What Next for Scared Conservatives?

[Hogeye]

So apparently you agree: The household ownership rate of "assault weapons" in Switzerland is much higher than in other countries, yet Switzerland has an extremely low crime rate.

As a freethinker, it is interesting that the many decisions government courts have made regarding the 2nd Amendment are all slavishly based on one single bad decision by the Supreme Court - United States v. Miller 1939. This was a case where there was no defense(!!), and the prosecutors lied through their teeth. E.g. The claim that the NFA (National Firearms Act of 1934) was a revenue-collecting measure is laughable. The US prosecutors' claim that the militia phrase is qualificatory was taken at face value by the judges, there being no defense.

Luckily we freethinkers reject all authority over our minds. We believe in the efficacy of our own brains, and have no fear about questioning a decision made by government "high priests." We no more believe in Supreme Court infallibility than papal infallability. Five hundred nor five thousand appeals to US v. Miller cannot disuade us from judging the issue for ourselves.

[Dardedar]

Luckily we freethinkers reject all authority over our minds.

DAR
Ironic how Hogeye uses the royal "we" to refer to some kind of collective of freethinkers, as if he speaks for them, or has some kind of authority.... I used to hear that all the time in Kingdom Hall. Sticks out like a sore thumb when a "freethinker" does it.

If I found your 2nd amendment arguments persuasive, I would adopt them. But I do not.

D.

[Barbara Fitzpatrick]

Household OWNERSHIP of army rifles or assault weapons in Switzerland is nil. Slightly over 13% of the population of Switzerland is in their militia-style army and keep their state-owned arms (along with their uniforms) in a locked closet at their dwelling places to allow for more flexibility in destination should they be called out. Other types of guns may or may not be owned by the individual, but are carried only after fulfilling all the state requirements regarding necessity and training.

[Hogeye]

Definition from Wikipedia:
"Freethought is a philosophical doctrine that holds that beliefs should be formed on scientific facts and inquiry and not be comprised by authority, tradition or any other dogmatic belief system that restricts logical reasoning."

So, Darrel, when I write, "we freethinkers reject all authority over our minds," this is simply applying the definition of "freethinker." If you are not one of us who reject all authority over our minds, then you are not a freethinker.

Barbara, those gun-crazy Swiss are fun to read about. A girl won the Knabenschiessen last time. Here's some stuff from an article about a multiple shooting. Apparently the people don't "officially" own their militia weapons, but they get to keep them during and after service - making them de facto owners.

...the ubiquity of automatic weapons -- some 320,000 assault rifles are tucked away in Swiss closets, according to the federal defense department ... Another 100,000 of those older rifles and several thousand army-issue handguns are in the possession of private citizens, the defense department said. ... Switzerland has few regulations governing the sale of rifles. Soldiers are allowed to take with them a single-shot version when they step down from active reserve duty at age 40. Under the law, sales must be recorded and the buyer's name and address listed. The law bars sales to people with criminal records or violent histories. But weapons may be given to family members without such formalities.

Buying a gun commercially requires registration, and Mr. Günter and other lawmakers are urging that 'as a minimum measure, the private sale and the inheriting of army-issue handguns must be controlled in the same way.' ... There is an active Swiss lobby for rifle possession on grounds that it is part of the country's democratic tradition, but the toughest obstacle in revising gun laws may be the sentiment the country's ex-soldiers for a souvenir of their youthful days.

''I kept my Sturmgewehr after my service was finished,'' recalled Guido Meyer, a banker who was visiting the victims' memorial in Zug. full article

The latest Knabenschiessen:

The greatest shooting festival in the world for youngsters takes place every year in Zurich, Switzerland. Imagine thousands of boys and girls shooting military service rifle over three days amid an enormous fair with ferris wheels and wild rides of all kinds. You’re at the Knabenschiessen (boys’ shooting contest).


The Knabenschiessen Fair. (click on images to see full size photographs)

Held since the year 1657, the competition traditionally has been both a sport and a way of encouraging marksmanship in a country where every male serves in the militia army. Today, girls compete along side the boys. In fact, girls are now winning the competition.

