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[Kogan Loloklam]

The Constitution is always true, untill the states of the union mutualy feel that it must be amended, in which case the AMENDED VERSION is true, and becomes the constitution, keeping the constitution true.

Fixed for you.

[Leafsnail]

"Liberal" Supreme Court my ass.

Sounds pretty liberal to me.  The vote shouldn't have been 5-4, it should to have been 9 to nothing.  You either follow the 2nd Amendment or not, there's no gray area here.  What part of "the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed" did these 4 enforcers of the law not understand?

"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."
I'd say there's quite a big grey area there.  As in, huge.

Firstly, does the justification still hold?  Will America collapse without a civilian militia?

Secondly, what is a "well regulated Militia"?  There's no way any old hick with a gun can count as one, since they're not regulated at all.

Thirdly, how far does it go?  Most are fine with some weapons being restricted, but up to what point?  Up to the point where there's no way you could reasonably use the weapon for defence?  To the point where you can't use it for hunting?

Whatever.  But I don't see how judges can overturn a law a city made because they lean conservative on this part of the constitution.

[Huesoo]

I did they could have easily done it with those weapons.

Did we read different accounts? I thought the explosives failed. Silly me.

Yes they did, but that doesnt mean they could have used them properly. Your saying that it wouldnt have happenend.

[Leafsnail]

And besides, it didn't really have the intended consequences...

[lumin]

"Liberal" Supreme Court my ass.

Sounds pretty liberal to me.  The vote shouldn't have been 5-4, it should to have been 9 to nothing.  You either follow the 2nd Amendment or not, there's no gray area here.  What part of "the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed" did these 4 enforcers of the law not understand?

"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."
I'd say there's quite a big grey area there.  As in, huge.

Firstly, does the justification still hold?  Will America collapse without a civilian militia?

Secondly, what is a "well regulated Militia"?  There's no way any old hick with a gun can count as one, since they're not regulated at all.

Thirdly, how far does it go?  Most are fine with some weapons being restricted, but up to what point?  Up to the point where there's no way you could reasonably use the weapon for defence?  To the point where you can't use it for hunting?

Whatever.  But I don't see how judges can overturn a law a city made because they lean conservative on this part of the constitution.

The first part of the 2nd Amendment states that a well regulated Militia is necessary to the security of a free State.  In no way does this statement indicate that the right to bear arms will be infringed if a Militia does not properly follow a regulation.

The two statements are clearly mutually exclusive.  You're reading things that simply do not exist.

[lumin]

"Liberal" Supreme Court my ass.

Sounds pretty liberal to me.  The vote shouldn't have been 5-4, it should to have been 9 to nothing.  You either follow the 2nd Amendment or not, there's no gray area here.  What part of "the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed" did these 4 enforcers of the law not understand?

"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."
I'd say there's quite a big grey area there.  As in, huge.

Firstly, does the justification still hold?  Will America collapse without a civilian militia?

Secondly, what is a "well regulated Militia"?  There's no way any old hick with a gun can count as one, since they're not regulated at all.

Thirdly, how far does it go?  Most are fine with some weapons being restricted, but up to what point?  Up to the point where there's no way you could reasonably use the weapon for defence?  To the point where you can't use it for hunting?

Whatever.  But I don't see how judges can overturn a law a city made because they lean conservative on this part of the constitution.

The first part of the 2nd Amendment states that a well regulated Militia is necessary to the security of a free State.  In no way does this statement indicate that the right to bear arms will be infringed if a Militia does not properly follow a regulation.

The two statements are clearly mutually exclusive.  You're reading things that simply do not exist.

If there is any assumption here, it is that both rules must be enforced:

We the People can form a regulated militia, and have the right to bear arms without any infringement.  The former is not stated as a right and is not requirement for the latter, which is stated as a right. 

In other words, In order for a regulated militia to be formed, the people must have the right to bear arms.  You have the logic backwards.  Here's how it would be put in binary logic:

if(B == true)//All people have right to bear arms
{
   for each individual
   {
     If(A == true) //Militia is well regulated
      Output A

     Output B //We all still get right to bear arms regardless
    }
}

[Leafsnail]

They're in the same sentence.  If someone says

"You'll get a cold if you wander around in the rain, don't go outisde"

Then "logically", they're telling you

a) You'll get a cold if you go out in the rain
b) You should never go outside

Or you could actually read what it says, and realise that one is following from the other.

[lumin]

They're in the same sentence.  If someone says

"You'll get a cold if you wander around in the rain, don't go outisde"

Then "logically", they're telling you

a) You'll get a cold if you go out in the rain
b) You should never go outside

Or you could actually read what it says, and realise that one is following from the other.

Correct.  "b" in your example is exclusive from "a".  We are all still required to never go outside, regardless of what happens in "a".

Except in the 2nd Amendment we are given positive rights, not negatives, so in order for We the People to create "regulated Militias", we all have the right to bear arms regardless, else "regulated Militias" could never exist because it would negate the second statement by "infringing".

