From: fcrary@ocf.berkeley.edu (Frank Crary)
Newsgroups: talk.politics.guns
Subject: Re: Atlanta Journal and Constitution: an excerpt...
Date: 30 Aug 1992 06:25:15 GMT
Organization: U. C. Berkeley Open Computing Facility
Distribution: usa
NNTP-Posting-Host: lightning.berkeley.edu

[Posted excerpts from an Atlanta Journal article:]

>	Ross Perot was right to focus on this subject and say that we
>must be prepared to take drastic law enforcement measures. Diminishing
>America's arsenal will require some reasonable, temporary compromises
>with civil liberties;

"Temporary" can have all sorts of meanings. In this case, I suspect
it would mean, "until we solve the problem of urban crime." Not to
seem pessimistic, but this would be, essentially, forever.

>	Broad-scale domestic disarmament is not prohibited by the Second
>Amendment. The Supreme Court has dealt with this constitutional claim
>four times, in 1875, 1886, 1894, and 1939. Consistently, it has ruled
>that the Second Amendment deals with the right of states to maintain
>a militia free from interference from the federal government. 

In all those cases (US v. Cruikshank, Presser v. Illinois, Miller v. Texas
and US v. Miller {different Miller}) the Court made no mention of
state controled militias. The entire issue of militia control was not
discussed, but the rulings (either explicitly or implicitly) assumed
the "militia" to mean an armed public (e.g. including all able-bodied
citizens.)

>The Second
>Amendment never was meant to create an individual right to possess
>firearms.

Essays by the framers of the Constitution certainly imply otherwise.
The only debate over the Amendment, when first proposed to Congress, 
started with an objection by Rep. Elbridge Gerry (anti-fed. Mass.)
He was concerned that a third clause, later deleted, could by used to
justify the sort of "domestic disarmament" suggested above.

Further, the Supreme Court rulings mentioned, as well as Scott v. Sanford,
Patsonne v. Pennsylvania and US v. Verdungo-Urquidez (where the Second
Amendment is mentioned tangentially) all treat the right as an individual
right (though not an unlimited one.)

>	A meaningful program would include a broad ban on the possession
>and sale of handguns and other weapons whose sole or primary purpose is
>to commit crimes;

"Sole or primary purpose" is a very vague phrase. The author seems to
think that "assault weapons" are such a type of weapon, despite FBI
statistics such weapons account for, at most, a few percent of gun
related crime. By this loose meaning, all weapons usefull for self-defence
or militia purposes would be included.

>and subsequent searches, confiscations of weapons and
>punishment of those illegally possessing them.

I find in the Constitution the assurance that "The right of the people
to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against
unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no 
warrants shall be issued but upon probable cause, supported by oath
or affirmation..." It would seem the author is, at least, consistant: He
opposes not only the Second Amendment, but rather the Bill of Rights in
general.

[From the original poster, not the cited article:]
>Just thought I'd share my disgust with the net.
>What can I do about this kind of garbage? My letter to the editor
>didn't get published last week, although I missed one day's copy.

Buy a newspaper, and gain some control of editorial policy. This isn't
exactly a joke: The Oakland Tribune, for example, was baddly in debt
a few years ago and anyone with ~$5 million could have purchased it.
Though the Oakland Tribune isn't in for sale anymore, this gives an
idea of the prices. Were the NRA interested, they could pick up
newspapers at ~$2 to $5 per member. Nor is _owning_ the paper needed:
I suspect most of the stock holders care very little about gun control.
Anyone owning even a 5 or 10% share could no doubt influence editorial
police on the subject.

						Frank Crary
						CU Boulder

(By the way, does anyone know how to get usenet access at CU Boulder?
My account on pprince doesn't seem to have access and remote logins
to my old Berkeley account are getting to be a pain...)

Newsgroups: talk.politics.guns,talk.politics.animals