AmericanPapist Comments
I love the reference on page 9 of the Certiorari:
"4 Commentaries on the Laws of England 55 (1769) (hereinafter Blackstone); see also 1 W. & M., c. 15, §4, in 3 Eng. Stat. at Large 422 (1689) (“[N]o Papist . . . shall or may have or keep in his House . . . any Arms . . . ”); 1 Hawkins, Treatise on the Pleas of the Crown 26 (1771) (similar)."
It is a terrific victory for the "original meaning" wing of the Court (ably piloted over recent years by Justices Scalia and Thomas).
But gun enthusiasts beware: the "original meaning" of the Second Amendment applied only to the federal government (or, as here, the District of Columbia).
No one can say for certain that this decision will provide any limitation on state laws that curtail the right recognized in Heller.
I don't think that any loosing of restrictions on handguns will make me any safer on the streets of DC. Sorry, by I am not that eager to pack heat in my apartment.
Uh, no, the Bill of Rights as they've been interpretted throughout the centuries applies to all the states, otherwise you'd e saying sure, the federal government can't own slaves but Maryland residents can.
The whole point of having amendments in the Constitution is to protect the rights of the people from the federal government's encroachment...
So now this ruling will allow alot of people to march back courts and local governments who took away their rights while pointing at Miller et. al.
Well, then, I guess I will use my gun rights to get a Saturday Night Special for my one bedroom apartment in DC just cause I'm Catholic, American, and just cause I can.
Do you think they will sell me one on Friday night? Do they have trigger locks for cats?
Gun enthusiasts should beware because Scalia pointedly said in his opinion that there are other alternatives that can be pursued to ensure safety. I haven't read the opinion in full, but he said that guns can still be banned from places like schools. I'd like to know how he rationalizes that schools are sacrosanct but not supermarkets or libraries.
Uh, no, the Bill of Rights as they've been interpretted throughout the centuries applies to all the states
Wrong.
The BoR applies only when a specific Amendment is "incorporated" by virtue of the 14th Amendment--which Scalia did NOT DO in his decision.
Thus (although this will be tried in Chicago) the right does not automatically apply to all US citizens otherwise qualified, (etc.)
Most likely the result will be the same--but there's a rocky road ahead for the Chicago litigants.
Last October 26, our Church beatified a man, Franz Jaegerstaetter -- an Austrian farmer and husband/father of four daughters who refused to "bear arms" in the Nazi Army because of his Catholic faith, and was beheaded for his refusal on August 9, 1943. Our Church celebrated the holy witness of a man who refused to participate in inflicting violence on others, even others who would do him harm...as did Jesus on the cross, whose response to the thugs who tortured and crucified him was "Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing." It seems to me that our response as Catholics is to refuse to participate in violence, even when it is visited upon us.
The Catechism says that is a viable moral option. It also says that defense, up to and including the use of deadly force, when needed, is a viable moral option. And it says that for some people, such as police officers, there are times when the use of deadly force may be a "grave duty".
SWEET! I've been worried...
Michael, the point about having guns is not that you're going to do violence (that is, assuming, as you are, that you are Catholic and trying to live the Gospel). The point about having guns is that if you have a gun, it makes it far less likely that anyone's going to do violence to YOU. I live out in the country and everybody has guns, and absolutely the only break-ins that happen happen when nobody's home. It's assumed that if anybody's home, they'll have a gun, and you're better off not trying. Similarly, if any sane person on the streets of DC can have a gun, and if most or many do, the chances of some crazy shooting a bunch of people will be a lot less, because he'll know that people can shoot back. If nobody can shoot back, then there's nobody who can stop him.
Mary Catherine, speaking as a police officer, I just want to say that you nailed it. The criminals of D.C. will hate this ruling.
I know a criminal justice professor who has studied the impact of conceal-carry laws (or maybe he was referring to the research of others), and if memory serves me correctly, he once told me that research shows that they neither increase nor decrease gun violence.
On the applicability of the Second Amendment and Heller to the states, see footnote 23 of Justice Scalia's opinion for the Court.
[He acknowledges that it's an open question, not answered in Heller.]
John Lott did a study of every county in the country a few years back ("More Guns, Less Crime" was the title, I think), that compared crime rates in those counties with the severity of their gun control laws. The study showed that the counties with the most restrictive gun control laws have the highest rates of violent crime and those with the least restrictive gun control laws have the lowest. It makes sense; criminals have their own version of OSHA, and they know that law-abiding citizens with guns make their jobs more dangerous.
Not all citizens who will register a gun and have it in their home are going to be law abiding types who will only shoot intruders. Proliferation of guns in urban areas leads to theft of guns, misuse of guns which is what criminals want. Let's stop being Annie "Polyanna" Oakly's about this one. And stop finding excuses with Catholic Morality. Just because it is a ligitmate moral option it is not automatically the best or even necessarily a good one.
Yeah, I can see where a lot of criminals are going to register their guns. Funny, though, in 19 years as a police officer, I've never run across one.
