What's All This Brouhaha? » Right to Keep and Bear Arms

Commitment or confiscation?

anonymous — Mon, 02 Jul 2007 22:37:10 +0000

As the gun powder was clearing on the Virginia Tech massacre a few months ago, the gun law lobby was citing the tragedy as evidence for greater gun control. On our side we were pointing out that draconian gun laws in Blacksburg failed to disarm the perp or protect the 32 victims. Additionally there were some on RKBA side, your correspondent amongst them, who looked at Seung-Hui Cho’s history and asked, “Why was this man walking around the campus?” We pointed to the failure of the mental health establishment and school administration, who had plenty of evidence that this man was dangerous and unbalanced, who took no action to protect the campus. In California, Laura’s Law was intended to address this issue.

However, I have some ambivalence about this, as well as a general uneasiness with laws named after individuals. Is there an individual liberty issue here? If all citizens have a right to be armed, does society have a right to protect itself by assuring that all those at liberty are mentally balanced? Or are the two liberties to be crazy and the to be armed so important that we cannot trade them off against each other? The statist is always focused on the benefits of the suppression of liberty, ignoring the consequences of abuse, but I am not blind to the negative by-products of liberty. Typically my response is that planning, regulation and control have their downsides as well, and I ma willing to accept the abuses of liberty, which IMHO are usually minor in scope when compared to the abuses of government control.

A great example is the eye-sore liquor store in my neighborhood. How I wish it would disappear and return our town to a more pristine state. However, I acknowledge that Mr. Singh, the owner of this blight on 1st Street, has a right to set up his business and sell booze to a public that demands his wares. Thus I sigh as I pass, “A small price to pay for liberty.” However, one must judge events by their scope, and 32 dead students are a significantly greater consequence than minor urban blight.

So is forced commitment in a society that allows citizens great liberty of action justified?

Paper analyzing U.S. v. Miller (Second Amendment case)

Eric — Wed, 23 May 2007 20:30:11 +0000

A friend pointed out the paper The Peculiar Story of United States v. Miller, in which law clerk Brian L. Frye analyzes the only major Second Amendment case decided by the Supreme Court. This case is commonly cited by parties on both sides of the issue, but the actual decision is very narrow, and doesn’t actually set precedent regarding whether the right in question is an individual or collective right.

Viva Zapata!

anonymous — Sun, 20 May 2007 23:36:58 +0000

On Friday night we watched Viva Zapata, Elia Kazanâ€™s 1953 biopic, starring Marlon Brando and Anthony Quinn. It is well thought of (IMDB 7.6), but I found it an uneven collection of performances that were within themselves jewels. Once such scene takes place when Zapata is speaking with Mexicoâ€™s new president Francisco I. Madero. Zapata was one of several military leaders who joined in a revolution in 1910 that driove long-time dictator Porfirio DÃaz from power and ushered in Madero. Zapata was moved to join this movement and mobilize a large peasant army because of the lack of access these peasants had to land for farming under Diazâ€™s regime. Now, the revolution being over, Madero suggests that Zapata and his peasant army lay down their arms and wait for the new government to execute land reforms that will give all a plot of land.Zapata (Brando) tells Madero they will not do this, and Madero, incredulous, asks why. This is where we walk into the theatre â€¦

Zapata: Give me your watch.

Madero: What?

Zapata: – Give me your watch.

(pointing his rifle at Madero) Give it to me!

(Madero hands him the watch; Zapata examines it)

Zapata: It’s a beautiful watch. Expensive.

Now take my rifle.

Madero – No.

(Zapata thrusts his rifle into Maderoâ€™s arms, so that it is pointing back to
Zapata)

Zapata: Now you can have your watch back â€¦

(hands him back his watch and points to the rifle in Maderoâ€™s hands)

â€¦ but without this, never!

Pretty powerful message. Historical note: The peasants disarmed; Maderoâ€™s government was taken over by hangers on from Diaz, and there was no land reform. However, the peasants rearmed and the revolution, in one from or another, went on until 1917.

The Wikipedia article on the films states that Viva Zapata is the favorite movie of G.H.W Bush and John McCain, but from this exchange in the film, I think you can see why a number of extreme revolutionaries on the far left embrace the second amendment as strongly as those on the right.