Second Amendment and Rules of Construction

Discussion in 'Politics' started by Jick Magger, Oct 5, 2008.

  1. pjdude1219 The biscuit has risen Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    16,479
    Which shows your not getting what i am arguing. I am not arguing that the 2nd admendment protects an individual right but I am arguing that as well as the individual right their are implied collective rights as well. The reason I don't mention the individual right aspect is that I don't see the point in rearguing what in my opinion is a forgone conclusion. The framers were smart people. They wouldn't have left the implied collective rights language with out good reason. Look while the phrase For the people clearly indicates a individual right the word militia no matter how you cut implies a group combined with the phrase bear arms after to keep is also telling considering the phrase was used by congress in that time period to refer to using weapons in a military context.


    as for my arguement being lame and disproven no has attempted to disprove what my actual point is. They have disproven what they think it is. Be entire arguement is based on language used to refer to a group of people as a whole and that shouldn't be ignored. I'm trying to push people to look at the entire thing and not just the rights of the people partI'll admit with little success. ok none.).


    I'm sorry you feel the way you do but ignoring 75% of the words in the admendment isn't rational or intelligent.
     
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  3. Buffalo Roam Registered Senior Member

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    And not understanding 100% of the Second Amendment is criminal.

    Why are you sorry? your the one who doesn't understand the Second Amendment, and is trying to spin it to agree with your point of view, in contravention of all the Founding Fathers, now that is sorry.

    Now if your interpretation is correct, and as intended as any type of collective right produce:

    1. Quote

    2. New Paper

    3. Federalist Paper

    That support your supposition.

    Then why are you arguing with me?

    And guess what, the collective rights is just what the anti gunners are arguing, that it is only a collective right.

    But the right of the people is still a absolute individual right, the absolute collective right and has nothing to do with the States having a right.

    That is in the preamble clause,

    “ A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free State"

    What right is collective to the state? No right is stated for the state, so no collective right is given, there is nothing even giving the State the Right to Raise a Militia, it is the People who raise the Militia, Arm the Militia, Command the Militia, and decide if the State is right in calling out the Militia.

    When read alone the preamble in the Second Amendment makes no sense on it's own,

    “ A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free State"

    Were does it go and how does it achieve a free state?

    It alone cannot bear arms, with out the People, and the People are the ones guaranteed the Arms, and People are individuals, so no collective right to the State.

    So we still have a Individual Right, nothing collective about it.

    The last point why the National Guard is not a Militia is that it was raised by Congressional action:

    10 U.S.C. 311(a).

    Title 32 U.S.C. in July 1918
     
    Last edited: Oct 12, 2008
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  5. Buffalo Roam Registered Senior Member

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    This is why the National Guard is not a Militia, this is the Federal Law, deconstructing the Militia, and in stead institution a Federal Force called the National Guard under control of the Federal Government, subject to inspection and regulation of the Federal Government, and paid by the Federal Government, a standing Army, Drawing the Queens Shilling.

    The personel requirements of the National Guard, set by the Federal Government, the Guard is a Federal Entity, it's structure is controled by the Federal Government, so it is not a State Militia.

    THIS TITLE WAS ENACTED BY ACT AUG. 10, 1956, CH. 1041, SEC. 2, 70A
    STAT. 596
    Chap. Sec.
    1. Organization 101
    3. Personnel 301
    5. Training 501
    7. Service, Supply, and Procurement 701
    Table Showing Disposition of All Sections of Former Title 32


    CHAPTER 32 - OFFICER STRENGTH AND DISTRIBUTION IN GRADE

    -MISC1-
    Sec.
    521. Authority to prescribe total strengths of officers on active
    duty and officer strengths in various categories.
    522. Authorized total strengths: regular commissioned officers on
    active duty.
    523. Authorized strengths: commissioned officers on active duty in
    grades of major, lieutenant colonel, and colonel and Navy grades
    of lieutenant commander, commander, and captain.
    524. Authorized strengths: reserve officers on active duty or on
    full-time National Guard duty for administration of the reserves
    or the National Guard in grades of major, lieutenant colonel, and
    colonel and Navy grades of lieutenant commander, commander, and
    captain.
    525. Distribution of commissioned officers on active duty in
    general officer and flag officer grades.
    526. Authorized strength: general and flag officers on active duty.
    527. Authority to suspend sections 523, 524, 525, and 526.
    AMENDMENTS
    1988 - Pub. L. 100-370, Sec. 1(b)(3), July 19, 1988, 102 Stat.
    840, struck out former item 526 'Authority to suspend sections 523,
    524, and 525', and added items 526 and 527.
    1984 - Pub. L. 98-525, title IV, Sec. 414(a)(4)(B)(ii), inserted
    references to the National Guard and to full-time National Guard
    duty in item 524.
     