Bravo, Mary Catherine. My dad always brings up in arguments like these that when he was a teenager, guns were allowed around his school (just not inside it). The result was that there were no shootings or bomb threats because if there were, countless angry teenagers could just run to their cars and yank the firearms out of their trunk. It's an odd sort of protection against shootings... giving guns to people.
I have a cousin who was so excited when Kansas passed a conceal-carry law, and I couldn't understand his enthusiasm. I couldn't figure out if he wanted to carry a gun to make himself feel more like a man, or if he actually lives in a perpetual state of fear that he worries about getting gunned down as he walks down the street. I think it's both, but more of the latter, and from the comments left in this thread, it's definitely the latter.
A lot of the fear in this country is the media's fault. Until recently, crime rates have been dropping but the media reports it all as a "crime wave" to make you think danger surrounds you. I'm not discounting the fact that we're not as safe as we could be, but it's really odd to me that people think they're so unsafe that they need a dangerous weapon for security. Strange days indeed.
Those states that have seen the biggest drop in crime are those which made it easier for their law-abiding citizens to get carry permits.
Nathan,
My excitement comes from a simple fact: I'm no longer being denied one of the rights that is God given and natural to my as a person.
Some liberal elites "know better" than the sheeple (just look at our public schools, exponentially higher crime rates, pregnancy and STD issues, efficiency of government, general public morality, etc), and want to control what individuals do-- it is rooted in a hatred of the authentic freedom given to us by God.
When criminals know that the citizenry can not resist them, they run rampant. In many major American cities gangs are now armed bandits, but the travels are powerless to resist the banditry. It's really odd to me that the liberal elites are so afraid of the people and feel so unsafe that they seek to deny anyone weapons of any sort, other then those who are being directly paid and controlled by them.
The real question is this-- why are you opposed to the authentic freedom given to us by God?
Overheard:
Q - Why do you carry a gun?
A - Because a cop is too heavy.
I have an advanced degree in Theology and I have never, ever heard of the right to bear arms as a God given right.
Also, a policeman should know better. Shame on you. Criminals do not register guns, but they do steal registerd guns. And, BTW, cite your sources. I would be interested in seeing the studies you alude to.
Right above your last post. Shame on you.
The right to keep and bear arms, as a moral right rather than as a privilege of the positive law, may be correctly extrapolated from the moral right to defend oneself, as one may not exercise that particular moral right without the means supplied by the Second Amendment.
oooh, an "advanced degree in theology"! So apparently you've never read the Old Testament, or the New? What did Jesus ask to be bought from the sale of someone's cloak again? Why that's right, a sword. Hmmm. I wonder why.
And why did he suggest the disciples bring their walking sticks with them... merely to aid in their footsteps? You do know what shepherds used their 'walking sticks' for, right?
"There is a time for war, and a time for peace, a time for violence and a time for calm." It's not the sword that's evil, it's living BY the sword that's the moral problem.
As for men compensating....It's the fact that words or threats to call the ACLU can't drop an unjust aggressor that most gun owners are compensating for! But nice try projecting your own psychosis on others.
I guess advanced degrees help with that sort of thing, huh?
Guns, like knives or shovels are not intrinsically evil, they're tools. Now obviously Glenn does not trust himself with a tool like a gun. OK, fine, no one is forcing him to buy one (and "Saturday Night Specials" aren't any more dangerous than Tuesday Morning deals).
Few law-abiding people (and they'll have to be law-abiding to pass the NICS screening to even get a gun) will put down $300 or more for a rifle and $400 or more for a pistol, plus hundreds more for the accessories and ammo, and training...to then be irresponsible with it. And if they'll allowed to carry their pistols with them the threat of losing their weapons to burglaries goes down too!
Besides, it doesn't even cover pistols. Now DC residents can keep their Shotguns and rifles loaded, but without a round in the barrel...They are no longer subjects, they're starting to be citizens.
Are you for real???
"ATLANTA, Georgia, (AP) -- The Supreme Court's landmark ruling on gun ownership last week focused on citizens' ability to defend themselves from intruders in their homes. But research shows that surprisingly often, gun owners use the weapons on themselves.
The Supreme Court's landmark ruling on gun ownership last week focused on citizens' ability to defend themselves.
1 of 2 Suicides accounted for 55 percent of the nation's nearly 31,000 firearm deaths in 2005, the most recent year for which statistics are available from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
There was nothing unique about that year -- gun-related suicides have outnumbered firearm homicides and accidents for 20 of the last 25 years. In 2005, homicides accounted for 40 percent of gun deaths. Accidents accounted for 3 percent. The remaining 2 percent included legal killings, such as when police do the shooting, and cases that involve undetermined intent.
Public-health researchers have concluded that in homes where guns are present, the likelihood that someone in the home will die from suicide or homicide is much greater.
Studies have also shown that homes in which a suicide occurred were three to five times more likely to have a gun present than households that did not experience a suicide, even after accounting for other risk factors."
Just one of many many points that have nothing at all to do with any "God given right to defend yourself"
I see, so since some people may kill themselves, it's better to disarm ALL people?