It’s September 13, 2004. In the U.S. on this date, the Clinton fake “assault weapon” ban sunsets. In Zurich, some 5,631 teens – 4,046 boys and 1,585 girls, aged 13-17 – have finished firing the Swiss service rifle, and it’s time for the shootoff.

Geschossen wird mit dem Armee-Sturmgewehr

That rifle is the SIG Strumgeweher (assault rifle) model 1990 (Stgw 90), a selective fire, 5.6 mm rifle with folding skeleton stock, bayonet lug, bipod, and grenade launcher. The Stgw 90 is a real assault rifle in that it is fully automatic, although that feature is disabled during the competition. Every Swiss man, on reaching age 20, is issued one to keep at home. Imagine all those teenagers firing this real assault rifle while their moms and dads look on with approval, anxiously awaiting the scores.

...

The Mayor is a member of the Socialist Party, but being on the left does not necessarily entail being anti-gun. A few years ago, the socialist fringe wanted to ban the Knabenschiessen, but the proposal was promptly shot down. Last year Switzerland’s Minister of Justice was voted out of office after proposing firearm registration. Switzerland stands alone in Europe with her free market economy and respect for firearm ownership, and citizens vote accordingly.
- Girl Beats Guys: A Swiss Teen Rifle Festival - Das Zürcher Knabenschiessen

[Savonarola]

As Hogeye has since started a new thread regarding the definition of "Freethinker," let's continue that discussion there.

Thank you for your cooperation.
--Sav, Politics Moderator

[Savonarola]

DOUG
I disagree with the legal theory of constitutional interpretation called originalism.

SAV
I don't totally disagree with you, but...

DOUG
I think that is a poor way to interpret law, especially given that the framers intended that Blacks would count only as 3/5 human.

SAV
Blacks counted as whole persons unless they were enslaved. (Where you could really make a case is that the anti-slavery Northerners wanted slaves not to be people, and the pro-slavery South wanted slaves to be people...) The three-fifths clause was nullified by the Fourteenth Amendment.

DOUG
And slavery was intended to be legal. And they intended to exclude women from voting.

SAV
This is why we have amendments.

[Dardedar]

Definition from Wikipedia:
"Freethought is a philosophical doctrine that holds that beliefs should be formed on scientific facts and inquiry and not be comprised by authority, tradition or any other dogmatic belief system that restricts logical reasoning."

So, Darrel, when I write, "we freethinkers reject all authority over our minds," this is simply applying the definition of "freethinker." If you are not one of us who reject all authority over our minds, then you are not a freethinker.

DAR
Oh kiss my freethinker butt. People use and define words differently and no one is obliged to subscribe to your favorite one.

Your vague phrase "authority over our minds" is not clear to me at all. Freethinkers, including you, can and do regularly acknowledge, accept and respect all sorts of authority and they do so entirely consistent with being freethinkers. Obviously you recognize the Supreme Court's authority on this matter regarding the 2nd amendment or you would't waste any time talking about it. It's not like the Constitution is just something you read on the bathroom wall. Within the context of our society, it matters not one whit what Hogeye thinks about the Constitution, or who he thinks should interprete it. It matters a great deal what the SC thinks it says. This doesn't make their interpretation infallible but it does, through an extensive system of representative government and checks and balances, make it the law of the land.

I still find it profoundly inconsistent to ascribe any power or value to one little part of the Constitution you do like (the 2nd, when interpreted your special NRA way), but then think you can just throw out the part about who is duly assigned interpret it.

You think it matters enough to expend a lot of time and energy talking about the 2nd, so this is a tacit recognition of it's power and authority. You can say you don't recognize authority and will only stop at every second stop sign if you want, but what matters here in the real world, is what the law says about such behavior, because that is what is going to be enforced.

You seem to have a rudimentary misunderstanding of the appeal to authority fallacy. Consider this:

***
This fallacy is committed when the person in question is not a legitimate authority on the subject. More formally, if person A is not qualified to make reliable claims in subject S, then the argument will be fallacious.

This sort of reasoning is fallacious when the person in question is not an expert. In such cases the reasoning is flawed because the fact that an unqualified person makes a claim does not provide any justification for the claim. The claim could be true, but the fact that an unqualified person made the claim does not provide any rational reason to accept the claim as true.

