Scalia: Guns May be Regulated

[el duderino]

Actually, I agree with you, but I have to say, their classic cars and babes are worth taking a look at. Maybe we could annex them as the 52nd (or it 58th?) state?

I've said it before and still believe: Even with all our warts, this is the greatest country on Earth and a better place to live than anywhere else I know of.

We need some political compound-W.

This, we can make them a state when we make puerto rico and guam states.

 

[OfficerObie59]

Well there you have it. Even the most conservative justice is saying guns can be regulated.

This shouldn't come as news to anyone who was paying attention to the court's decision in Heller, which Scalia wrote. The case says plainly some restrictions, like prohibiting felons from possessing guns is lawful.

The Shall Not Infringers are really just absolutists railing about a governmental/legal system that has rarely, if ever, found any right to be absolute. If someone can point to where Madison, Jefferson or any other Founding Father wrote or said otherwise, please do post it in context here for all to see.

How about the plain text of the law? "Shall not be infringed". Simple, absolutist, to the point language.

Juxtapose that with the Fourth Amendment which forbids "unreasonable searches and seizures" without a warrant. There's ambiguity there, thus some reasonable warrantless searches are permitted. As a result, literally hundreds of times more pages in legal casebooks dedicated to the topic area.

Seems to me if the 2nd Amendment wasn't supposed to be absolute, I wouldn't be able to make this distinction.

 

[center442]

Scalia's exact quote:

Scalia - a proponent of the idea that the Constitution must be interpreted using the meaning of its text at the time it was written - cited "a tort called affrighting" that existed when the Second Amendment was drafted in the 18th century making it a misdemeanor to carry "a really horrible weapon just to scare people like a head ax."

Notice the first word I bolded. I am not a lawyer, nor would I presume to lecture a Supreme Court Justice (well, some I would), but a tort is not a law. If a person is "affrightened" by someone carrying a gun then they should sue for whatever damages they have suffered in a civil court. Good luck with that. I'm surprised that Scalia would consider a tort a misdeameanor.

We already have too many laws on the books trying to protect people from seeing or hearing things that they might find distasteful. I'm "affrightened" every day by some of the things I see, hear, or read. I'm not running to court suing people over them, and I sure as hell don't want government passing laws about them.

 

[cekim]

This shouldn't come as news to anyone who was paying attention to the court's decision in Heller, which Scalia wrote. The case says plainly some restrictions, like prohibiting felons from possessing guns is lawful.


How about the plain text of the law? "Shall not be infringed". Simple, absolutist, to the point language.

Juxtapose that with the Fourth Amendment which forbids "unreasonable searches and seizures" without a warrant. There's ambiguity there, thus some reasonable warrantless searches are permitted. As a result, literally hundreds of times more pages in legal casebooks dedicated to the topic area.

Seems to me if the 2nd Amendment wasn't supposed to be absolute, I wouldn't be able to make this distinction.

I don't understand why this so hard to understand?

2A was intended to protect the right of the people to do as they had just done to form this nation. Rise up against tyranny with an armed and effective civilian militia with all the tools and wherewithal they would face from that same government.

It was hoped that this standing threat to the government would both be sufficient to keep them in line most of the time and when not, leave enough arms in the hands of the people to fix it.

Scalia is FOS and as others have said, this is not a surprise given the vile nonsense he spewed in heller.

 

[neEEGuru]

[video]http://www.youtube.com/embed/wV1lZMTCqf8[/video]

RIP George. He had it right all along.

 

[neEEGuru]

Maybe it's time to take off in boats to a new uncharted/uninhabited piece of land, setup our own settlements free of corruption and tyranny and make sure we draft a contract of some sort that lists things the newly formed settlers can NEVER do so that it remains free and non corrupt.

1st thing is to ensure anyone can say whatever they want and 2nd is make sure that everyone is always armed so that nobody feels they can 'control' or 'conquer' the rest and keeps things on an even playing field.

When we do this, we need to use VERY CLEAR AND PLAIN language so it won't be twisted and misconstrued later down the road when we're gone. Maybe something like, SHALL NOT BE INFRINGED. That should be simple enough.

Good, now who's with me, and where we going?

I want MY country, the country my ancestors worked to build. Not cuba. F cuba. Let's send the liberals there. That's what they want anyways, a socialist state.