Now, how many of those could/would have killed themselves other ways? Was the gun the determining factor such that being disarmed would have saved them? The assumption is yes by Glenn. I'm not so sure, having known depressed people....
Besides, disarming everyone in order to 'save' less than 1% who actually need friendship and therapy not disarmament strikes me as an odd position for a Catholic theologian to have.
Surely the Catholic position on the best way to handle depression in a small percentage of the population is not to disarm ALL people?
After all, how well has disarmament of civilian populations fared in the history of the world Glenn?
How well has it worked domestically?
The experience of DC, Chicago, and New Orleans (pre and post Katrina) teaches us that civilian populations who are disarmed are on the one hand terrorizied by criminals and easily tyrannized by armed authorities on the other.
But Glenn has an advanced degree in Theology so he can roll out the big arguments in favor of civilian disarmament -like scripture, councils, papal documents, saints, mystics, historical precedents, common experience, etc. and the rest of us just sit in awe of his erudition while he asks rhetorical "are you real?" questions and cites CDC statistics without commentary. You studied how long to be able to do this?
Give us reasons to believe disarming ALL the people saves more of them than letting those lawabiding among them arm themselves.
In light of Rwuanda, Darfur, Bosnia, Cambodia....to say nothing of the Armenian and Jewish holocausts... how sure are you that civilian disarmament leads to their security?
In light of high crime rates in cities and states with draconian gun control laws...how sure are you that fewer guns = greater security?
And from your stated 'high' ground of Catholic theology, since when has the Church taught total disarmament and pacificism? It sure as shooting doesn't preach socialism or state control of everything.
So I fail to see how you can raise a civic or Catholic argument to support your opinion that disarmament of civilian populations is a CATHOLIC position.
Calmation, John.
The only reference to Catholic Theology that I have made is that "the right to bear arms as a God given right" is not found anywhere in Catholic Theology.
Hope you are not as trigger happy with your service revolver.
Au contraire mon frere,
Catholic Theology does allow individuals to use deadly force to protect their lives.
It does not specify how or by what means innocent victims or defenders of others (like a husband or father) may so defend themselves from unjust aggressors, but the moral principle is well expressed in the Catechism, in many ancient and modern sources of "Catholic theology" including recent Papal discourses.
We're not talking "WMDs" or indisciminate, disproportionate force either like bazookas, anti-aircraft guns or grenades. Clearly, any weapon whose use by design or physics would be indiscriminate is morally suspect for 'self-defense' (though not entirely forbidden as we see in the case of warfare where soldiers may use certain weapons albeit not on civilian targets) but the typical "Saturday Night Special" is a handgun, caliber unspecified. Hardly a weapon of mass destruction.
Just because you prefer to be unarmed and are ignorant of Catholic source materials going back to St. Augustine (if you discount scripture) doesn't mean "there's nothing in Catholic theology" about the right to self-defense.
The Church does not preach socialism and it does not preach pacifism. This means it does not preach that the state ought to have a monopoly on the use of force (because otherwise individuals would not be licitly able to morally defend themselves) and it also means that people may fight back in self-defense. No one is arguing for vigilantes or personal vendettas here.
John, are you on medication? Can you read English properly?
My statement is that the right to bear arms is not a God given right in Catholic Theology.
I have not made a statement on "allow individuals to use deadly force to protect their lives" or "defend themselves from unjust aggressors".
Do I have to repeat it? The right to bear arms is not a God given right.
Now read it carefully.
No, you need to read - and think -carefully.
You claim there is no "God given right to bear arms" in Catholic theology. I beg to differ.
Since the right to self-defense up to and including killing of an unjust aggressor IS recognized in Catholic theology (cf.CCC), it would be preposterous to conclude that swords and clubs are OK but handguns are not.
Guns are one form of tool that - like a sword, club, rock or bare hands, can indeed either disuade an attacker, sufficiently injure an attacker but not kill, or kill. But they are not typically indiscriminate weapons that run the high risk of harming the innocent (like, say, a hand grenade).
There are copious quotes in "Catholic Theology" about the need for such indiscriminate weapons to be kept out of the hands of civilians, but no such paper trail refering to personal, individual weapons.
Insasmuch as a Catholic according to Catholic theology has indeed a right to self-defense, that Catholic has a right to use proportionate tools towards that end - be this blunt objects, blades, or guns.
Other wise you would have us believe we have a right to something (safety from unjust aggressors) but are forbidden to use the appropriate measures to secure that right!
Our Lord bade his followers to take their walking staffs with them. In later eras Christians were allowed personal arms in the form of swords and other deadly 'arms'.
Now clearly if alternatives to bearing arms can be found, those alternatives ought to be pursued - the end is not an armed society but a safe one. But inasmuch as the Democratic party run Washington DC is incapable of guaranteeing the safety of its citizens, I fail to see the "Catholic" argument whereupon citizens must not be allowed to defend themselves or their charges from unjust aggressors as though such a defense is somehow sinful (as in doing something for which one has no "God given rights" to do).
Yeah, and remember how the Holocaust was ended by those who refused to bear arms ....
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