When a person falls prey to this fallacy, they are accepting a claim as true without there being adequate evidence to do so. More specifically, the person is accepting the claim because they erroneously believe that the person making the claim is a legitimate expert and hence that the claim is reasonable to accept. Since people have a tendency to believe authorities (and there are, in fact, good reasons to accept some claims made by authorities) this fallacy is a fairly common one.

Since this sort of reasoning is fallacious only when the person is not a legitimate authority in a particular context, it is necessary to provide some acceptable standards of assessment. The following standards are widely accepted:

the rest
***

DAR
There is good reason to respect the authority of someone who is an expert in constitution law. Harriet Myers, Bush's nominee and accomplished lawyer had far more training in law than you or I but non-the-less was deemed wholly unworthy largely because of her almost complete lack of expertise in "constitutional law". We observed this over and over in the global warming debate where you constantly had appeal to non-experts because all of the experts, almost without exception, strongly disagreed with your position. Now when cornered and asked to come up with a superior system of assigning who should judge the meaning of the 2nd, you posit that Bangalore high school graduates are better qualified to interpret and dissect constitutional law than the people who have been deemed experts in a very extensive selection process of peer review. That's laughable of course.

In reality we constantly find that when people get out of their area of expertise, they make the most rudimentary mistakes. I see this when I deal with professional pianists, people with perhaps even a doctorate in piano. I routinely see that they haven't the foggiest idea regarding piano tuning or a proper test of when a piano is in or out of tune. It is quite amazing that someone can be so proficient with an instrument in one area (playing) and so absolutely clueless in another area (tuning). Likewise, some of the best piano tuners in the world cannot play piano at all. Almost 1/2 of piano tuners do not "play piano" at all.

When I quote the ABA's opinion of the second amendment, or the Supreme Court's, I am quoting a respected authority and people who have devoted their lives to studying law. People who have attained their position through extensive training and peer review. I am not committing the fallacy of appeal to authority when I give their opinion a great deal more authority than the musings of someone who can repeat NRA religious talking points.

As I quote the ABA's position on this, some may notice the pattern of how they are struggling against the propaganda and mythology spread by the NRA in a way similar to how global warming experts struggle against the propaganda and mythology put forward by the global warming skeptics.

***
As part of a comprehensive policy position adopted in 1994, the ABA committed itself to work to better inform the public and lawmakers through a sustained educational campaign regarding the true import of the Second Amendment. Opponents of firearms control legislation have relied upon the Second Amendment's guarantee of "the right to bear arms." The Second Amendment, in its entirety, states:

"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."

The United States Supreme Court and lower federal courts have consistently interpreted this Amendment only as a prohibition against Federal interference with State militia and not as a guarantee of an individual's right to keep or carry firearms. The argument that the Second Amendment prohibits all State or Federal regulation of citizen's ownership of firearms has no validity whatsoever.

The controversy over the meaning of the Second Amendment exists only in the public debate over gun control. Few issues have been more distorted and cluttered by misinformation than this one. There is no confusion in the law itself. The strictest gun control laws in the nation have been upheld against Second Amendment challenge, including local bans on handguns. The Supreme Court enunciated in United States v. Miller, 307 U.S. 174 (1939) what, over fifty years later, remains clearly the law of this country -- that the scope of the people's right to bear arms is limited by the introductory phrase of the Second Amendment regarding the necessity of a "well regulated militia" for the "security of a free State." In Miller, the Court held that the "obvious purpose" of the Amendment was "to assure the continuation and render possible the effectiveness of..." the state militias and cautioned that the Amendment "must be interpreted and applied with that end in view."

Since today's "well regulated militia" does not use privately owned firearms, courts since Miller have unanimously held that regulation of such guns does not offend the Second Amendment. The Supreme Court has twice reaffirmed its view of the Second Amendment as expressed in Miller. In Burton v. Sills, 394 U.S. 812 (1968), the Court dismissed a gun owner's appeal, for want of a substantial federal question, of a New Jersey Supreme Court holding that the Second Amendment permits regulation of firearms "so long as the regulation does not impair the active, organized militias of the states." Most recently, in Lewis v. United States, 445 U.S. 55 (1980), the Court held that legislative restrictions on the use of firearms do not - for purposes of equal protection analysis - "trench upon any constitutionally protected liberties."

