quote:

ORIGINAL: Lordandmaster

You're operating according to your own definitions.  What's a "personal weapon"?  The word "arms" doesn't imply any distinction between personal and impersonal.  Is a bazooka a "personal weapon"?  I'm curious to know where you draw the line--and, more importantly, why you draw the line wherever you draw it.  Because it's clear that even you believe there's a line that has to be drawn somewhere.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Lordandmaster
You're operating according to your own definitions.  What's a "personal weapon"?  The word "arms" doesn't imply any distinction between personal and impersonal.  Is a bazooka a "personal weapon"?  I'm curious to know where you draw the line--and, more importantly, why you draw the line wherever you draw it.  Because it's clear that even you believe there's a line that has to be drawn somewhere.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Sinergy
I found it odd about the dictionary comment about what an arm is (firearms) since half the weapons we currently have were not even invented when the 2nd Amendment was written.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Sinergy
Preventing me from owning my own tactical nuke is a violation of my rights, as enumerated in the 2nd Amendment of the Bill of Rights.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Sinergy
Which isnt to say I want to be the first on my block with a fully armed and loaded Abrams M1A1 tank, but the amendment was written to prevent government abuse of power.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Sicarius

quote:

ORIGINAL: Lordandmaster
You're operating according to your own definitions.  What's a "personal weapon"?  The word "arms" doesn't imply any distinction between personal and impersonal.  Is a bazooka a "personal weapon"?  I'm curious to know where you draw the line--and, more importantly, why you draw the line wherever you draw it.  Because it's clear that even you believe there's a line that has to be drawn somewhere.

Well, I believe that when the framers wrote it, they meant firearms.  I would categorize a firearm as a personal weapon ... an easily man-portable device that can be operated by a single individual that sends a piece of ordnance down range toward a target.  I think that you're going to have a problem if you're trying to argue that the long rifles that were used in the War of Independence were not just as lethal (if not more lethal) than a handgun with the one exception of magazine capacity.  The range and accuracy are actually better, in most cases.  I think that for the sake of practicality, the line should be drawn at "bullets."  I do not believe that individuals should be toting around bazookas, no.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Lordandmaster
Whatever the framers thought it means doesn't matter very much, because we don't use the framers' intentions (and I'll grant the whole argument over whether we can even know them) to decide the limitations of, say, free speech.  Going by the framers' supposed intent is a discredited theory of adjudication.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Lordandmaster
Anyway, regarding the Second Amendment: "An an easily man-portable device that can be operated by a single individual that sends a piece of ordnance down range toward a target."  A bazooka fits that description pretty nicely.  (In fact, that's the purpose of a bazooka.)

quote:

ORIGINAL: Lordandmaster
"Bullets" isn't a good criterion either.  Nerve gas doesn't require bullets--or you can use bullets with nerve gas pellets.  Or are you saying that we're not permitted to bear arms unless they require bullets?  That doesn't make sense either.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Lordandmaster
Incidentally, we seem to have tacitly agreed that the Second Amendment doesn't say anything about bearing CONCEALED weapons.  Nor does it institute the right to bear arms for the purpose of personal protection.  It's specifically for the purpose of maintaining a militia.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Sicarius

Amendment II:  "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."

See the comma there after "State?"  That's dividing the sentence.  Being that a well regulated militia is necessary for the security of a free State ... ... ... the right of the People to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed (so that they may overthrow the militia in the event that another revolution is required).

quote:

ORIGINAL: Sicarius

quote:

ORIGINAL: Sinergy
I found it odd about the dictionary comment about what an arm is (firearms) since half the weapons we currently have were not even invented when the 2nd Amendment was written.

They're based on the exact same principles, Sinergy.  You're igniting gunpowder behind an unguided chunk of metal and propelling it through a barrel from a man-portable device.  You're seriously going to try to draw a keen distinction between the long rifles used in the War for Independence and the hunting rifles used today, save for being improved some?

quote:

ORIGINAL: Sinergy
Preventing me from owning my own tactical nuke is a violation of my rights, as enumerated in the 2nd Amendment of the Bill of Rights.

I love that you see no problem in likening my comparison between two types of firearms (a rifle and a handgun) with a jump from rifles to fissionable materials triggering atomic reactions.  If you don't see what a desperate attempt this is, I don't know what more can be discussed.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Sinergy
Which isnt to say I want to be the first on my block with a fully armed and loaded Abrams M1A1 tank, but the amendment was written to prevent government abuse of power.

