Re: The 2ed Amendment as a Gun Nuts Wet Dream

Buckaroo Banzai wrote:
> 
> "ulTRAX" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
> news:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> > "Scout" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
> news:<[EMAIL PROTECTED]>...
> > > "ulTRAX" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
> > > news:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> > > > It's rather curious that the Gun Nuts find a universal right to bear
> > > > arms in language that clearly doesn't intend one: "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."
> > >
> > > Interesting how many people can't seem to see "the right of the
> people"....
> >
> > MORE interesting that some can't see that the "well regulated militia"
> > being consistent with the Constitution and the Militia Act can NOT
> > mean EVERYONE.
> 
> Even more interesting is the fact that all of the rights in the BofR are
> guaranteed to *all* the people, *except* the 2nd Amendment.  Very
> convenient.

Straw. Bogus straw. Show where ALL of the rights are guaranteed
to ALL of the people, or where anyone, other than you
strawslingers are exempting the 2nd Amen from what THE PEOPLE
consistently refers to.

IN all legal and constitutional usage THE PEOPLE (note, not just
"people" but THE PEOPLE) simply means the singular, collective
enfranchised body politic in its political capacity. It is made
up of the FREEMAN CLASS, which in 1789 was free, white males of
age, sometimes limited to property-owners or FREEHOLDERS. As the
general populace also included women, blacks, kids, foreigners,
indians, prisoners, etc, this was not the same thing. When the
Const says "person" it means an individual; when it says THE
PEOPLE, it means the collective class, taken collectively,
independent of the number or who is a member of the class at any
given moment.

In 1789 the "electorate" was IDENTICAL to THE People (the
enfranchised body politic ONLY comprised of Freemen who could
vote, serve on juries, or in the militia, and NOT every
individual PERSON, which included women, children and others who
were NOT part of the "electorate)!

THE PEOPLE is a legal term of art that has a specific meaning in
law and language; IF you don't know what the terms mean, they
may as well be in Chinese!

So, as the Bouvier Law Dictionary, THE 19th Century authority on
the subject of the MEANING of the TERMS used in the Const
stated:

The definition for the CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES OF
AMERICA (see previous post) includes the 12 amendments ratified
up to 1856. The term "the PEOPLE" is used in those mentions.
Therefore, if one wants to know HOW the term "the PEOPLE" is
used in these lines:

13. - 1. Relates to religious freedom; the liberty of the press;
the right of the people to assemble and petition.
14. - 2. Secures to the people the right to bear arms.
21. - 9. Secures to the people the rights retained by them.
22.- 10. Secures the rights to the states, or to the people the
rights they have not granted.

one looks UP "People" and finds:

PEOPLE 
A state; as, the people of the state of New York; a nation in
its collective and political capacity. 4 T. R. 783. See 6 Pet.
S. C. Rep. 467.

and, as one is naturally inclined to do, one next looks up STATE
for further amplification:

STATE
This word is used in various senses. In its most enlarged sense,
it signifies a self-sufficient body of persons united together
in one community for the defence of their rights, and to do
right and justice to foreigners. In this sense, the state means
the whole people united into one body politic; (q.v.) and the
state, and the people of the state, are equivalent expressions.
1 Pet. Cond. Rep. 37 to 39; 3 Dall. 93; 2 Dall. 425; 2 Wilson's
Lect. 120; Dane's Appx. Sec. 50, p. 63 1 Story, Const. Sec. 361.

In a more limited sense, the word `state' expresses merely the
positive or actual organization of the legislative, or judicial
powers; thus the actual government of the state is designated by
the name of the state; hence the expression, the state has
passed such a law, or prohibited such an act. State also means
the section of territory occupied by a state, as the state of
Pennsylvania.

finding a (q.v., which see) one looks up BODY POLITIC:

BODY POLITIC: 
When applied to the government this phrase signifies the state.
As to the persons who compose the body politic, they take
collectively the name, of people, or nation; and individually
they are citizens, when considered in relation to their
political rights, and subjects as being submitted to the laws of
the state. 

and, seeing CITIZEN, one looks that up:

CITIZEN:
, persons. One who, under the constitution and laws of
the United States, has a right to vote for representatives in
congress, and other public officers, and who is qualified to
fill offices in the gift of the people. In a more extended
sense, under the word citizen, are included all white persons
born in the United States, and naturalized persons born out of
the same, who have not lost their right as such. This includes
men, women, and children.

3. All natives are not citizens of the United States; the
descendants of the aborigines, and those of African origin, are
not entitled to the rights of citizens. Anterior to the adoption
of the constitution of the United States, each state had the
right to make citizens of such persons as it pleased. That
constitution does not authorize any but white persons to become
citizens of the United States; and it must therefore be presumed
that no one is a citizen who is not white. 1 Litt. R. 334; 10
Conn. R. 340; 1 Meigs, R. 331.
http://www.constitution.org/bouv/bouvier_c.htm


Sad as that last paragraph is, THAT was the legal reality up to
that point in time!

