The recent mass shootings at a movie theatre in Aurora, Colorado and a Sikh temple in suburban Milwaukee have reignited the discussion on the optimal methods to provide domestic security, and more specifically, the role of guns in promoting and perpetuating such heinous crimes. Despite the attention paid to these atrocities by the media, gun control – a polarizing subject – is likely to be a non-issue in this election campaign. That being said, an investigation into both parties’ stances on domestic security and gun control is no doubt warranted, as is a historical analysis of the language and intention of Founding Fathers in crafting in Second Amendment.
The Republican Party is, on principle, against any restriction on the sale of firearms to Americans, with the exception of sophisticated military-grade weaponry. To the GOP, gun control laws are a case of legal adverse selection – law-abiding citizens are most likely to be compliant and are therefore endangered, as a higher percentage of guns will be in the hands of violent criminals. This line of reasoning has merit, but the Republican claim to be the party of law and order certainly does not. A party of law and order would take all domestic security matters seriously.
In the interest of public safety, the GOP elects to practice the new-age McCarthyism of Michele Bachmann. Rep. Bachmann suggested Huma Abedin, deputy chief of staff to Hilary Clinton, has ties to the Muslim Brotherhood through an associate of her late father and has called for an investigation into the matter. Given that the constitution fundamentally guarantees all people the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, this degree of racial profiling is not only an affront to American values but is also a blatant disregard for the totality of credible threats facing the nation.
The Republican safety plan is, substantively, a comprehensive war on Islam. In 2009, John Boehner blasted the Department of Homeland Security for investigating white supremacist domestic terror groups instead of focusing on al Qaeda.
Peter Bergen of CNN and the New America Foundation reports that since 9/11, there have been more attacks on US soil by right-wing extremists (9) than by Islamic terrorists influenced by al Qaeda (4). Including the massacre at the Sikh temple, the death toll by these different organizations is similar: 15 by right-wing terrorist groups, and 17 by Islamic terrorist groups.
Democrats, on the other hand, lack the political will, capital and consensus to advance gun control legislation. In 2009, Attorney General Eric Holder announced that the Obama administration would pursue a renewal of the assault weapons ban signed by Bill Clinton in 1994, which expired in 2004. Recently thereafter, 65 House Democrats signed a letter to Holder opposing the ban. Obama will look to protect Democrats running for Congress from being unduly targeted by the NRA and other pro-gun groups and avoid the issue in order to preserve party unity. At least the Department of Homeland Security, Office of Intelligence and Analysis, and the Federal Bureau of Investigation have investigated all terrorist threats thoroughly during the Obama administration.
The lack of public consensus for gun control measures makes advancing legislation on the matter politically unviable. A Pew Research Center poll conducted July 26-29 illustrates the split in opinion, with 46% of Americans prioritizing the need to protect right to own guns, and 47% favoring more control over gun ownership. A ban on assault weapons and high-capacity magazines of ammunition, which would have a significant impact in preventing or mitigating the fatalities in mass shootings, enjoy a strong majority of public support according to a CBS News/New York Times poll conducting shortly after the Tuscon shooting in early 2011. The reality is that the majority of homicides by firearms are perpetrated with handguns. However, not only does the public oppose a ban on handguns by a ratio of 2:1, but the Supreme Court has also ruled that such bans are unconstitutional.
Within the past four years, the Supreme Court has issued a pair of landmark rulings demonstrating its interpretation of the Second Amendment. In Heller v. D.C. (2008), which struck down the city ban on handguns, the Court ruled that the Second Amendment is an individual right that enables people to carry “all instruments that constitute bearable arms.” The implication which can be inferred is that society and Congress get to define what comprises a bearable arm. McDonald v. Chicago (2010) is a related case where the Supreme Court ruled that city’s handgun ban was unconstitutional. The ruling stresses the importance of protecting an individual’s right to self-defense through the Second Amendment, vis-a-vis handguns. Prior to these judgments, U.S. v. Miller (1939) did not affirm the Second Amendment as an individual right, but rather through the collective right of each state’s ability to maintain a militia. Thus, ownership of a firearm could only be restricted on the basis that the weapon in question had no connection to military activity, and as such fails to provide for common defense. The Court’s interpretation of the Second Amendment has evidently changed drastically over the past 75 years. Therefore, a review of the amendment’s language and the purpose for which it was developed is justified in order to judge the Court’s fidelity to the Constitution.