In that case, the tank would be armed and you would be controlling the tank.  You even said in your statement a "fully armed" one ... and here, the distinction becomes very apparent.  You're attacking me, but it's right under your nose in common usage.  You arm the platform.  Individual arms are such because they "arm" the individual.

-Sicarius

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ORIGINAL: farglebargle

I think you're looking too closely at that Amendment.

[...]

The 2nd Amendment says, "You wanna be secure, do it your fucking self".

quote:

ORIGINAL: Lordandmaster

Same thing as what I just wrote above.  Strange how gun-control opponents seem to think it's everyone ELSE'S obligation to put an end to murder.  There's always going to be murder.  Gun-control opponents recognize that too.  If you're going to object to any idea that doesn't bring about an end to murder, you're going to object to every policy on earth.

quote:

The question (at least in America) is: How do you limit people's capacity to commit murder without objectionably infringing on their Constitutional rights?  I don't believe the right to carry a handgun whenever and however you choose is found anywhere in the Constitution, so for me the question is really pretty simple.  Nor am I persuaded, obviously, by the argument that widespread handgun ownership would reduce crime.  As I pointed out in the other thread, by that argument, you'd be in favor of removing handgun restrictions on commercial aircraft as well.  If someone tried to hijack the plane, you'd just have everyone whip out their Glocks and blow him away.  When a few people immediately (and predictably, I suppose) announced that they oppose handgun restrictions on airplanes, I declared that conversation over.

quote:

ORIGINAL: farglebargle

I think you're looking too closely at that Amendment.

Let me offer this. Perhaps they were less afraid of the Federal Government then they were of a strong Police force.

If you're armed, you're not going to call 911, then wait for the coroner to toe-tag you after the intruder kills you.

You're going to take the initiative and do whatever is necessary TO ENSURE YOUR OWN SAFETY.

The 2nd Amendment says, "You wanna be secure, do it your fucking self".

quote:

ORIGINAL: Lordandmaster
OK, congratulations, you've given me Sicarius's interpretation of the Second Amendment.  I'll just say this: if you're really interested in determining the framers' intentions, as you claim to be, you'll have to abandon that interpretation.  Find out what the word "militia" means, for one thing.  It does NOT refer to the military organ of a state.  In fact, that's exactly what it DOESN'T mean.

quote:

ORIGINAL: James_Madison
Let a regular army, fully equal to the resources of the country, be formed; and let it be entirely at the devotion of the federal government; still it would not be going too far to say, that the State governments, with the people on their side, would be able to repel the danger.  The highest number to which, according to the best computation, a standing army can be carried in any country, does not exceed one hundredth of the whole number of souls; or one twenty-fifth part of the number able to bear arms.  This proportion would not yield, in the United States, an army of more than twenty-five or thirty thousand men.  To these would be opposed a militia amounting to near half a million of citizens with arms in their hands, officered by men chosen from among themselves, fighting for their common liberties, and united and conducted by governments possessing their affections and confidence.  It may well be doubted, whether a militia thus circumstanced could ever be conquered by such a proportion of regular troops.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Noah_Webster
Tyranny is the exercise of some power over a man, which is not warranted by law, or necessary for the public safety.  A people can never be deprived of their liberties while they retain their own hands, a power sufficient to any power in the state.

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ORIGINAL: Noah_Webster
Another source of power in government is a military force.  But this, to be efficient, must be superior to any force that exists among the people, or which they can command; for otherwise this force would be annihilated, on the first exercise of acts of oppression.  Before a standing army can rule, the people must be disarmed; as they are in almost every kingdom in Europe.  The supreme power in America cannot enforce unjust laws by the sword; because the whole body of the people are armed, and constitute a force superior to any band of regular troops that can be, on any pentence, raised in the United States.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Alexander_Hamilton
The power of regulating the militia, and of commanding its services in times of insurrection and invasion are natural incidents to the duties of superintending the common defense, and of watching over the internal peace of the Confederacy.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Sicarius

Can I ask you a point blank question, before I respond?  I've been relatively courteous and polite to you, but every chance you get you're approaching this discussion with an unbecoming chip on your shoulder.  What the hell is your problem?

quote:

ORIGINAL: Lordandmaster

I knew it wouldn't be long before you lost control of yourself.