The lower federal courts have uniformly followed the interpretation of the Supreme Court. No legislation regulating the private ownership of firearms has been struck down in our nation's history on Second Amendment grounds.

Yet the perception that the Second Amendment is somehow an obstacle to Congress and state and local legislative bodies fashioning laws to regulate firearms remains a pervasive myth. The gun lobby has conducted extensive and expensive campaigns to foster this misperception and the result has been that the myth of the "absolute bar of the Second Amendment" has real effects on regulatory efforts.

As lawyers, as representatives of the legal profession, and as recognized experts on the meaning of the Constitution and our system of justice, we share a responsibility to the public and lawmakers to "say what the law is." The ABA is committed to bringing about a more reasoned and lawyerly discussion of the meaning and import of the Second Amendment.
***

LINK

D.
-----------------------
free-think-er n. A person who forms opinions about religion on the basis of reason, independently of tradition, authority, or established belief.

One definition used by the FFRF and my Websters New World, Third College Edition

[Doug]

DOUG
And slavery was intended to be legal. And they intended to exclude women from voting.

SAV
This is why we have amendments.

DOUG
And that is why we can't simply trust the intent of the founding fathers.

[Barbara Fitzpatrick]

Hogeye, America does not have an equivalent to the Swiss paramilitary training clubs, nor its universal service. The closest America ever had to the kinds of training that culminates in national shooting contests is the youth training programs the NRA used to have (still does in some areas) back when it's focus was training rather than politics.

Doug & Sav - you both have points. The founders used the term "Man" and if you'd asked them they would have said they used it in the "human" sense - but their definition of human was white, male, and land owning. What the amendments have done over the course of 2 centuries is to legally expand that definition to its dictionary one - human includes all people of whatever race or gender.

[Hogeye]

Darrel, if you assume that the Supreme Court is an infallable authority (esp. after reading their illogical decision in Miller!), then you are falling for fallacy of appealing to authority. As I've pointed out, the Supreme Court is not a legitimate authority for interpreting the Con. In any contract, all parties involved interpret it - unless all parties have agreed on an arbiter. For the Con, only one party agreed to the Supreme Court as an arbiter, the government which appoints them. The states did not agree - they retained the right to nullify. So did the people. Why you'd accept such a biased "authority," one judging its own case, is beyond me.

I say again, I do not accept the Supreme Court as an authority on anything. I consider it a propaganda institution combined with monopoly court. Over time it has legitimized increasing power to the State time and again, just as you would expect from the incentives. As I wrote before the discussion started, the real issue is about the right of self-defense and is based on self-ownership, not founders' scripture. I consider a discussion like the one about the 2nd A as kind of a dumbed down proxy issue for USAmericans.

Barbara, a high rate of firearms possession does not necessarily mean a high crime rate - it may mean a very low one. Switzerland is a great example. As you know, I don't buy the tortured interpretation of the 2nd which considers the militia phrase to be qualificatory. Thus, the militia situation is irrelevant to the individual right to possess arms.

[Guest]

The militia situation is very relevant, since in preparation for militia duty kids are trained in the use of firearms and all the Swiss who own weapons are certified trained (and to have a good reason for owning one). If that were the same in this country, you would not be getting an argument from me about gun ownership. I don't want untrained, emotional 5-year-olds with deadly weapons any more than I want physical 5-year-olds with deadly weapons.

[Barbara Fitzpatrick]

The militia situation is very relevant, since in preparation for militia duty kids are trained in the use of firearms and all the Swiss who own weapons are certified trained (and to have a good reason for owning one). If that were the same in this country, you would not be getting an argument from me about gun ownership. I don't want untrained, emotional 5-year-olds with deadly weapons any more than I want untrained, physical 5-year-olds with deadly weapons.

[Hogeye]

Most RTKBA people would agree with you about the sorry state of firearms education. But your "solution" of restrictions and bans is a self-fulfilling prophesy - you dumb down the American public with restrictions and then complain that youngsters don't know about firearms safety anymore.

There is a learned cultural factor. As they say, "An armed society is a polite society." I might add: A legally disarmed society with shoot-em-up TV shows and video games is a stupid and violent society.

