Re: church/state seperation

> >> Take the words of George Washington, who presided over
> >> the constitutional convention (and speaks with far greater authority than
> >> our resident lunatic).
> >
> >Yeah, I'm sure you love everything Washington said in the speech you
> >just cited:
> 
> Irrelevant.  Your claim is that the founders intended something.
> Washington says that you are wrong, and he was a founder. QED.

My point is that Washington's farewell address is not the lens through
which the meaning of the second amendment is decided any more than it
is the lens through which the first amendment is decided. For if it
was, one would have to concede that the 1st amendment meant that
religion was an absolutely necessary foundation for good government,
just as Washington said.

The Supreme Court is much more inclined to look at the defenses of the
Federal Constitution that appeared in the press in 1788 and 1789 to
understand the mindset of the framers.

The most noteworthy of these defenses is known as the Federalist. In
the 28th installment, one of the constitution's framers wrote:

"If the representatives of the people betray their constituents, there
is then no resource left but in the exertion of that original right of
self-defense which is paramount to all positive forms of government,
and which against the usurpations of the national rulers, may be
exerted with infinitely better prospect of success than against those
of the rulers of an individual state. In a single state, if the
persons intrusted with supreme power become usurpers, the different
parcels, subdivisions, or districts of which it consists, having no
distinct government in each, can take no regular measures for defense.
The citizens must rush tumultuously to arms, without concert, without
system, without resource; except in their courage and despair. The
usurpers, clothed with the forms of legal authority, can too often
crush the opposition in embryo. The smaller the extent of the
territory, the more difficult will it be for the people to form a
regular or systematic plan of opposition, and the more easy will it be
to defeat their early efforts. Intelligence can be more speedily
obtained of their preparations and movements, and the military force
in the possession of the usurpers can be more rapidly directed against
the part where the opposition has begun. In this situation there must
be a peculiar coincidence of circumstances to insure success to the
popular resistance."

This explanation of the Constitution is far more authoritative than
Washington's 1796 Farewell Address as an explanation of the intent of
the Constitution's framers.

In the Pennsylvania press in 1789, another member of the Continental
Congress served to defend the ratification of the U.S. Constitution
and the Bill of Rights with the following explanation:

"As civil rulers, not having their duty to the people duly before
them, may attempt to tyrannize, and as the military forces which must
be occasionally raised to defend our country, might pervert their
powers to the injury of their fellow-citizens, the people are
confirmed by the next article [the Second Amendment] in their right to
keep and bear their private arms."

Tench Coxe, "Remarks on the First Part of the Amendments to the
Federal Constitution," Philadelphia Federal Gazette, 18 June 1789 at 2
col. 1.

In light of these clear statements of the Constitution's earliest
defenders, even the ACLU wouldn't make the silly denials about the
intention of the 2nd amendment in this thread.

You know you're dealing with a real wacko when he is claiming that the
ACLU is too "right-wing."

Searle