This is a tough one.
Oh, I dunno...what do you think: Should we try and make it harder for terrorists to get guns? David Frum, who's opinion I normally respect, seems to think not. After watching the most recent Real Time with Bill Maher, Natalie Maines is my new hero. She really held her own, and dare I say, showed up ol' David. Also, if Barbara Boxer is becoming a spokesperson for Democrats, we're in toruble.
posted by Rob Moran at 3:10 PM
1 Comments:
Ah, guns. Which inevitably brings us to the Second Amendment. Amusingly, on this one issue, conservatives and liberals and their interpretation of the Constitution swaps. Liberals tend to hold a strict constructionist view in regards to the Second Amendment, which tends to favor disarming invdividual citizens, whereas conservatives embrace the "living Constitution" philosophy here. On just about any other Constitutional issue or fundamental right, you'll find the positions to be reverse.
That being said, federal jurisprudence on this issue is anything but clear. Some federal circuits (read: not in the South) adhere to a collective rights theory with respect to the Second Amendment. Essentially, under this view, one could make the argument that it is the states that have the right to bear arms, and each state's national guard force qualifies that right, and all other citizens of that state can legally be disarmed. The countervailing view, most recently discussed in a case a few years ago in the 5th Circuit, is the individual rights theory. This is generally the view espoused by the NRA and other pro-gun lobby groups, whereby all citizens have the right to bear arms. And bear in mind that the 5th Circuit encompasses Texas, Louisiana, and Mississippi, so that opinion is no surprise to this writer.
Unfortunately, the U.S. Supreme Court refuses to touch the Second Amendment collectively and has not done so since the 1930's. (Although Justice Thomas actually mentioned in briefly in a concurring opinion in the Printz case)
The two major cases the USSC has heard in the recent past that involved gun control laws were Lopez and Printz. In both cases, the Court struck down the gun control law in question, but in neither case on Second Amendment grounds. The former was struck down in violation of the Commerce Clause and the latter was struck down due a federalism issue. Which brings me to my point.
The problem, I think, with any federal gun control law is drafting it without running afoul of the federalism issue. That is to say, Congress can only go so far in its legislation before the USSC will generally strike down a statute that appears to commandeer the executive or legislative branches of the individual states. Therefore, we are left with a situation where the states themselves will have to legislate most gun control issues. And, in many regions of the country, that does not look very promising at all. That being said, any supposed terrorist will likely be able to have a field day
at gun shows in the South or Midwest for many years to come.
Post a Comment
<< Home