I listened to the various arguments in the
D.C. vs Heller case
now before the Supreme Court. (The case revolves around D.C.’s ban on
handguns in the home.) While it was (very) mildly heartening to hear
some of the justices apparently argue in favor of an individual’s right
to defend himself and the Second Amendment’s role in guaranteeing that
right, overall, the ebb and flow of the discussion revealed the depth
of the morass both defenders and opponents of a right to self-defense
create when they eschew fundamental principles and focus on minutiae to
explain their concrete-bound positions.
Far more (way too much...) time was spent on the Second Amendment’s
secondary, nonrestrictive clause involving “militia” and on the meaning
of “keep and bear arms” than on the critical core phrase “shall not be
infringed.” Such diversionary tactics are common, of course, among the
anti-freedom crowd who know they have no legitimate grounds for
enslaving their fellow citizens. Far easier to wrangle over what a
militia is or was or should be and what precisely is or is not to be
considered “arms” or how or where such arms should or can be stored or
used or sold than it is to focus on what “shall not be infringed” means
and how it should be applied.
Sadly, even Heller’s side conceded that “reasonable” governmental
restrictions are okey-dokey; that licenses and permits are just fine;
that “machine guns” are “obviously” to be prohibited to the average
citizen; that anti-carry laws might well be acceptable. Whether these
folks actually believe such nonsense or compromised the truth in order
to seem “reasonable” and strengthen their odds of acceptance by a
majority of the justices, I can’t say. But I cringed every time I heard
concessions to the victim disarmament thugs.
Indeed, when I listened to a panel discussion earlier that morning on
this issue (a panel stacked two-to-one in favor of victim disarmament),
both sides committed another egregious error: stating repeatedly that
the Constitution or Bill of Rights “grants” or “gives” or “confers” a
“right” to self-defense. The Bill of Rights does no such thing, of
course. (See my “
Getting the Bill of Rights Right” for a fuller explication of this.) The Bill of Rights simply recognizes
preexisting rights we possess as human beings and
guarantees that those rights will be protected from government interference. While the correct position
was stated in the Supreme Court, it received rather poor shrift; virtually
all of the arguments before the court focused on precisely
how much the State
can interfere with those very rights. (The correct answer, of course, is: not at all.)
The State has
zero authority to require training or licensing or
permits or to limit the number of guns or the kinds of guns people may
buy or to prevent children from having access to guns or to prohibit
“machine guns” or “plastic” guns (no such thing) or “armor piercing
bullets” (why?) or anything else related to self-defense and defense
against a potentially tyrannical government.
Of course, we can readily understand
why the State wants to preserve its “right” to demand such infringements: people in power rarely do or agree to anything that will
limit their illegitimate coercive power over others. The Bill of Rights
restricts the power of the State in order to curb
abuses of its delegated authority.
While a decision from the Supremes declaring that a complete
prohibition of “arms” violates the Constitution’s protection of an
individual right would be better than the opposite, very little will
likely change for the majority of Americans. Virtually all current
infringements would remain. In my home in Iowa, the jerk sheriff would
still arbitrarily deny average people the legal “right” to carry
concealed weapons. I would still have to
pay for the
“privilege” of a permit to buy weapons. I would still be vetted by an
unconstitutional “instant” check system and placed on an illegal gun
registry. Other folks in various locations would continue to face even
tougher violations of their rights.
The justices want to treat the Second Amendment far differently than most would want to treat the First Amendment.
Keep these points in mind: an action that is ours by
right is one that requires no one’s
permission to exercise. The U.S. Constitution imposes limits on what the
government is authorized to do. Adult citizens have the right to engage in whatever
peaceful
behavior they want as long as their actions do not physically harm or
threaten to harm the life or property of another citizen. The
government is supposed to
defend our rights, not violate them. The U.S. is supposed to operate on the
rule of law, not the
rule of men.
Imposing upon peaceful citizens the arbitrary decisions of one person
or a small group of people with political power is the opposite of
liberty.
Imagine if you had to get a
permit and be
forced to undergo training classes in order to buy or carry a book; imagine if you had to get a
license to attend the church of your choice; imagine if a sheriff could
deny you those rights on a whim, based on rules he
refuses to tell the citizens whose rights he has sworn to uphold and defend. Imagine if that sheriff gets to
decide for you
whether your reasons are “good enough,” your “need” great enough to
exercise your rights to free expression and religion. Imagine if the
government got to decide if that book or those ideas or that sermon were
too dangerous to allow.
Imagine how
you would feel if such things happened to you here as they have in other countries. Imagine if a
newspaper published a list of who was
allowed to have books or attend church or publish a newspaper or novel.
As I said earlier, even many who are more or less in favor of
self-defense are infected with the statist bias towards victim
disarmament. Consider an article by Thomas Bowden, a member of the Ayn
Rand Institute (see
here).
(Of course, too many Objectivists have long been tepid — to say the
least — in supporting the Second Amendment and its full meaning. For
more on this, see my essay, “
Are Objectivists Afraid of Guns?”)
My reply to Bowden included the following:
While I agree with most of what you stated, I disagree with
two points. One — while it is true handguns are designed to kill — it
is untrue that they “have no peaceful purpose.” Handguns are used
recreationally for target practice. Some handguns are useful for
hunting purposes. Usually, handguns resolve a dispute without ever
being fired, let alone killing someone, when a potential victim shows a
criminal he is ready and able to defend himself. Two, it is false to
imply, as your article seems to do, that guns are morally only to be
used against private criminals, i.e., “emergency self-defense.” This
flies in the face of history, both here and abroad. When the colonists
resisted gun confiscation at Lexington and Concord, the weapons they
used were wielded against those who were supposed to protect their
rights, not violate them. Cf. also to the Warsaw ghetto uprising (as told in the novel Mila 18
by Leon Uris) and countless other situations in Europe and Africa where
guns were used to defend against tyrannical governments.
As for “appropriate limits” on gun ownership, Justice Ginsburg touched
on the reality of what that entails, a reality that neither side of the
current lawsuit will admit: that machine guns are, indeed, “standard
issue” for military personnel and (for the reasons detailed by
Jefferson and others re: oppressive governments:
“The strongest
reason for the people to retain the right to keep and bear arms is, as
a last resort, to protect themselves against tyranny in government.”)
should not be prohibited for the average, law-abiding citizen (cf.,
Swiss citizens who routinely have automatic weapons — true “assault
weapons” — in their homes).
The
sole principle in deciding what should or should not be
considered “appropriate” for individual ownership is: does that
ownership result in the
violation of others’ rights, either directly or indirectly. If the affirmative can be demonstrated, then yes, a ban would be proper. But if
no violation of rights occurs when
owning weapon X, then no legitimate, moral case can be made for banning
such a weapon for individual citizens. The fears or misconceptions or
personal preferences of various people regarding certain weapons have
no bearing on making such a judgment.
Only when we steadfastly adhere to
principles and reject
secondary issues and borderline cases will we have a chance for full
recognition and protection of our right to self-defense...against
criminals both private and public.
(from
Don't Get Me Started!, 3-19-08)
