Former Supreme Court justice: ‘Repeal the Second Amendment’

[thackney]

If it's your gun, why shouldn't you be liable for harm committed with it?   Shouldn't you as the owner be responsible for ensuring the gun is safely stored,  and duly reported when lost, stolen or transferred?

That's simply a matter of taking responsibility.  And no, it is not an infringement on your right to be legally responsible for the harm caused by the dangerous implements you choose to own.   

The gun isn't the source of harm.  It is the one using it.

[roamer_1]

If it's your gun, why shouldn't you be liable for harm committed with it?   Shouldn't you as the owner be responsible for ensuring the gun is safely stored,  and duly reported when lost, stolen or transferred?

NO.   

That's simply a matter of taking responsibility.  And no, it is not an infringement on your right to be legally responsible for the harm caused by the dangerous implements you choose to own.   

Like hammers? The sawbox in my pickup is full of things that can make you just as dead, and many of which would do so in a far more horrifying manner. How many of those 'dangerous implements' will be treated likewise? Your frame of mind is not only appalling, but invincibly ignorant.

[mountaineer]

HAMILTON: Even Without The Second Amendment, Our Natural Right To Self-Preservation Is Inalienable
Recall The Federalist No. 84
By Elliott Hamilton
March 28, 2018

Nearly eight years after retiring from public service, former Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens penned an article in The New York Times calling for a repeal of the Second Amendment. Just as he had done in his dissent in the landmark case District of Columbia v. Heller, Stevens expressed his belief that the Second Amendment does not protect an individual right to keep and bear arms. He also went further by stating that Article V amendment procedures should be utilized to "weaken the N.R.A.’s ability to stymie legislative debate and block constructive gun control legislation." In essence, Stevens believes that killing the Second Amendment would result in killing the foundation for our right to have a firearm.

However, Stevens is categorically wrong there, too. To believe that the Bill of Rights, which includes the Second Amendment, provides the people with individual liberty is to assume that government granted them. However, our Founding Fathers did not believe that to be the case.   ...

Locke emphasizes a seemingly universal principle that individuals not only have rights and liberties, but they do not possess any rights to infringe upon those of others. He states that no man can harm life, health, liberty, possessions, or interfere with one's property. More importantly, he states that man is "bound to preserve himself, and not to quit his station wilfully." This highlights the natural right of self-preservation, which states that man has an obligation to defend himself from actors who seek to infringe upon his natural liberties. This includes not only man, but also the government itself.  ...

More at Daily Wire

[INVAR]

Anyway, while I personally disagree with an suggestion that registration is cause for armed rebellion, I also wouldn't consider for a moment complying with such a requirement should one be passed into law.  I'm not going to start shooting, but I'm not going to register, either.

That's fine.  The agents of the state will come to shoot you for refusing to comply.  That is what is inevitable when they pass registration under the color of law.

We will then have the choice to live on our knees as slaves to the state and their mercies or die on our feet resisting their attempts to force compliance with an illegal "law" they think gives them the authority to infringe upon an inalienable right.

[txradioguy]

The gun isn't the source of harm.  It is the one using it.

@thackney that is a piece of logic and critical thinking that escapes most of the people advocating for registration and/or confiscation.

Load a gun and put it on a table and it does nothing...kills no one...injures not one inch of a person's body.

It's not until someone intent  on either defending themselves from bodily harm or someone intent on doing evil things picks up that gun that it becomes the killing machine the Libs fear.

[Cyber Liberty]

New York Times has such a brilliant suggestion. Feel free to disagree. 

Brilliant!  One thing we know for sure, the founders feared a deer uprising the most.   

[txradioguy]

I'm not going to start shooting, but I'm not going to register, either.

Same here.

[thackney]

@thackney that is a piece of logic and critical thinking that escapes most of the people advocating for registration and/or confiscation.

Load a gun and put it on a table and it does nothing...kills no one...injures not one inch of a person's body.

It's not until someone intent  on either defending themselves from bodily harm or someone intent on doing evil things picks up that gun that it becomes the killing machine the Libs fear.

The liability for harm comes from the one that actually causes the harm.

If someone steals my car and runs down a pedistrian, no one would reasonably consider me responsible.

[Cyber Liberty]

Same here.

