Quote:
Originally Posted by SpeedRacerXXX
I never said "scrap" the 2nd Amendment. I said I would not be opposed to rewriting the 2nd Amendment to clarify what is meant by its words. But it will never happen. So we will continue to rely on the states to enact gun laws as they see fit and for citizens to bring court cases to challenge those laws, as was done in McDonald v. Chicago and District of Columbia v. Heller and New York State Rifle & Pistol Association, Inc. v. Bruen. And depending on which way the specific court leans, Conservative or Liberal, the decision will tend to favor one side or the other.
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And as we have all learned the hard way, Liberal Justices and Conservative Justices view the entire Constitution in different ways not just the 2nd Amendment. Generally speaking, especially the Liberal women on the court ( I have Sotomayor and Kagan in mind ) believe the Constitution is a so called "living document" meaning subject to change with the times in which we live and the Justices will make that decision and Conservative justices recognize that our beautiful system of government allows for the people through their Representatives to change the document not the 9 justices of the Supreme Court.
The argument goes something like this. "since there were no automatic weapons in the time of writing the Constitution, how can it be applied to today's times with new weapons that didn't exist at the time of the writing? Liberals will say "for this reason, of course we have to update the Constitution periodically", while the Conservative justices say no, if there are to be changes to the Constitution, the Legislative branch shall make these changes not the justices.
Sotomayor recently remarked and I'm paraphrasing here, "that we must base our decision on what is best for the country right now". That is a complete mis-reading of the role of SC justices. What is best for the country in whose opinion, 9 people wearing robes with differing opinions that I have laid out or the people through their Representatives?
Of course with the second Amendment we have "competing interpretations", that only a well regulated militia ( what we had at the time ) shall be authorized to bear arms" and "the right of the people to bear arms, shall not be infringed".
So which is it because you can't have both! I agree that any such decision should be left up to the people, not the government.
I believe it is clear that the people should have the right to make this decision since the basic reason ( one of two actually ) to have a weapon, is the right to protect oneself FROM the government and anybody that would try to hurt you.
To use the first part, would give this right to the government "a well regulated militia", but the people already had their guns! The government asked for volunteers to form a militia and yeah, bring your weapon with you because we aren't going to give you one. A gun in every home for the purpose of protection and not depending on the government for your protection which doesn't work all that well these days.
So, which would you prefer?
And I believe the people shall also decide on restrictions such as the right to own a bazooka, perhaps a fully automatic weapon.
But "the right of the people to bear arms, shall not be infringed", speaks loudest to me and I think this right can be taken away with a Liberal Court "if we let them"..