"Some Americans think the U.S. Constitution contains a right to own guns, but legal scholars generally disagree. "

CRC

Those legal scholars can shove a surplus GI barrel where the sun don't shine.

Oh!  Thank god for legal scholars to tell me what a sentence really means.  I suppose they think it means the opposite of what it says.

ROTFL

And some british think of America as a Rebellious Province..that needs to come back under British Rule.

Most Ivory Tower Intellectuals are very liberal in their outlook in the sense that they "worship" the state. I guess this makes sense since their paychecks and grant money comes from the government..at least in public universities.

Thank goodness for a bunch of Whiskey drinking farmers and no do gooders who joined the Militias in Concord and Lexington Massachussets!

While Intellectuals who populated the Continental Congress were still debating whether or not Americans had a "right" to break away from the British..this HICKS, these drunken, hungover Rednecks actually had the balls to start shooting at the Red Coats!
"Take our Guns?" "Hell No! Hey King George! Take our lead shot first!"

After they got through littering the road back to Boston with dead red coats..the Intellectuals in the Continental Congress had no Choice but to pen and post the Declaration of Independence!

Even then, it still took a little over a YEAR for the intellectuals to realize.."Hey! We have a REVOLUTION going on and we haven't even ANNOUNCED IT YET!"

The shooting started at Lexington and Concord, MA on April 19,1775.

The Declaration of Independence was signed on July 4, 1776.

Do the Math!

Lets see ... how does that go ???

"What part of Europe you from ...???
The part who's ass we saved or the part who's ass we kicked "???

God Damn Eurotrash !! Assholes all !

[usa][usa][usa][usa][usa][usa][usa][usa][usa][usa][usa]

Only legal scholars and liberal politicians could miss the point so completely. My only fear is that the government gets it in their head that it is for them to decide. The price of their education will be unpleasantly high.

[:D]



[wave]

LOL!

Never trust any country whos favorite sport ofetn ends with scores of 1-0!!

Europe is the real reason we have nukes[;)]

SGtar15

"The conclusion is thus inescapable that the history, concept, and wording of the second amendment to the Constitution of the United States, as well as its interpretation by every major commentator and court in the first half-century after its ratification, indicates that what is protected is an individual [b]RIGHT[/B] of a private citizen to own and carry firearms in a peaceful manner." — Report of the Subcommittee on the Constitution of the Committee on the Judiciary, United States Senate, 97th Congress, Second Session, Feb 1982

Ill remember that the next time I look up at the [s]british[/s] [b]American[/b] flag.

G. Gordon Liddy writing in his book "When I Was a Kid This Was a Free Country"...


There has been a lot of twaddle bandied about in recent years that the prefatory words “A well-regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State…” somehow indicate that “the right of the people to keep and bear arms” is not an individual right, as in the First and Fourth Amendments, but a “collective” right.  Nothing could be more false.  As Roy Copperud, author of “American Usage and Style: The Consensus” and a member of the “American Heritage Dictionary” usage panel, has pointed out:

The words “A well-regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State…” constitute a present participle, rather than a clause.  It is used as an adjective,  modifying “militia,” which is followed by the main clause of the sentence (subject “the right,” verb “shall”).  The right to keep and bear arms is asserted as essential for maintaining a militia…  The sentence does not restrict the right to keep and bear arms, nor does it state or imply possession of the right elsewhere by others than the people…  The right to keep and bear arms is not said by the amendment to depend on the existence of a militia.  No condition is stated or implied as to the relation of the right to keep and bear arms and to the necessity of a well-regulated militia as a requisite to the security of a free state.  The right to keep and bear arms is deemed unconditional by the entire sentence.

The Framers of the Constitution were highly educated men and masters of the English language; they knew exactly what they were saying.

Doesn't have anything to do with Europe or Europeans.
Time Magazine and Time Magazine Europe are wholly owned by AOL.
So if you're pissed at that quote, and rightfully so, complain to AOL, and cut it out with the racist remarks.