Ah... that's where I got the idea from...

 

[MassMark]

This shouldn't come as news to anyone who was paying attention to the court's decision in Heller, which Scalia wrote. The case says plainly some restrictions, like prohibiting felons from possessing guns is lawful.


How about the plain text of the law? "Shall not be infringed". Simple, absolutist, to the point language.

Juxtapose that with the Fourth Amendment which forbids "unreasonable searches and seizures" without a warrant. There's ambiguity there, thus some reasonable warrantless searches are permitted. As a result, literally hundreds of times more pages in legal casebooks dedicated to the topic area.

Seems to me if the 2nd Amendment wasn't supposed to be absolute, I wouldn't be able to make this distinction.

That.

 

[n1zfg]

After skimming through the seven pages of posts on the subject of who should or shouldn't be able to have guns, I'm going to re-iterate my own stance, which will sound remarkably similar to many of the prior posters in this thread.

It is not an absolute for me. That's right, I don't believe everyone should have the ability to get them.
It is also not just about guns. It includes all weapons including guns, knives, cricket bats, whatever.

And it goes like this:

If a person has the mental capacity and moral fiber to be allowed to be at large without responsible supervision, then they should have the right to keep and bear arms.

The hard, unsolved problem is how to go about figuring who lack the mental capacity or moral fiber to be at large, outing them and only them, how to properly deal with them, and keep the system from being used to subjugate the majority of the rest.

 

[cekim]

The hard, unsolved problem is how to go about figuring who lack the mental capacity or moral fiber to be at large, outing them and only them, how to properly deal with them, and keep the system from being used to subjugate the majority of the rest.

Step one is this pesky little thing called due process...

No it isn't an easy problem to solve when you have people hurting other people, but this is the exception and there is a concept that allows a legal process to evaluate the individuall and provide for incarceration or even abridgement of fundamental rights in response to their actions or mental state.

What Scalia is missing and many who talk about these limitations is:
PRESUMPTION OF INNOCENCE.

Whatever may be done after due process, those not availed of due process (i.e. the rest of us neither charged not guitly of any crime) are to be presumed innocent and their rights intact.

The government has no legitimate power to infringe on the natural rights of people without due process. As such, they have no power to ban innocent people from exercising their natural rights.

 

[TomH]

The hard, unsolved problem is how to go about figuring who lack the mental capacity or moral fiber to be at large, outing them and only them, how to properly deal with them, and keep the system from being used to subjugate the majority of the rest.

That isn't possible, welcome to real life. The key to living in a free society is accepting the risk that occasionally bad things will happen with the freedoms allowed to people. That is the cost, but it is worth it.

 

[Baikal49]

Jefferson. Washington. Madison. Adams. Franklin. Probably a few others. Have you actually READ any of those documents?

I have. Assuming that you have, please provide me with cited quotes from these authors setting out that the 2nd Amendment is absolute.

As for you "obviously" not being a "Shall Infringer" because you CC 1) *I* don't know that you CC 2) I'm pretty sure most of Martha's crew DOES CC and 3) even if you aren't a shill, having a "CC" doesn't automatically credential you as a pro-gun advocate.

I am not a "Shall Infringer" for your numbers 1, 2 or 3. I am not one because I say I'm not and have agreed with the position that Justice Scalia has taken.
Now, as to your #1--I really don't care what you believe. I have my unrestricted Class A, know I have it and CC. #2 is irrelevant to the discussion here. #3 is illogical. If I wasn't to a fair degree pro-gun, I wouldn't have applied for a Class A, nor would I be likely to CC.


How about a Federal Bureau of Pre-Crime Investigation?

They could compile lists of likely offenders and then get court orders to strip them of their rights based on their probability of someday committing a crime.

Your paranoia is impressive. Your argument is not. The legal standards regarding commitment are clearly defined by statute and case law. The person subject to the court proceeding has a guardian ad litum appointed if they can not afford an attorney to protect their rights. I can tell you from my experience having handled a Sec. 730 proceeding in NY Supreme Court, judges are loath to take away a person's freedom prior to the commission of a criminal act. That even carries to a defendant criminally charged with a lunchtime assault in Bryant Park where he hit a woman in the side of the head with a soda can. Why? "Because she was a social climbing Jewess that I could smell from three blocks away." A clearly sick client who the judge refused to even hold for a few days in hospital 730 evaluation.