[RedKing]

Guys....if there's anything to be learned from studying how legislation is crafted, it's that people don't pay attention to the specific grammatical interpretations of what they write. And if we're going to start getting into divining intent and looking at what words meant in 1776 versus now, you start to get into a whole new level of exegesis.

It comes down to the same sort of argument you see over the Bible: do you treat it as a literal, carved-in-stone legal document or as a guidebook whose intent should be followed? And not surprisingly, you see a remarkable amount of overlap between the two camps. Biblical fundamentalists tend to be strict Constitutional constructionists. Apparently there's a certain shared appeal in living according to laws that are never updated.

[Kogan Loloklam]

Guys....if there's anything to be learned from studying how legislation is crafted, it's that people don't pay attention to the specific grammatical interpretations of what they write. And if we're going to start getting into divining intent and looking at what words meant in 1776 versus now, you start to get into a whole new level of exegesis.

It comes down to the same sort of argument you see over the Bible: do you treat it as a literal, carved-in-stone legal document or as a guidebook whose intent should be followed? And not surprisingly, you see a remarkable amount of overlap between the two camps. Biblical fundamentalists tend to be strict Constitutional constructionists. Apparently there's a certain shared appeal in living according to laws that are never updated.

And this is why we need the right to own weapons. Some people will take it as holy and launch an invasion of your space due to it, and if you don't defend yourself your land gets sacked and looted.

On a more serious note, the constitution is open to interpretation, but it is generally interpreted based on the definitions of the words at the time.
For example, Militias from then are also called "Lynch Mobs" now (when they were commissioned by the local leaders). This is probably the source of the 'well regulated', to remove mobs that are acting outside the laws and with only the purpose of murder and mayhem. A posse is a "well-regulated militia" and it used to be an important tool of our law enforcement back in the days.

I do know that many of the states were afraid of tyranny, and only the threat of outside invasion caused them to join up with the majority of the group. As such, you can bet your butt that they did want to have the right to continue to fight against tyranny if it occurred again. Also, arms includes swords and crossbows, as well as nuclear weapons. If I built a nuclear bomb, I could probably argue, justly, that it is my right to have it. Of course I don't think the state would respect that and that my right to bear it would be infringed quite quickly.

How would that sit with everyone? Both sides. If the Supreme Court ruled that I could not keep a nuclear weapon I built from scratch, would you agree with their decision? That's a much better debate than a puny handgun

How about flashing THAT around a bar?
"626,000 counts of Felony Menacing!"

[Heron TSG]

Sorry I must have missed that line in the 2nd amendment, or is that Aqizzar's amendment?

"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"
This line comes from the constitution, the document that set the rules for the federal government. The federal government wasn't infringing the citizen's gun laws, the STATE was. The federal government didn't do anything to prevent chicagoans from owning guns.

[Josephus]

How would that sit with everyone? Both sides. If the Supreme Court ruled that I could not keep a nuclear weapon I built from scratch, would you agree with their decision? That's a much better debate than a puny handgun

I'm pretty sure that if you built a nuclear weapon from scratch, the government would hire you. Because seriously, if you have that level of technical acumen...

Nah, that'd be a much sillier debate than a handgun debate.

[Earthquake Damage]

but that's for the Constitutional lawyers, not us 'tards on the internet

While I'm just as guilty as anyone of taking this position, we should try to keep in mind that <insert profession here> also use the internet.  For entertainment, even.  We have someone with oil rig experience here at Bay 12, for example.

Not shooting down your argument.  Just saying.

[Strife26]

How would that sit with everyone? Both sides. If the Supreme Court ruled that I could not keep a nuclear weapon I built from scratch, would you agree with their decision? That's a much better debate than a puny handgun

I'm pretty sure that if you built a nuclear weapon from scratch, the government would hire you. Because seriously, if you have that level of technical acumen...

Only people in North Korea build personal nuclear devices.



In my mind, this ruling pretty simply incorporates the 2nd via the 14th, not a lot other than the will of the court there. The 2nd meanwhile, gives two major rights.
One: there should be regulated militias, see the national guard and the couple of official state militias (which are like the national guard, just being under the state governor, not das Prez)
Two: the right to bear arms shall not be infringed.

We don't assume that the first only protects speech given while peacefully assembling to religiously reporting on a list of grievances to the government; I don't see why the 2nd only covers bearing arms in well regulation.

In my mind, not having gun regulation, leads to uncontrolled availability of firearms in urban environments. Having gun control also leads to uncontrolled gun control availability of firearms in urban environments for those willing to break the law (now the evidence is pretty unclear, what with correlation-causation problems, but you don't see strict gun-control cities seeing huge dips in any kind of crime.)

[HideousBeing]

The Constitution is always true, untill the states of the union mutualy feel that it must be amended, in which case the AMENDED VERSION is true, and becomes the constitution, keeping the constitution true.

Fixed for you.

This is true. I'm disappointed that gun bans get put into place in the first place while the second amendment still exists. It's not an argument of should we or shouldn't we; there are very binding laws in place for this. Banning guns is just turning a blind eye to the most binding contract in America.

Arguing to repeal or change the amendment is fine of course. I'm not sure guns are particularly useful for their risk, but they are fun!