“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.”
The rationale for the Second Amendment is deeply ingrained in the Declaration of Independence – the ability for free men to take up arms against a tyrannical government. George Washington once remarked that:
"Firearms stand next in importance to the constitution itself. They are the American people's liberty teeth and keystone under independence … from the hour the Pilgrims landed to the present day, events, occurrences and tendencies prove that to ensure peace security and happiness, the rifle and pistol are equally indispensable … the very atmosphere of firearms anywhere restrains evil interference — they deserve a place of honor with all that's good."
This celebration of firearms and their guaranteed place in the Constitution is, in this light, a partial homage by the Founding Fathers to themselves for their accomplishments during the American Revolution.
Explicit statements made by several Founding Fathers assert that the Second Amendment is intended to promote a strong militia. The quartering of British soldiers (forbidden by the Third Amendment) and the revenues raised by the Stamp Act to pay for standing armies were primary causes for the Revolution. As such, the Founding Fathers were wary of standing armies, especially in peacetime, though they recognized their pragmatic necessity, especially since the young America was surrounded on all sides by foreign powers. Alexander Hamilton and Thomas Jefferson blatantly state the intention of the Second Amendment – as a safeguard for individual citizens to protect themselves against the standing army of a tyrannical government.
“…but if circumstances should at any time oblige the government to form an army of any magnitude, that army can never be formidable to the liberties of the people, while there is a large body of citizens, little if at all inferior to them in discipline and use of arms, who stand ready to defend their rights…”
- Alexander Hamilton, The Federalist Papers, No. 29
“The strongest reason for people to retain the right to keep and bear arms is, as a last resort, to protect themselves against tyranny in government.”
- Attributed to Thomas Jefferson
These men intended for the militia, which in that era referred to all white men able to operate a firearm, to be superior to any standing army. Gun control advocates will note that the Second Amendment calls for a “well-regulated militia” and that this language implies that the government can impose restrictions on militias. However, in Federalist Paper No. 29, Alexander Hamilton indicates that “well-regulated” means, simply, well trained:
The project of disciplining all the militia of the United States is as futile as it would be injurious if it were capable of being carried into execution. A tolerable expertness in military movements is a business that requires time and practice. It is not a day, nor a week nor even a month, that will suffice for the attainment of it. To oblige the great body of the yeomanry and of the other classes of the citizens to be under arms for the purpose of going through military exercises and evolutions, as often as might be necessary to acquire the degree of perfection which would entitle them to the character of a well regulated militia, would be a real grievance to the people and a serious public inconvenience and loss.
Adding all this up shoots a few holes in the Supreme Court’s interpretation of the Second Amendment. The founders did not intend for individuals to have bearable arms for their own personal defense, but arms that enabled them to defend themselves against a tyrannical government. Thus, the array of weaponry owned by citizens should necessarily equal the sophistication of weapons carried by the government’s standing army. AR-15s? AK-47s? RPGs? Nukes? Under a strict constructionist view of the Second Amendment, all of these weapons are legitimate and legal for US citizens in order to match the force wielded by the State. To read into the intent of the user and the thoughts of what constitutes a “bearable arm” for self-defense, as the Supreme Court rules, is an exhibition of judicial activism that ignores the desires and intentions of the Founding Fathers.
Reality changes. Technology changes. Hell, even the meaning of the words in the Second Amendment has changed.
If we, as a country, swear blind and eternal fealty to the original Constitution, Bill of Rights, and the wishes of the Founding Fathers, rather than treating the lot as living, breathing documents, sometimes the results may seem incorrect, out-of-touch, and downright dangerous to the public.
We can continue indiscriminately following the wishes of the Founding Fathers – who agreed that black men constitute three fifths of a person – or maybe it might be time to update the 221-year-old how-to manual on the rules for governing a Republic.
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