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  7. Jick Magger Registered Senior Member

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    38
    The word "militia" in the Second Amendment means "a body of the people trained to fight [as a military force]", because that's what the "subject matter" says it is; and the word "people" in the Amendment means the same thing, because when the parts of a law don't coincide, the means is sacrificed to the end.

    The protection afforded by the right to keep and bear arms applies only to the people in a well regulated body of people trained to fight.

    I'll whip any one who says I'm wrong.
     
  8. iceaura Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    30,994
    You are wrong, and leaning almost to the opposite of the plain meaning of the words. A militia is specifically not a standing body of trained fighters under formal, legal command. At the time of the writing of the Constitution, a militia was an assembly of citizens, bearing their own weapons, from a variety of training backgrounds including none whatsoever, choosing their own leadership, formed in response to need. It was one step above a posse. Since then the term has been expanded greatly to include entities, such as the National Guard of the US, that would have been the best trained and equipped armies in the world in 1776. Regardless of whether you think such an expansion is justified (I don't. The Guard is not a militia), it is recent, and the Constitution certainly did not anticipate such revisions of the meanings of its words.
    As a state's rights issue, it was settled en masse with the other state's rights issues of the Bill of Rights - Freedom of speech, of the press, etc.
     
  9. Baron Max Registered Senior Member

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    23,053
    Then why did they even bother to include that little statement about "individuals" if they didn't mean "individuuals"?

    Baron Max
     
  10. Jick Magger Registered Senior Member

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    38
    It is a fundamental rule of common sense and a basic principle of Constitutional Interpretation that words are to be generally understood according to their usual and most know signification at the time the document was made. (See Blackstone's Commentaries on the Laws of England, Page 59.)

    At the time the Constitution was made, the usual and most known significations of the word militia, according to Dr. Johnson's Dictionary (1787 edition), was "train-bands" and "the standing force of a nation." It was not, as you allege, "an assembly of citizens, bearing their own weapons, from a variety of training backgrounds including none whatsoever, choosing their own leadership, formed in response to need."
     
    Last edited: Oct 14, 2008
  11. Jick Magger Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    38
    Huh? The word "individual" isn't even in the Second Amendment.
     
  12. Buffalo Roam Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    16,931
    Look at the definitions, and the meaning of Militia becomes clear, the Militia is the People, and not in National or Federal Service, and not professional soldiers.

    The National Guard is not a Militia because it created and abide's under Federal Regulation, and does not answer to the People, or the State, but to the Federal Government.

    mi·li·tia /mɪˈlɪʃə/ Pronunciation Key - Show Spelled Pronunciation[mi-lish-uh] Pronunciation Key - Show IPA Pronunciation
    –noun

    1. a body of citizens enrolled for military service, and called out periodically for drill but serving full time only in emergencies.
    2. a body of citizen soldiers as distinguished from professional soldiers.
    3. all able-bodied males considered by law eligible for military service.
    4. a body of citizens organized in a paramilitary group and typically regarding themselves as defenders of individual rights against the presumed interference of the federal government.

    mil·i·tar·y /ˈmɪlɪˌtɛri/ Pronunciation Key - Show Spelled Pronunciation[mil-i-ter-ee] Pronunciation Key - Show IPA Pronunciation adjective, noun, plural -tar·ies, -tar·y.
    –adjective

    1. of, for, or pertaining to the army or armed forces, often as distinguished from the navy: from civilian to military life.
    2. of, for, or pertaining to war: military preparedness.
    3. of or pertaining to soldiers.
    4. befitting, characteristic of, or noting a soldier: a military bearing.
    5. following the life of a soldier: a military career.
    6. performed by soldiers: military duty.

    ar·my /ˈɑrmi/ Pronunciation Key - Show Spelled Pronunciation[ahr-mee] Pronunciation Key - Show IPA Pronunciation
    –noun, plural -mies.