The leftists think there are only two buckets.  "Comply and register" or "Come out shooting." 

[mountaineer]

Erick Erickson
‏Verified account @EWErickson
4m4 minutes ago

I will say on the gay marriage-gun control fight, the media is lying through its teeth again. The media will keep pushing the “it’ll never happen” thing until they get close. Then they’ll demonize anyone who stands in the way. They’re doing that now.

[LMAO]

Anyway, while I personally disagree with an suggestion that registration is cause for armed rebellion, I also wouldn't consider for a moment complying with such a requirement should one be passed into law.  I'm not going to start shooting, but I'm not going to register, either.

There is a lot of chest thumping and bravado about shooting government agents here. But even soidiers in war become haunted from having to kill another human being. Simple non compliance by enough people would put the government in an unpleasant position to expand a police state, which wouldn’t be popular with the general public and would be extremely costly both politically and financially for the government to pursue.

Of course, the media would be critical of those who disobey and the anti gun crowd would name call.

[Jazzhead]

The gun isn't the source of harm.  It is the one using it.

Correct.  But the owner of the gun should be legally responsible.  He's the one who benefits from the gun's utility, and he's the one with the incentive to keep it safely stored,  and to document its loss, destruction or transfer.   

Common sense.   

[INVAR]

Correct.  But the owner of the gun should be legally responsible.  He's the one who benefits from the gun's utility, and he's the one with the incentive to keep it safely stored,  and to document its loss, destruction or transfer.   

Common sense.

We're not gonna comply, so you can stop trying to argue the merits of your tyranny.

[IsailedawayfromFR]

The Heller opinion is recent (my guess without checking is 2010 or so).   To overturn that decision, the composition of the Court must change (and the right case must be presented to it).   

This was, of course, THE defining issue in the 2016 election.  So many of us swallowed hard and voted for Trump solely because of his promise to fill the Court's recent vacancy with a conservative.   (And so many of us were grateful that McConnell recognized the importance of the Court majority by refusing to entertain the Garland nomination.)

There is no greater divide between right and left right now than the composition of the courts.   For the right, more conservative jurists hold out the hope of overturning Roe v. Wade.  For the left, more liberal jurists hold out the hope of overturning Heller.   Both these important and valuable constitutional rights are being held hostage to politics.   That's why I favor amending the 2A to codify Heller, while we still have the chance to do so.     

Now you are veering dangerously close to lunacy.

Here's the quote you made in a prior post "But check back in five years after the Dems again control the Presidency and Congress.  " 

Heller was in 2008, and the Dems had both the Presidency and Congress afterwards.

I ask again: Why did they not do what you say at that time?

Hell, why did they not do any gun control for that matter?

[Cyber Liberty]

Correct.  But the owner of the gun should be legally responsible.  He's the one who benefits from the gun's utility, and he's the one with the incentive to keep it safely stored,  and to document its loss, destruction or transfer.   

Common sense.

If your car is stolen from your parking lot and the thief runs down a couple of elderly pedestrians, it's your responsibility for leaving the car where somebody would steal it.

Common sense.

[thackney]

...Simple non compliance by enough people would put the government in an unpleasant position to expand a police state, which wouldn’t be popular with the general public and would be extremely costly both politically and financially for the government to pursue....

The Canadian gun registration had so much non-compliance, they gave up, eventually.

Canada Tried Registering Long Guns -- And Gave Up
https://www.forbes.com/sites/danielfisher/2013/01/22/canada-tried-registering-long-guns-and-gave-up

... Canada tried it and gave up, discovering like several other nations that attempting to identify every gun in the country is an expensive and ultimately unproductive exercise. Criminals, of course, don't register their guns. And even law-abiding citizens tend to ignore registration when it comes to long guns mostly used for hunting and target shooting....

...The program turned out to be far more expensive than expected and didn't have any discernable impact on crime, perhaps because long guns are used so rarely by criminals in the first place. Canada's gun homicide rate, according to the handy statistics at Gunpolicy.org, has held steady since the late 1990s.

Canada passed a strict gun-control law in 1995, partly in reaction to a 1989 shooting  at Montreal’s Ecole Polytechnique with a semiautomatic rifle. The law required universal regulation of guns, including rifles and shotguns. Proponents said the central registry would give law-enforcement agencies a powerful new tool for tracking guns used in crimes. They also claimed it would help reduce domestic violence and suicide....