Conversation over.  You may declare victory, if that makes you feel better about yourself.

quote:

There is something so far-fetched and so extravagant in the idea of danger to liberty from the militia, that one is at a loss whether to treat it with gravity or with raillery; whether to consider it as a mere trial of skill, like the paradoxes of rhetoricians; as a disingenuous artifice to instil prejudices at any price; or as the serious offspring of political fanaticism. Where in the name of common-sense, are our fears to end if we may not trust our sons, our brothers, our neighbors, our fellow-citizens? What shadow of danger can there be from men who are daily mingling with the rest of their countrymen and who participate with them in the same feelings, sentiments, habits and interests?

quote:

If there should be an army to be made use of as the engine of despotism, what need of the militia? If there should be no army, whither would the militia, irritated by being called upon to undertake a distant and hopeless expedition, for the purpose of riveting the chains of slavery upon a part of their countrymen, direct their course, but to the seat of the tyrants, who had meditated so foolish as well as so wicked a project, to crush them in their imagined intrenchments of power, and to make them an example of the just vengeance of an abused and incensed people?

quote:

ORIGINAL: Sicarius

You attacked me over a point where it can very substantially be argued that in the scheme of history, you were wrong.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Lordandmaster
I didn't attack YOU; I attacked what you were saying, since it was uninformed.  (You, on the other hand, attacked me.)

quote:

ORIGINAL: Lordandmaster
Your examples from the Revolutionary War show that your own interpretation of the Second Amendment cannot be correct.  The framers could not have intended that amendment to mean that people should arm themselves in order to protect themselves against the state if they used the word "militia."  A militia is a paramilitary organization of private citizens that bears arms in times of crisis.  That's what it means today, and that's what it meant in the eighteenth century, too.  It is precisely NOT a state military organ.  When states are poor and need to bolster their militaries, they're naturally quick to expropriate militias and combine them, as best they can, with their regular armies, because it's a way of unloading the main costs of maintaining a military onto private citizens.  That's why we had militias in the Revolutionary War (and the Civil War, for that matter, too).

quote:

ORIGINAL: Lordandmaster

quote:

There is something so far-fetched and so extravagant in the idea of danger to liberty from the militia, that one is at a loss whether to treat it with gravity or with raillery; whether to consider it as a mere trial of skill, like the paradoxes of rhetoricians; as a disingenuous artifice to instil prejudices at any price; or as the serious offspring of political fanaticism. Where in the name of common-sense, are our fears to end if we may not trust our sons, our brothers, our neighbors, our fellow-citizens? What shadow of danger can there be from men who are daily mingling with the rest of their countrymen and who participate with them in the same feelings, sentiments, habits and interests?

Funny how you didn't bother to quote that.  "DAILY MINGLING with the rest of their countrymen."  That's not an army.  That's an organization of private citizens.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Lordandmaster
Obviously, he's distinguishing between the army and the militia.  I'd call that proof that the militia is not the army.  But all you'd really have to do is look at Article I, Section 8, of the Constitution, which also distinguishes between the army and the militia.

quote:

ORIGINAL: ArticleI_Section8
To provide for calling forth the Militia to execute the Laws of the Union, suppress Insurrections and repel Invasions;

To provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining, the Militia, and for governing such Part of them as may be employed in the Service of the United States, reserving to the States respectively, the Appointment of the Officers, and the Authority of training the Militia according to the discipline prescribed by Congress

quote:

With obvious purpose to assure the continuation and render possible the effectiveness of such forces the declaration and guarantee of the Second Amendment were made. It must be interpreted and applied with that end in view.  The Militia which the States were expected to maintain and train is set in contrast with Troops which they were forbidden to keep without the consent of Congress. The sentiment of the time strongly disfavored standing armies; the common view was that adequate defense of country and laws could be secured through the Militia- civilians primarily, soldiers on occasion.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Sicarius

Right there you have the crux of my entire argument laid out!  That portion of the Constitution is what took the "militia" of that era (in your view of what it was) and took the first steps of turning it into what the National Guard is today!  Read the words.  It gives the Congress permission to call forth the Militia to execute the Laws of the Union and to suppress insurrections.  It is basically saying that they are taking the standing Militias that fought in the Revolutionary War and regulating, arming, and discplining them so that they may be employed in the service of the government.  This is exactly what the Anti-Federalists were afraid of and why they didn't want to ratify the Constitution!

Are you disputing the well-documented motives of the Anti-Federalists?  It is very well known what they were afraid of and why they insisted on the drafting of the Bill of Rights before the Constitution could be ratified.  They wanted to insert protections against this exact thing by arming the people of the United States to resist what the Congress was seizing control of.