[Dardedar]

Darrel, if you assume that the Supreme Court is an infallable authority (esp. after reading their illogical decision in Miller!), then you are falling for fallacy of appealing to authority.

DAR
Of course that is precisely the opposite of what I said:

"This doesn't make their interpretation infallible but it does, through an extensive system of representative government and checks and balances, make it the law of the land."

Interpreting the constitution is not like counting apples in a barrel. There is no scientific fact at the end of the process. It's subjective like judging a piece of art or the winner of a debate. This is compounded by the fact that everyone admits the 2nd amendment is a muddled mess. What matters is who is appointed to get the final say. Someone, some group, has to be put in this position, and they are. And they are not from Bangalore and never will be.

D.

[Hogeye]

Okay, then we agree: The Supreme Court's opinion has zero relevance to whether there is an individual right to bear arms. It is merely the final say about the statist "law of the land."

As in other discussions, we have different emphases. I am interested in the moral aspect, while you are interested in the legalistic aspect.

[Barbara Fitzpatrick]

The American west was not a polite society. In fact, the first step in "settling" the wild west was "check your guns at the sheriff's office".

[Hogeye]

The west had a lower murder rate that the east back then. A few party towns for coyboys had such local gun control you speak of. In Dodge it was only the saloon section of town.

If you look real hard at the record of Dodge City, Kansas from the time the cattle herds started shipping from there until the last year as a "cow town" – a span of about 15 years you can come up with approximately 15 people who died by violence. Yep that’s fifteen, not 150, in a period of 15 years. An average of 1 per year. However in the worst year, five people died so there were several years in that 15 in which no one was killed in Dodge City. A couple of those are famous incidents which get told and retold. One is the cowboy who was killed by the officers Earp and Masterson. One was Bat’s brother Ed who was mortally wounded by one of two cowboys named Walker and Wagner, who were in turn shot by Bat Masterson (both survived the shooting). Another, not so well known homicide was the accidental shooting of Dora Hand by a drunk on the street when the bullet went through several walls and hit her in the head as she slept.

Now everyone knows of the famous sign which orders all the visitors to Dodge City to check their guns. What you might not be aware of is that there were, in effect, actually two Dodge Cities adjacent to one another, split by a spur line of the railroad called the "deadline". The sign was there for mostly for the benefit of those who visited the saloons and brothels south of the deadline. While It was the denizens on the "other side of the tracks" who were required by law to disarm when they ventured into town. So, in this little microcosm of western society we have an excellent comparison of just how effective restrictive gun laws actually are. Now of the 15 people who perished by violence in Dodge City’s most violent years, just how many do you think fell victim North of the Deadline. If you guessed 0 you would be right! Now isn’t that amazing. You take a town and put all of the miscreants, rebel rousers, and assorted ne’er-do-wells in one area, forbid the carrying of weapons by those who frequent a certain part of town, and ALL of the homicide occurs there. "Gun Control" works just as well today as it did then. Dodge City is not the exception. Tombstone, where the Earps moved, enjoyed the same proscription on going armed, though it was truly a violent place, the violence was contained in the area near the controlled section of town. There are numerous other examples. (From Check Your Gun Mister)

[Dardedar]

Okay, then we agree: The Supreme Court's opinion has zero relevance to whether there is an individual right to bear arms. It is merely the final say about the statist "law of the land."

DAR
No, in this country I would say the SC's opinion has exactly 100% relevance to whether there is an individual right to bear arms.

As in other discussions, we have different emphases. I am interested in the moral aspect, while you are interested in the legalistic aspect.

DAR
That may be correct. You may want to judge an individual right to bear arms as moral/immoral, I am interested in what is really happening and what is going to really happen. And what is really happening and going to really happen is that as long as there is this US Consitution, the Supreme Court is going to interprete what it says. Someone's moral musings or personal opinions about it make no difference whatsoever.

D.

[Savonarola]

Finally you good folks are getting to the meat of the matter. No doubt the moderator will soon punt this to another thread.

Quite right.

As the nature of rights certainly warrants having its own thread, the appropriate posts have been split to The Nature of Rights. Please continue that discussion there.

Thank you for your cooperation.
--Savonarola, Politics Moderator