 

[Baikal49]

[video]http://www.youtube.com/embed/wV1lZMTCqf8[/video]

RIP George. He had it right all along.

He was a national treasure. His critical thinking comments are so on point in this forum.

 

[Baikal49]

What we need is a new country based on an absolutist stand. This one is clearly swirling in the bowl.

You might want to read John Calvin Batchelor's novel The Founding of the People's Republic of Antartica.

 

[Roscoe]

Society has a very short memory. Does anyone remember that many people were forcibly incarcerated in mental institutions for being "I'll". When really they were just different than ither people. There was no hope for their release either.

In this country you have the RIGHT to be mentally I'll, yes you DO. Forced 48 hour evaluations are RARE. And they have an incredible burden to prove IMMEDIATE harm to themselves. If they refuse treatment, they are released.

The police or mental health "professionals" can do NOTHING until dangerous action by that individual is PROVEN to be harmful. And when it is, they receive treatment. If they commit a felony then the EXISTING laws are already prepared to deal with it. Problem solved, no new laws needed.

Given the power to pick which "conditions" are violent the government will always pick every "condition" as violent.

"oh get animated at a football game? " violent

"use foul language ?". Your Violent

"frustrated at the cat for stealing your ball if yarn ?" your violent

"like Guns and military stuff " YOUR VIOLENT.

I have seen this shit brought up in courts for restraining orders all the time.

if your worried about a nutcase taking out the next theater then carry a gun and take him out first.

 

[Baikal49]

They still run all the 1950's American cars they got before the embargo as daily drivers.

I'm in:

https://www.google.com/search?num=1....6.6.0.94.713.12.12.0...0.0...1ac.BngMt0nUuBk

You can google "hot cuban girls" for yourselves.

The best selection of cars is in Montevideo, Uruguay.

 

[Baikal49]

After skimming through the seven pages of posts on the subject of who should or shouldn't be able to have guns, I'm going to re-iterate my own stance, which will sound remarkably similar to many of the prior posters in this thread.

It is not an absolute for me. That's right, I don't believe everyone should have the ability to get them.
It is also not just about guns. It includes all weapons including guns, knives, cricket bats, whatever.

And it goes like this:

If a person has the mental capacity and moral fiber to be allowed to be at large without responsible supervision, then they should have the right to keep and bear arms.

The hard, unsolved problem is how to go about figuring who lack the mental capacity or moral fiber to be at large, outing them and only them, how to properly deal with them, and keep the system from being used to subjugate the majority of the rest.

BINGO!! We have a winner.

 

[Baikal49]

Step one is this pesky little thing called due process...

No it isn't an easy problem to solve when you have people hurting other people, but this is the exception and there is a concept that allows a legal process to evaluate the indivual and provide for incarceration or even abridgement of fundamental rights in response to their actions or mental state.

What Scalia is missing and many who talk about these limitations is:
PRESUMPTION OF INNOCENCE.

Whatever may be done after due process, those not availed of due process (i.e. the rest of us neither charged not guitly of any crime) are to be presumed innocent and their rights intact.

The government has no legitimate power to infringe on the natural rights of people without due process. As such, they have no power to ban innocent people from exercising their natural rights.

The presumption of innocence is a rule of evidence only that places the burden of proving a charge on the government in a hearing/trial controled by substantive and procedural due process.

 

[TomH]

BINGO!! We have a winner.

Except his solution is impossible without violating everyone's rights in the process. Utopia can't be a reality, despite how much you wish it to be.

 

[smitty]

They don't all have 24/7 protection.
You can read into this posting and believe whatever the hell you want to!

"I do believe I'd be better off dead and if you can take a man's life for the thoughts that's in his head".

smitty

Oh great I've posted in another threat that the magnificent anti gun shit Baikal49 has intruded into.

 

[cekim]

The presumption of innocence is a rule of evidence only that places the burden of proving a charge on the government in a hearing/trial controled by substantive and procedural due process.

No, it is a philosophy of governance grounded in the very concept of fundamental rights.

What I am saying and what the constitution and the common law in which it was grounded were saying is that people are innocent and free until the government can show otherwise with a high burden of proof.

