Dear Editor,
I read the letter from Tom Hastings concerning repealing the 2nd Amendment. I also read the fine response letters explaining and defending the 2nd Amendment. I am quite shocked a professor in the Conflict Resolution department at Portland State University who directs PeaceVoice and considers himself a pacifist would begin trying to win people over to his viewpoint of non violence by calling the 2nd Amendment stupid! Without the first 10 Amendments, also known as the Bill of Rights, the Constitution would not have been ratified by the states, and this country would not exist as we know it. You, the writers of the other letters about the 2nd Amendment, myself and the Editor of the paper would most certainly have been arrested by now!
The Constitution was created as a solution to the oppressive governments our Founders saw throughout history and in this country at the time under England, where the Government Would Be Under The Control Of The People, Not The People Under The Control Of The Government! “WE The People” wrote the rules on how our government was to specifically function. So WE are ABOVE the Constitution! Therefore, not only is it an individual right to bear arms, it is a right that can not even be restricted constitutionally! The Bill of Rights is not something the government benevolently granted the people! It was to distinctly tell the government the lines it could not cross! The rest of the 10 Amendments are only possible because of the 2nd Amendment! You can have your own opinions, but not your own facts. The Founders were very clear on why this was included.
“To disarm the people…[i]s the most effectual way to enslave them.”
– George Mason, referencing advice given to the British Parliament by Pennsylvania governor Sir William Keith, The Debates in the Several State Conventions on the Adoption of the Federal Constitution, June 14, 1788
* James Madison: Americans have “the advantage of being armed” — unlike the citizens of other countries where “the governments are afraid to trust the people with arms.”
* Patrick Henry: “The great objective is that every man be armed…. Everyone who is able may have a gun.”
* Samuel Adams: “The Constitution shall never be construed… to prevent the people of the United States who are peaceable citizens from keeping their own arms.”
* Alexander Hamilton: “The best we can hope for concerning the people at large is that they be properly armed.”
“Before a standing army can rule, the people must be disarmed, as they are in almost every country in Europe. The supreme power in America cannot enforce unjust laws by the sword; because the whole body of the people are armed, and constitute a force superior to any band of regular troops.”
– Noah Webster, An Examination of the Leading Principles of the Federal Constitution, October 10, 1787
This propaganda of disarming the public for their own good is not a new idea.
“The laws that forbid the carrying of arms are laws of such a nature. They disarm only those who are neither inclined nor determined to commit crimes…. Such laws make things worse for the assaulted and better for the assailants; they serve rather to encourage than to prevent homicides, for an unarmed man may be attacked with greater confidence than an armed man.”- Thomas Jefferson, Commonplace Book (quoting 18th century criminologist Cesare Beccaria), 1774-1776
After Sandy Hook, Obama directed the CDC to study the best way to reduce gun violence. It found the best way to reduce firearm-related crime is to increase the number of guns in the hands of law-abiding citizens, since citizens possessing privately owned firearms used them to stop crime as much as 10 times more often than criminals used them to commit crimes. (Whoops!)
Honestly, “Common sense gun control laws” disarm the public, which historically has never turned out good for the public!
“Gun Free Zones,” Advocates should first try it out for themselves. I assume Mr. Hastings has one of these signs at his residence. They also ought to be displayed where advocates work, like the Capitol building and White House.
While speaking before the Constitutional Convention in 1787, James Madison said, “A standing military force, with an overgrown Executive will not long be safe companions to liberty.”
Candidate Barack Obama: “We cannot continue to rely on our military in order to achieve the national security objectives we’ve set. We’ve got to have a civilian national security force that’s just as powerful, just as strong, just as well-funded.”
One of the few legitimate duties of government is to protect borders. Understandably, FBI, Border Patrol and Customs are well armed. Alarmingly, under Obama, 73 federal agencies are now armed with BILLIONS of mostly hollow point bullets, forbidden under the Geneva Convention of war, and have SWAT teams. This includes the EPA, NOAA, Department of Education, Social Security, Postal Service, and Agriculture Departments! Homeland Security has almost 2 billion rounds alone, and at last count 2717 armored personnel carriers! Fish and Wildlife, BLM and Park Service are among 24 federal agencies employing more than 250 full-time officers.
Major General Curry asks a troubling question:
“We have local police, backed up by each state’s National Guard, backed up by the Department of Defense. So in addition to all these forces why does DHS need its own private army? Why do the SSA, NOAA and other government agencies need to create their own civilian security forces armed with hollow nose bullets?”
Amazingly, most American federal and local police SWAT teams probably have fewer restrictions on conducting forced entry raids than do US forces in Afghanistan. At last count, 80,000 of these raids occur per year! A few that surprisingly made the news:
• The Department of Education raided the home of Kenneth Wright looking for his estranged wife who was accused of misusing federal aid for students. Officers from the Department dragged Mr. Wright out of his house in his boxers at 6 a.m., threw him to the ground and handcuffed him. While this occurred his children — ages 3, 9 and 11 — were left in a patrol car for two hours. His estranged wife no longer lived at the house and was not there at the time of the raid.
• Officers in full SWAT gear from the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service stormed the home of Kathy and George Norris, grandparents in their 60’s. The agents instigated the raid for George’s failure to file the proper paperwork for orchids he imported.
• The EPA led a joint raid along with the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service, the Bureau of Land Management, the Coast Guard, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (the guys that predict the weather) and the U.S. Park Service on an Alaskan mining operation for possible violations of the Clean Water Act.
• The Bureau of Land Management had a long standoff with Cliven Bundy, a rancher, over his use of federal land to graze his cattle. It only ended when armed citizens came to stand with him and publicity got too intense.
• In 2010 the FDA raided Dan Allyger’s Rainbow Acres Farm, an Amish farm in Pennsylvania, because he had been selling unpasteurized milk across state lines.
The Federal Government has a domestic para-military force almost as large as the entire United States Marine Corps! It only answers to political appointees put there by the President! When called by YOUR Congress to answer questions regarding rules of engagement or how often their SWAT teams are deployed, the standard answer is “we can’t tell you that”. They have also been caught in lies on how much ammunition and weaponry they actually possess.
Need more? The National Defense Authorization Act, NDAA, the Bush Patriot Act on steroids, was sarcastically passed on Constitution Day in 2012. Sections 1021 and 1022 authorize the indefinite military detention, without charge or trial, of any person, including an American citizen, and applies the “Law of War,” to U.S. soil, making the United States legally a battlefield! It gives the President Sole Authority To Decide Who Is An Enemy Of The United States And Deal With Them As He Sees Fit! According to Washington’sBlog, Jan. 6, 2015, Obama has killed more people with drones than died on 9/11, almost 5000. This includes 4 American citizens, one being a purposeful assassination!
THESE are the kinds of incursions the Constitution and Bill of Rights were written to protect us against. Freedom can be taken away, but it can also be given away through shear ignorance! Mr. Hastings, what other rights do you think are stupid?
A government that operates outside it’s constitutional boundaries is a dangerous government.
Thank God for the 2nd Amendment!
David Wolosik
Oroville
