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Since the role of a militia has been replaced by the highly-organized, well-trained and disciplined National Guard, I would change the 2nd Amendment like this:
The privilege of owning and bearing arms shall be highly-regulated, for the purpose of providing safety for the people. Those who would pose a risk to others or themselves by bearing arms, shall be identified and prevented from doing so. A high standard for safe firearm use by civilians shall be maintained and violators of those standards shall lose their privileges to own or bear them. Legitimate police and military organizations shall regulate their own use of firearms, unless they are proven in the courts to have done so negligently. No one shall sell, trade or give a firearm to anyone, unless the recipient meets high standards for firearm ownership and use and registers this transfer with the appropriate public agency. No one shall sell firearms for profit, unless they have a publicly-issued license and have no felony convictions.
With this, the well-behaved people could continue to own and use guns, but those who wielded them aggressively or unsafely, would lose the privilege. Just as driving a vehicle is a privilege and is highly-regulated by our society and in fact, by all societies on earth, so guns would also be controlled. It's the civilized thing to do. I have left many of the details of regulation unspecified, which would be up to each state to establish. Hopefully, this would serve to reduce the trafficking of guns across state lines, with different requirements by each state.
We already have laws that address all of that, criminal penalties intact. Besides the Constitution is a Bill of Rights, not a bill of privileges. As it is now those who commit crimes including "those who wielded them aggressively or unsafely" already forfeit their 2nd Amendment rights if found guilty in a court of law. As there are thousands of laws that address both the criminal and negligent mis-use of firearms. Along with laws that address every conceivable criminal act imaginable.
It's already a crime to knowingly sell a firearm to a prohibited possessor as described by federal law, for both private sales and those that go through a federally licensed dealer. Those who sell firearms for profit are already required to have a federal firearms license. This does not include private sales in states where it's legal, except for firearms that have to be registered with the state, those have to go through a federally licensed dealer.
It's already illegal to traffic in firearms across state lines without the transaction going through a federally licensed firearms dealer.
Last edited by Ex New Yorker; 08-06-2018 at 07:58 PM..
If it were up to me, I would remove the Second Amendment altogether and leave it up to the individual states (or towns) as to what what kind of weapons their residents are permitted to have and what restrictions apply.
We had that and it didn't work out well.
The Black Codes were state laws enforced brutally by state militias that forbade Blacks from owning guns. The rights abuses suffered from leaving gun ownership rights "up to the states" was an important impetus for the 14th Amendment.
Of course the federal enforcement of the right to arms against state infringement has been delayed; the 2nd Amendment only being formally applied under the 14thA to state action in 2010 (McDonald v Chicago) and effectively stalled since.
There are some encouraging developments though, such as the recent Young decision in the 9th Circuit.
If it were up to me, I would remove the Second Amendment altogether and leave it up to the individual states (or towns) as to what what kind of weapons their residents are permitted to have and what restrictions apply.
To clarify my position, I have no problem with handgun or rifle ownership, but I do have a problem with most people being able to buy a weapon capable of murdering a hundred people or other large mammals in less than a minute and that has no other purpose. (For example, I know that dynamite can kill a great number of people, but it has other purposes, also.)
Well that would be just great if every town and municipality had their own gun laws. You could be perfectly legal in one town and a felon in another. That would be a logistical nightmare for anyone that lawfully possesses a firearm for any lawful purpose. Of course it wouldn't matter to a criminal anyway. The only purpose for laws such as that are to deter the lawful possession of firearms and the right of self defense outside the home.
If it were up to me anyone who is not a prohibited possessor as described by federal law should be able to travel freely anywhere throughout the United States in possession of a firearm without risk of criminal prosecution and incarceration. The problem with laws are that good people don't need them to behave appropriately, and bad people don't follow them anyway regardless of how many laws there are.
The whole purpose of laws are to provide a method of punishment for those who willingly choose to break them. People who deliberately break laws, any laws are gambling that they won't get caught. If laws were any kind of a deterrent to those who intentionally break them then we wouldn't need a criminal justice system or prisons.
Unfortunately we have a broken criminal justice system that knowingly and repeatedly allows career criminals to freely roam our streets. I think they call it turnstile justice? Fix that and I think we will have solved our crime problem.
The Congress, The Senate, Judicial, nor Executive branch, state, nor county, shall hinder the unalienable right to keep and bear arms. Any attempt at such shall be treated as an act of treason. No taxes shall be collected upon for that turns a right into a privilege. Furthermore, the citizenry shall have access to whatever the government and it's agencies have access to, to ensure checks and balances exist without a form of tyranny.
Any crime committed with a firearm of any type shall result in execution. Any forcible felony of rape, murder, burlarly, if a firearm is commissioned the individual once found guilty shall be hung following trial behind the courthouse.
Gun free zones shall not flourish. Any entity that remains a gun free zone assumes responsibility and culpability for the life liberty and Pursuits of Happiness of its patrons/attendees.
Any case of abuse of the right to keep and bear arms shall be met with extreme prejudice. Any threats of violence with a firearm will result in the confiscation of the right to keep and bear arms, right to vote, and be subject to involuntary evaluation for further review. Any agency that fails to uphold this decree shall face termination of employment and benefits and be charged as co-conspirators should an act of terror be employed in the jurisdiction of where the event had occurred or agency it was reported to.
^That means if you report someone for making credible threats of violence, be it published or verbal, and the agency you reported it to did not follow through with an arrest and follow thorough with an investigation, the rot is removed from the top down. Agencies will have an incentive to enforcing the laws. Rather than brush things off like that parkland scumbag or pulse shooter.
I would make everything accessible.
I would make harsh penalties for criminal use.
I would address criminal motive, incentive, intent.
That's where the focus needs to be.
Agreed and could not increase your REP for this.
In an age of all of the lawyers that we have now, we have to make it bullet proof.
Case in point, I remember reading that a smart lawyer got someone off for breaking and entering, because the house had a "WELCOME" mat in front of the front door. And according to the lawyer how could my client be breaking in if they were WELCOME.
I like the Right of the people to Keep and Bare arms shall not be infringed.
You can own any weapon you can afford...............................
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