And the definition of STATE comes in part from:

Judge Story discusses the relationship between "the people" and
"the state" (equivalent expressions) and quotes Justice Wilson
with respect to the rights of states (a state being a "moral
person"). This carries weight, since the Justice Wilson is James
Wilson, signer of the Declaration of Independence, a part of the
first Supreme Court appointed by Washington, a professor of law
at the University of Pennsylvania, and above all, a delegate to
the Constitutional Convention where he served on the "Committee
on Detail," which was charged with putting the Constitution
into its final form. Here's what Story and Wilson said (I thank
Leif Rakur for providing this cite):

"§ 208. In like manner the word "state" is used in various
senses. In its most enlarged sense it means the people composing
a particular nation or community. In this sense the state means
the whole people, united into one body politic; and the state,
and the people of the state, are equivalent expressions.2 Mr.
Justice Wilson, in his Law Lectures, uses the word "state" in
its broadest sense. "In free states," says he, "the people form
an artificial person, or body politic, the highest end [and]
noblest, that can be known. They form that moral person, which
in one of my former lectures,3 I described, as a complete body
of free, natural persons, united together for their common
benefit; as having an understanding and a will; as deliberating,
and resolving, and acting; as possessed of interests, which it
ought to manage; as enjoying rights, which it ought to maintain;
and as lying under obligations, which it ought to perform. To
this moral person, we assign, by way of eminence, the dignified
appellation of STATE." - Joseph Story, "Commentaries on the
Constitution of the United States," 1833.

NOW, put ALL that info together and go back and apply it to the
lines 13, 14, 21, and 22. 

http://www.saf.org/LawReviews/HeymanChicago.htm

How was the right to arms understood in post-Revolutionary
America? We can attain great insight on this point by exploring
the Massachusetts Constitution of 1780.[145] This document,
which was drafted by John Adams, contains the most carefully
written of all the state declarations of rights and constitutes
one of the best statements "of the fundamental rights of
Americans at the end of the Revolutionary period." [146] [Page
261]

In its preamble, the Massachusetts Constitution sets forth the
relationship between society and its members. The "people" or
"the body-politic" are "formed by a voluntary association of
individuals," who come together through "a social compact." What
is most remarkable is that, having distinguished between the
"people" and "the individuals who compose it," the document then
uses these terms in a consistent way throughout. This makes it
possible to discern with great clarity how the various rights
were understood, and whether they were viewed in individual or
collective terms...

In this way, the Massachusetts declaration draws a clear and
uniform distinction between the rights that belong to
individuals and those that belong to the people as a whole. This
distinction is followed so carefully that it is observed even
when both sorts of rights are implicated. Thus, Article XXIX
declares that the independence of the judiciary is essential
"for the security of the rights of the people, and of every
citizen."

Article XVII of the Massachusetts declaration reads as follows:

The people have a right to keep and to bear arms for the common
defence. And as, in time of peace, armies are dangerous to
liberty, they ought not to be maintained without the consent of
the legislature; and the military shall always be held in an
exact subordination to the civil authority and shall be governed
by it.

In view of the declaration's careful usage, there can be no
question that the "right to keep and bear arms" that it
recognizes is one that belongs not to private individuals but to
the people in their collective capacity. This is made even more
clear by the fact that the right is to bear arms "for the common
defence," as well as by the overall concern of the provision: to
control the military force of the community and guard against
the danger of military tyranny. [148]

I have chosen to focus on the Massachusetts Constitution because
of the precision of its language, which strongly illuminates the
nature of the rights that it contains. Yet the same distinction
[Page 263] between "individuals" (or cognate terms) and "the
people" is also generally, although not invariably, observed in
the other post-Revolutionary state declarations of rights. When
these documents recognize a right to bear arms, they always
describe it as a right of "the people," rather than of every
"individual" or "man." [149] This is strong evidence that the
right was understood in collective terms."


Second Thoughts: What the right to bear arms really means. 
by Akhil Reed Amar 
http://www.constitution.org/2ll/2ndschol/103wha.htm

"The amendment speaks of a right of "the people" collectively
rather than a right of "persons" individually. 

And it uses a distinctly military phrase: "bear arms." A deer
hunter or target shooter carries a gun but does not, strictly
speaking, bear arms. The military connotation was even more
obvious in an earlier draft of the amendment, which contained
additional language that "no one religiously scrupulous of
bearing arms shall be compelled to render military service in
person." Even in the final version, note how the military phrase
"bear arms" is sandwiched between a clause that talks about the
"militia" and a clause (the Third Amendment) that regulates the
quartering of "soldiers" in times of "war" and "peace."
Likewise, state constitutions in place in 1789 consistently used
the phrase "bear arms" in military contexts and no other. 

... anachronistically, libertarians read "the people" to mean
atomized private persons, each hunting in his own private Idaho,
rather than the citizenry acting collectively. 

But, when the Constitution speaks of "the people" rather than
"persons," the collective connotation is primary. 

"We the People" in the preamble do ordain and establish the
Constitution as public citizens meeting together in conventions
and acting in concert, not as private individuals pursuing our
respective hobbies. The only other reference to "the people" in
the Philadelphia Constitution of 1787 appears a sentence away
from the preamble, and here, too, the meaning is public and
political, not private and individualistic. Every two years,
"the people" -- that is, the voters -- elect the House. 

To see the key distinction another way, recall that women in
1787 had the rights of "persons" (such as freedom to worship and
protections of privacy in their homes) but did not directly
participate in the acts of "the people" -- they did not vote in
constitutional conventions or for Congress, nor were they part
of the militia/people at the heart of the Second Amendment. 

The rest of the Bill of Rights confirms this communitarian
reading. The core of the First Amendment's assembly clause,
which textually abuts the Second Amendment, is the right of "the
people" -- in essence, voters -- to "assemble" in constitutional
conventions and other political conclaves. So, too, the core
rights retained and reserved to "the people" in the Ninth and
Tenth Amendments were rights of the people collectively to
govern themselves democratically.
 
> > I tire of you gun nuts.
> 
> And I tire of you "gun nut" nuts!
> 
> > You have nothing to teach and
> > are unable to learn. Bet your parents and teachers thought this every
> > day they saw you: Poor scout..... a mind is a terrible thing to
> > sabotage.

-- 
Steven Krulick / [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Ellenville NY 12428-130727