life. Likewise, we have no right to provide for ourselves shelter, clothing, and so forth. The ultimate conclusion to which we must arrive is that we have no right to life itself. By this contradiction have we just arrived at the most monumental proof of the right to keep and bear arms in the history of humanity.

If we accept the Cardinal Postulate that states,

0. All men hold equal Claims to Life. (see essay (http://freedomisobvious.blogspot.com/2010/12/common-principles-of-free-living.html))

then the right to keep and bear the means of preserving the life to which we each hold title follows with invincible force, meaning that the right cannot be credibly counter-argued. Note my use of "the means". Food is a means of preserving life against malnutrition and disease. Shelter is a means of preserving life against the deleterious effects of the elements and other agents including human beings. Clothing is a means of preserving life against injuries and heat loss, all of which serve as agents by which life is threatened with harm and extinction.

Identically, weapons are a means of preserving life against the depredations of other living creatures that might injure, maim, or even kill oneself in an immediate and physically violent manner including the theft and destruction of property.

The greatest such predatory threat facing any human being is another human being.


Remember, the Supreme Court once wrote:

In United States v. Cruikshank, 92 U.S. 542 (1875), the Supreme Court ruled that "[bearing arms for a lawful purpose] is not a right granted by the Constitution".

Let us set aside the fact that what the SCOTUS writes is irrelevant to principled argument, wherein they may be right or wrong in their conclusions. The meaning of the quote may be correct or not depending on its precise use of words. If we assume correct usage, then the quote is indeed correct because the Constitution grants nothing. Specifically, the Second Amendment confers no right to keep and bear arms, individually or otherwise, but rather recognizes the preexisting right that follows as per the discussion, above.


If a well regulated Militia, IS NO LONGER necessary to the security of a free State, THEN the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, CAN be infringed.


Nonsequitur as the right to keep and bear arms, more broadly stated as the right to the means of defending property, is not predicated upon the necessity for a militia or any other arbitrarily contrived condition. Grand logic FAIL.


It's an interesting point. What do you think?

Interesting? More like as painfully boring, trite, and clapped out as a Hollywood celebrity. The only interesting element here, MAYBE, is the fact that anyone so ignorant and ill-adept in the use of reason is able to get from one day to the next without accidentally killing himself for sheer ineptitude.

I have here gifted thee with the means by which thou may'st now go boldly forth and demolish the pathetically weak "argument" of thine antagonist. Go thee then and slay ye the dragon which hobbleth so pathetically upon three legs, its fire quiesced with the infirmity of lameness, its roar reduced to a gurgling squeak by endless age. Do ye him the good mercy and place his agony at an end for it is God's Commandment that ye suffer not the agony of another when thou hast the remedy at hand.

[pcosmar]

I have here gifted thee with the means by which thou may'st now go boldly forth and demolish the pathetically weak "argument" of thine antagonist. Go thee then and slay ye the dragon which hobbleth so pathetically upon three legs, its fire quiesced with the infirmity of lameness, its roar reduced to a gurgling squeak by endless age. Do ye him the good mercy and place his agony at an end for it is God's Commandment that ye suffer not the agony of another when thou hast the remedy at hand.

A well deserved +rep

[Anti Federalist]

Interesting? More like painfully boring, trite, and clapped out as a Hollywood celebrity. The only interesting element here, MAYBE, is the fact that anyone so ignorant and ill-adept in the use of reason is able to get from one day to the next without accidentally killing himself for sheer ineptitude.

I have here gifted thee with the means by which thou may'st now go boldly forth and demolish the pathetically weak "argument" of thine antagonist. Go thee then and slay ye the dragon which hobbleth so pathetically upon three legs, its fire quiesced with the infirmity of lameness, its roar reduced to a gurgling squeak by endless age. Do ye him the good mercy and place his agony at an end for it is God's Commandment that ye suffer not the agony of another when thou hast the remedy at hand.

Well, goddamn, I don't know what to make of such oratorical skill displayed so early in my day.

Well done, sir, well done.

http://cdn.bleacherreport.net/images_root/article/media_slots/photos/000/760/085/applause-gif-tumblr-47_original.gif

[Wolfgang Bohringer]

The federal 2nd Amendment is a gun control statute directed against the federal government, just as nearly each of the state constitutions severely limited guns in the hands of the state governments:

Virginia's version (1776):


SEC. 13. That a well-regulated militia, composed of the body of the people, trained to arms, is the proper, natural, and safe defense of a free state; that standing armies, in time of peace, should be avoided as dangerous to liberty; and that in all cases the military should be under strict subordination to, and governed by, the civil power.

Maryland's (1776):


Art. 28. That a well regulated Militia is the proper and natural defence of a free Government.

Art. 29. That Standing Armies are dangerous to liberty, and ought not to be raised, or kept up, without the consent of the Legislature.

There is nothing more dangerous than a government with guns. This is why nearly ALL of America's original state and federal bills of rights reserve the right of bearing and using arms only to the people and do NOT delegate such a power to the state, just as the power to judge law and fact and punish criminals is reserved to the people's juries and NOT delegated to the government.

Jefferson in a letter to Francis Hopkinson (March 13, 1789):


...a [federal] bill of rights [must] secure freedom in religion, freedom of the press, [and] freedom from a permanent military...

[fisharmor]

If a well regulated Militia, IS NO LONGER necessary to the security of a free State, THEN the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, CAN be infringed.

It's an interesting point. What do you think?

I think his argument chokes and dies on the word "free".