The rest is jurists blowing hot air in eachother's orifices trying to justify otherwise. Contrary to what lawyers believe, our rights and freedoms don't come from the courts or judges. Those bodies serve only to regulate infringement by government to varying degrees.

 

[WBspectrum]

Society has a very short memory. Does anyone remember that many people were forcibly incarcerated in mental institutions for being "I'll". When really they were just different than ither people. There was no hope for their release either.

In this country you have the RIGHT to be mentally I'll, yes you DO. Forced 48 hour evaluations are RARE. And they have an incredible burden to prove IMMEDIATE harm to themselves. If they refuse treatment, they are released.

The police or mental health "professionals" can do NOTHING until dangerous action by that individual is PROVEN to be harmful. And when it is, they receive treatment. If they commit a felony then the EXISTING laws are already prepared to deal with it. Problem solved, no new laws needed.

Given the power to pick which "conditions" are violent the government will always pick every "condition" as violent.

"oh get animated at a football game? " violent

"use foul language ?". Your Violent

"frustrated at the cat for stealing your ball if yarn ?" your violent

"like Guns and military stuff " YOUR VIOLENT.

I have seen this shit brought up in courts for restraining orders all the time.

if your worried about a nutcase taking out the next theater then carry a gun and take him out first.

Needs to be remembered


+1

 

[namedpipes]

Your paranoia is impressive. Your argument is not. The legal standards regarding commitment are clearly defined by statute and case law. . . .

Wait. What was my argument?

I contended that the founding fathers believed in unalienable rights. "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness..."

Nothing vague about that. WHICH rights are unalienable we could debate, but without question they believed such rights exist.

Beyond that, I implied you could be a "shall infringer" (whatever that is) despite your claim otherwise basically because I have no basis to take your word for it. That means, since you and I are anonymous and there is no third party that we both know and trust, promising that our statements are true, there is no bond of trust. In short: I don't believe you.

You go on to say it's irrelevant if you work for Martha (that jab was made in jest, by the way).

Then you ramble on about why would you apply for an LTC if you didn't believe in gun rights etc but you never complete the logic chain to reach your conclusion. If you are really a lawyer I would conclude that you're a lousy one, based on my interpretation of your arguments here...

Cekim made some excellent points about due process. You should go read them. That and, you know. The Constitution. Stuff like that.

 

[xtry51]

After skimming through the seven pages of posts on the subject of who should or shouldn't be able to have guns, I'm going to re-iterate my own stance, which will sound remarkably similar to many of the prior posters in this thread.

It is not an absolute for me. That's right, I don't believe everyone should have the ability to get them.
It is also not just about guns. It includes all weapons including guns, knives, cricket bats, whatever.

And it goes like this:

If a person has the mental capacity and moral fiber to be allowed to be at large without responsible supervision, then they should have the right to keep and bear arms.

The hard, unsolved problem is how to go about figuring who lack the mental capacity or moral fiber to be at large, outing them and only them, how to properly deal with them, and keep the system from being used to subjugate the majority of the rest.

This post sums up how every massacre in history starts. The root of the failure in this logic is it leaves those in power the ability to decide who deserves the privilege of your "capacity". Law established under this premise DO NOT establish a right, they set up a privilege enjoyed by a person that may be revoked on the arbitrary basis of another human being. Your outlook presumes that a "good guy", this fabled mythical creature WHICH DOES NOT EXIST, is always in charge of executing the law. This is exactly why rights are supposed to be inalienable and not subject to law at all.

The system under which no one can be denied any form of weapon (including tanks, bombs, nukes, etc) will always result in more freedom and less bloodshed than the state being the sole proprietor and final judge. History proves this at every turn, yet no one wants to learn from it. They, like you, always pretend "this time is completely different and we are beyond the errors of all human history". Yeah, well guess the **** what? You're not, so please stop acting like you know what's better for everyone else.

I'd rather have every nutcase walking around with a gun and deal with them while freely carrying my own firearms anywhere I go, then deal with the police state kicking my door down with full auto weapons over a flash hider. No man has the right to deny others their rights unless an actual crime is being/has been committed. Any other form of government regarding self defense is nanny state precrime bullshit that COSTS INNOCENT LIVES.

 

[noddaduma]

I might have been sniffing too much paint from priming the walls of my bathroom earlier, but..