    1. the military forces of a nation, exclusive of the navy and in some countries the air force.
    2. (in large military land forces) a unit consisting typically of two or more corps and a headquarters.
    3. a large body of persons trained and armed for war.

    na·vy /ˈneɪvi/ Pronunciation Key - Show Spelled Pronunciation[ney-vee] Pronunciation Key - Show IPA Pronunciation
    –noun, plural -vies.

    1. the whole body of warships and auxiliaries belonging to a country or ruler.
    2. (often initial capital letter) the complete body of such warships together with their officers and enlisted personnel, equipment, yards, etc., constituting the sea power of a nation.
    3. (often initial capital letter) the department of government charged with its management.
     
  13. spidergoat pubic diorama Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    54,036
    Basically, the constitution says whatever it's modern interpreters think it says. It's up to the Supreme Court.
     
  14. iceaura Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    30,994
    With all due respect to Dr Johnson, the word "militia" was in common use in America at the time, by the writers of the Constitution and all their associates, and what it referred to is easily ascertained -

    and it wasn't the "standing force of a nation".

    I have no idea what "train-bands" means - perhaps that is the category under which the various town and county and district and local watershed militias that populated the countryside would fall.
     
  15. Jick Magger Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    38
    At the time the U. S. Constitution was made, it was well established that words in a constitution were generally to be understood according to their usual and most know significations. What was the usual signification of "militia" in 1787-1789?
     
  16. Jick Magger Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    38
    I am sure the word "militia" was used many times, by many people, to signify many different ideas or intellectual concepts. However, common sense and the rules of construction in the 1780's, dictated that words in a constitution were generally to be understood according to their usual and most known signification.

    According to the 1787 edition of A Dictionary of the English Language, it was.

    That's because you're not well informed regarding the King's English (circa 1780's).
     
  17. Buffalo Roam Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    16,931
    The People, and not a standing Army.

    And as defined by:

    George Mason IV (December 11, 1725 – October 7, 1792) was a United States patriot, statesman, and delegate from Virginia to the U.S. Constitutional Convention. Along with James Madison, he is called the "Father of the Bill of Rights".[1][2][3][4] For all of these reasons he is considered to be one of the "Founding Fathers" of the United States.[5][6]

    From the Virginia Debates on the ratification of the Constitution, George Mason speaking at the Time and writing of the constitution::

    "I ask, sir, what is the militia? It is the whole people, except for a few public officials."
    — George Mason, in Debates in Virginia Convention on
    Ratification of the Constitution, Elliot, Vol. 3, June 16, 1788


    So if you are serving the Public, the State, you are not in the Militia, only the people can serve in the Militia, as expressed in 1778


    The Founding Fathers knew the difference between the Militia and the Military, and that difference was expressed by the words the Right of the People, not the right of the State, and Not the Right of the Government.

    All Rights not specifically granted to the State or the Government were inalienable rights of the People, and it is those same People who the Founding Fathers gave the Right to Keep and Bear arms, not the State, or they would have said so, and definitely not the Federal Government.

    The State cannot bear arms, so if it was meant as a State Right, how does a State bear Arms?


    “ The Militia Act of 1903 resulted in the creation of the modern National Guard Bureau which is the federal instrument responsible for the administration of the National Guard of the United States established by the United States Congress as a joint bureau of the Department of the Army and the Department of the Air Force. It holds a unique status as both a staff and operation agency ”

    “ The 1903 act, which gave Federal status to the militia. Under this legislation the organized militia of the States was required to conform to Regular Army organization within five years. The act also required National Guard units to attend 24 drills and five days annual training a year, and, for the first time, provided for pay for annual training. In return for the increased Federal funding which the act made available, militia units were subject to inspection by Regular Army officers, and had to meet certain standards. ”
     
  18. spidergoat pubic diorama Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    54,036
    And yet when someone actually acts this out, they get painted as among the worst criminals in the world (Ayers).
     
  19. Buffalo Roam Registered Senior Member

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    16,931
    Ayers was a criminal, he attacked innocent people, he did nothing to affect change in the Government, because he never attacked any thing of the Government that would have effected a change, terrorist bombings are still terrorist bombings, and he was defending nothing, and no one, he was in this for his own aggrandizement.

    He was nothing but a rich kid bad boy:

    Pissed at Daddy for cutting him off from the Tit, and throwing him out to earn a living.
     