I guess you could argue that the Constitution proper doesn't grant a right to KABA but the Bill Of Rights or amendments to the Constitution do.

Actually, surveys of 2nd Amendment legal treatises since Levinson's "The Embarrassing Second Amendment" (Yale Law Review, 1989 [I believe]) show that a vast majority of scholarly law articles take the 2nd Amendment to mean that Americans have an individual right to own firearms, but that the right may be limited in some ways.  A few years ago, one survey stated that there were 43 pro-individual right articles since 1989, and 3 anti-individual right articles.  Two of those 3 were written by HCI lawyers.

What bothers me is that the first true 2nd Amendment case, [u]US v. Cruikshank[/u], held that the 2nd Amendment did not apply to the states because the Constitution is an agreement between the People and the National Government.  They relied upon [u]Barron v. Baltimore[/u] to get to this conclusion.

The [u]Cruikshank[/u] court failed to recognize in its analysis that 'Congress shall make no law …' (as found in most of the other amendments) is not the same as 'shall not be infringed.'  Well, they were eager to do something.  Do you know why the Supreme Court wanted to say that the 2nd Amendment did not apply to the states?

Because they wanted to uphold a state law preventing ex-slaves from acquiring firearms to defend themselves from the KKK.

That's right folks.  Gun control in the US started out as a way of putting down blacks.  Look how far we've come.

Anybody have a link to the whole article? I would like to read it.

Actually, the essence of the quoted statement is correct: the US Constitution does not grant any rights, including the right to keep and bear arms.

What it does do, (or at least is supposed to do) is protect those rights from being infringed or otherwise violated. The Constitution does not grant rights, it guarantees that certain rights will not be taken away.

The right to arm and defend oneself is one of the inalienable rights spoken of in the Declaration of Independence, although not specifically tallied.

Perspectives from some of the legal profession:

[url]http://www.abanet.org/gunviol/secondamend.html[/url]

Here is some great info from a current constitutional law scholar.

http://www1.law.ucla.edu/~volokh/beararms/testimon.htm

This will really blow your hair back.

The American Bar Association ("ABA") is largely looked at as a left-wing associated entity.  Some, but not all, state bar associations are looked at similarly.  Unlike the American Medical Association, the ABA has very little power.  More authority lies with the state bar associations.

Most lawyers I know do not bother with the ABA (I certainly don't).  They are not really capable of more than a website and glad-handing in Washington, DC.  They issue position points, but, does anybody listen?

To illustrate how bad they are at this, look at the last paragraph of the ABA's statement at:

[url=]http://www.abanet.org/gunviol/secondamend.html[/url]

It reads:

'As lawyers, as representatives of the legal profession, and as recognized experts on the meaning of the Constitution and our system of justice, we share a responsibility to the public and lawmakers to "say what the law is." The ABA is committed to bringing about a more reasoned and lawyerly discussion of the meaning and import of the Second Amendment.'

First off, the states have individual rules for recognizing "experts" in the legal profession, often based on time spent in a particular specialty.  And the ABA is an expert in … what?  Under whose rules?

Actually, John Marshall famously wrote that only the courts could say "what the law is."  Lawyers might contribute, by offering their views, but the courts are the only ones who say so.

(Similarly, all those bags you may have seen on TV, in the movies, or in real life that are stamped with some agency's logo and the word "evidence" are similar misstatements.  One judge I know stated:  'It's not evidence until I say it is.')

As for the ABA being committed to 'a more reasoned and lawyerly discussion,' that depends upon what the discussion concludes.  The ABA has already made its views abundantly clear.  In its collective (and collectivist) mind, no discussion is necessary.  Most legal scholars (as I noted in a previous post) have gone in a direction contrary to the ABA's position.  If the ABA had any real power, it would stifle the discussion; but, it doesn't and it can't.