Isn't he basically saying the same thing that was stated in the Heller decision? That there's been so little court decisions related to 2A that the limits to protections have yet to be defined. Unlike the right to free speech which is fairly fleshed out (ie libel, slander, and similar are not protected rights).


Why is this news?

 

[eric_07]

I might have been sniffing too much paint from priming the walls of my bathroom earlier, but..

Isn't he basically saying the same thing that was stated in the Heller decision? That there's been so little court decisions related to 2A that the limits to protections have yet to be defined. Unlike the right to free speech which is fairly fleshed out (ie libel, slander, and similar are not protected rights).


Why is this news?

November 06, 2012

 

[noddaduma]

November 06, 2012

Good point. In an election year a buffalo fart would make the headlines.

 

[In_God_We_Trust]

You might want to read John Calvin Batchelor's novel The Founding of the People's Republic of Antartica.

What is your beef man? I mean, seriously? The last thing I am looking for is to have a group of head shrinks (that are NOW under Obama care control) signing off that I am fit to have a firearm. You know why? No one will take on that liability. And I am critically thinking about this problem (in how this could be implemented) of being a "suitable" and mentally competent person. You talk a good talk but seem to fail to realize that there are always slippery slopes to every feel-good best intention.

Furthermore, what happens if you do pass some criteria and then go bezerk? Now what has to be changed? Do we start to limit magazine size, types of weapons next and then handguns? All of these types of prohibitions throughout history have proven that the law abiding citizens wind up having "Grip Here" tattooed to their ankles while the criminals flout laws and more innocent people die. Personal freedoms are all but dead at that point.

And I loathe the "reasonable people agree" argument which is completely BS. I am a reasonable person and as history has shown, when you begin to chip away freedoms due to "compromise" all you wind up with no freedoms in the end. And the simple fact of the matter is that law abiding citizens will always follow the law and in a free society, you cannot prevent mass killings due to a few whack jobs. To me, why people are not up in arms over the number of people killed in cars a year than by gun violence astounds me. If they all happened at once you can bet there would be changes in automobile safety. However, due to the actions of a few whack jobs, now freedoms for everyone else should be infringed? As that seems to be your argument, then there is no way to reason with you.

I have lived in MA my entire life and wish I could escape. I would never wish anyone the Ma**h*** gun laws on the rest of the country. Hopefully Romney will turn out better as President with regards to gun ownership, but I am not holding my breath. But, to me, the Second Amendment states "Shall not be infringed" and that is very clear to me. What is not clear about "Shall not be infringed" to you sir?

 

[n1zfg]

Except his solution is impossible without violating everyone's rights in the process. Utopia can't be a reality, despite how much you wish it to be.

Hey, I've only produced about half the solution, what it would be and not how to get it.

I stand by my standard for who should or shouldn't be able to possess firearms.

I also stand by the fact that I don't have an ideal solution.

One near ideal system would be to automatically vet out everyone at the age of 18, and then police up the ones that don't as they out themselves. Our current system is pretty close to this. Of course we would need to stop them before doing significant damage. And once out of circulation, we need to keep them there until they actually meet the standard.

To Xtry51, let me state my standard the other way around....

If you lack the mental capacity or moral fiber to be let out at large without responsible supervision (e.g. parent, legal guardian, parole officer, etc), then you shouldn't be allowed to carry.

Also there is an implied corollary to this:
If you lack the mental capacity or moral fiber to be let out at large without responsible supervision, you probably also shouldn't be at large without responsible supervision.

 

[In_God_We_Trust]

One near ideal system would be to automatically vet out everyone at the age of 18, and then police up the ones that don't as they out themselves. Our current system is pretty close to this. Of course we would need to stop them before doing significant damage. And once out of circulation, we need to keep them there until they actually meet the standard.

My problem is that we are all trying to find a solution to a problem that has no solution. Furthermore, the statement above is very concerning: Are you suggesting that we need to classify people and their rights do not start till they are 18? Are you f*ck*ng serious?

 

[Lip]

Intend to have weapon systems that are on par with the standard small arms of our armed forces (as close as you can lawfully get).
Folks when our nation breaks down all the way then it will be our own police and soldiers that we will have to fear.
In order to adequately fight back you will need to be sufficiently armed.

smitty

amen