  20. Jick Magger Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    38
    It doesn't matter what George Mason said. The well established common law rule of construction in 1788 was that words in a constitution are to be generally understood in their usual and most know signification. The usual meaning of the word "militia" in the late 1780's was "the standing force of a nation." The "subject matter" defined the word "militia" as "the body trained to arms."

    You may be interested to know that on the same day, George Mason also said,

    ...the militia consist... of the ....lower... classes of the people

    He further said,

    ...all people [cannot] be included in the militia.​
     
  21. S.A.M. uniquely dreadful Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    72,825
    So if a group of American citizens takes up arms and assassinates the US President, they are protected by the second amendment?
     
  22. Buffalo Roam Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    16,931
    The Man who was the father of the Bill of rights:

    and you dismiss his view out of Hand, he helped write the Constitution and would know exactly the meaning of the Words, and the intent of the Constitution, and the Bill of Rights, as he is the one who helped write it.

    I give you definition you ask for in a Direct Quote, from the Author of the Bill of Rights and now you say George Mason, doesn't know what was the Intent of the Second Amendment.

    Just exactly how obtuse are you, You must be a Legend, in your own Mind.

    Now how about the speech that you claim these statement were made in, so they can be observed in Context,

    But also let it be pointed out that He uses the word People, not State, and in context of his Famous Quote:

    "I ask, sir, what is the militia? It is the whole people, except for a few public officials."
    — George Mason, in Debates in Virginia Convention on
    Ratification of the Constitution, Elliot, Vol. 3, June 16, 1788

    Those are the individuals, and when you quote this:

    It is the People who are referred to not the State.

    The State has no lower classes.

    Now here are quotes from more signers, and authors of the Constitution, and the Bill of Rights.

    And they give the right to bear arms to the People.


    "I ask, sir, what is the militia? It is the whole people, except for a few public officials." George Mason (3 Elliot, Debates at 425-426)

    "The militia, when properly formed, are in fact the people themselves, ... all men capable of bearing arms;..." -- Richard Henry Lee writing in "Letters from the Federal Farmer to the Republic", 1788, page 169.

    "Who are the militia? Are they not ourselves? Is it feared, then, that we shall turn our arms each man against his own bosom? Congress shall have no power to disarm the militia. Their swords, and every other terrible implement of the soldier, are the birth-right of an American ... The unlimited power of the sword is not in the hands of either the federal or state governments, but where I trust in God it will ever remain, in the hands of the People." -- Tench Coxe - 1788.
     
  23. Buffalo Roam Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    16,931

    The lower classes, I find that interesting as George Mason held these beliefs:


    As stated in:

    Articles 1-3 address the subject of rights and the relationship between government and the governed. Article 1 states that "all men are by nature equally free and independent, and have certain inherent rights of which...[they cannot divest;] namely, the enjoyment of life and liberty, with the means of acquiring and possessing property, and pursuing and obtaining happiness and safety," a statement later made internationally famous in the first paragraph of the U.S. Declaration of Independence, as "we hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, and are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness."

    Article 4 asserts the equality of all citizens, rejecting the notion of privileged political classes or hereditary offices - another criticism of British institutions such as the House of Lords and the privileges of the peerage: "no set of men, are entitled to exclusive or separate emoluments or privileges from the community, but in consideration of public services; which, not being descendible, neither ought the offices of magistrate, legislator, or judge be hereditary."

    Virginia Constitution:

    I. That all men are by nature equally free and independent, and have certain inherent rights, of which, when they enter into a state of society, they cannot, by any compact, deprive or divest their posterity; namely, the enjoyment of life and liberty, with the means of acquiring and possessing property, and pursuing and obtaining happiness and safety.

    IV. That no man, or set of men, are entitled to exclusive or separate emoluments or privileges from the community, but in consideration of public services; which, not being descendible, neither ought the offices of magistrate, legislator, or judge be hereditary.


    George Mason said the People and he Meant the People, he never gave the State the Right to Keep and Bear arms, every reference to who hold the rights to Arms and Who is the Militia, states the People.

    "I ask, sir, what is the militia? It is the whole people, except for a few public officials"

    "The militia, when properly formed, are in fact the people themselves, ... all men capable of bearing arms;..."

    "Who are the militia? Are they not ourselves?"

    The Militia is the People, and the right to keep and bear arms is the right of the People as they are the Militia, not the State.
     

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