HELENA—Secretary of State Brad Johnson joined the many other Montanans who have weighed in on the DC v. Heller case currently before the U.S. Supreme Court. A letter to the editor from Johnson appeared in today’s Washington Times, urging the court to protect an individual’s right to bear arms.
“This is an important issue for Montanans,” Johnson said. “Many of Montana’s elected officials spoke out on this issue; I am proud to be among them.”
The letter can be found at this link.
Johnson’s letter argued that Montana’s agreement with the United States to enter the union included Montana’s constitution at the time, which guaranteed the right of “any person” to bear arms. He urged the Supreme Court to uphold an individual rights interpretation of the Second Amendment, rather than a collective interpretation, as best in keeping with Montana’s Compact with the United States.
Many other elected officials around Montana have concurred in a statement of the same argument, in a bipartisan effort to defend Montanans’ individual right to keep and bear arms. The list of officials, as well as their resolution, can be found at:
http://www.progunleaders.org.
Letter from the above link:
Second Amendment an individual right
The U.S. Supreme Court will soon decide D.C. v. Heller, the first case in more than 60 years in which the court will confront the meaning of the Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. Although Heller is about the constitutionality of the D.C. handgun ban, the court's decision will have an impact far beyond the District ("Promises breached," Op-Ed, Thursday).
The court must decide in Heller whether the Second Amendment secures a right for individuals to keep and bear arms or merely grants states the power to arm their militias, the National Guard. This latter view is called the "collective rights" theory.
A collective rights decision by the court would violate the contract by which Montana entered into statehood, called the Compact With the United States and archived at Article I of the Montana Constitution. When Montana and the United States entered into this bilateral contract in 1889, the U.S. approved the right to bear arms in the Montana Constitution, guaranteeing the right of "any person" to bear arms, clearly an individual right.
There was no assertion in 1889 that the Second Amendment was susceptible to a collective rights interpretation, and the parties to the contract understood the Second Amendment to be consistent with the declared Montana constitutional right of "any person" to bear arms.
As a bedrock principle of law, a contract must be honored so as to give effect to the intent of the contracting parties. A collective rights decision by the court in Heller would invoke an era of unilaterally revisable contracts by violating the statehood contract between the United States and Montana, and many other states.
Numerous Montana lawmakers have concurred in a resolution raising this contract-violation issue. It's posted at progunleaders.org. The United States would do well to keep its contractual promise to the states that the Second Amendment secures an individual right now as it did upon execution of the statehood contract.
BRAD JOHNSON
Montana secretary of state
Helena, Mont.
http://sos.mt.gov/News/archives/2008/February/2-19-08.htm
I might have to consider moving to Montana ESPECIALLY since this was the state that told Washington to *&%^ off with the REAL ID.
Montana people congrats you have leaders in power who have a spine.
You know Washington D.C. is stepping over it's bounds when you have states threatening to withdraw from the Union. If they do I will move there the next day. That's a promise.