...In 2002 Canada's auditor general released a report saying initial cost estimates of $2 million (Canadian) had increased to $1 billion as the government tried to register the estimated 15 million guns owned by Canada's 34 million residents....

... From 1997 to 2005, only 13% of the guns used in homicides were registered. Police studies in Canada estimated that 2-16% of guns used in crimes were stolen from legal owners and thus potentially in the registry....

...gun registration rarely delivers the results proponents expect. In most countries the actual number registered settles out at about a sixth. Germany required registration during the Baader-Meinhof reign of terror in the 1970s, and recorded 3.2 million of the estimated 17 million guns in that country; England tried to register pump-action and semiautomatic shotguns in the 1980s, but only got about 50,000 of the estimated 300,000 such guns stored in homes around the country...

[thackney]

Correct.  But the owner of the gun should be legally responsible.  He's the one who benefits from the gun's utility, and he's the one with the incentive to keep it safely stored,  and to document its loss, destruction or transfer.   

Common sense.

Can you provide examples where this is true of something besides a gun?

[INVAR]

There is a lot of chest thumping and bravado about shooting government agents here. But even soidiers in war become haunted from having to kill another human being.

Some of us remember the lessons of history when people did not have the foresight or stomach to defend themselves from disarmament and we recall what ensued afterwards.

So it's a matter of how we perceive those going about the task of disarmament or forcing the compliance with registration.  Our Forbears had no problems shooting agents of the Crown when they came to take the ammunition stores at Bunker Hill and Concord Green.  Why should we be any less resolved?  They at least understood what it meant if the agents succeeded.  They did not comfort themselves in the notion that if they let the Crown do as it wanted that they could simply go about life unmolested.

Simple non compliance by enough people would put the government in an unpleasant position to expand a police state, which wouldn’t be popular with the general public and would be extremely costly both politically and financially for the government to pursue.

It depends on how determined those who want a police state are in seeing that goal realized.  Given the amount of open in-our-face corruption and the blatant open declarations of what they want to do in terms of everything - they are already immune from what half the population opposes, and are busy ginning up the rest to become their army.

Of course, the media would be critical of those who disobey and the anti gun crowd would name call.

As has been pointed out, demonizing enemies of the state makes it easier for the state to eradicate the undesirables.

[roamer_1]

Correct.  But the owner of the gun should be legally responsible.  He's the one who benefits from the gun's utility, and he's the one with the incentive to keep it safely stored,  and to document its loss, destruction or transfer.   

Common sense.

That is not commons sense. Be careful what you wish for.
If someone steals my hammer and later uses it to beat someone to death, you are saying that I am to be made liable for that act, rather than the one who actually did it?

That is absurdity.

[Weird Tolkienish Figure]

These guys all get liberal after spending too many years in DC.

[IsailedawayfromFR]

These guys all get liberal after spending too many years in DC.

Or obtaining a doctorate in jurisprudence, which is an ironic misnomer.

[Frank Cannon]

These guys all get liberal after spending too many years in DC.

When was Stevens not Liberal?

[goatprairie]

If it's your gun, why shouldn't you be liable for harm committed with it?   Shouldn't you as the owner be responsible for ensuring the gun is safely stored,  and duly reported when lost, stolen or transferred?   

That's simply a matter of taking responsibility.  And no, it is not an infringement on your right to be legally responsible for the harm caused by the dangerous implements you choose to own.   

"If it's your gun, why shouldn't you be liable for harm committed with it?"

By that "logic," any tool (guns, knives, cars, hammers, clubs, matches, gasoline/chemicals, electrical equipment, etc.) anybody has can cause them to be held liable by somebody who steals it and uses it for a crime.

[Jazzhead]

  Disobedience to tyrants is obedience to God.

The hubris you display is ultimately comical.   You aren't eager to confront and shoot "tyrants", you are eager to confront and shoot your own neighbors. 

We are a Constitutional Republic, with our leaders chosen in free and fair elections.  If laws are passed that trample on your rights,  a system exists for impartial judges to consider the primacy of your rights under the Constitution, the political and moral compact that binds us. 
 
If the day should come where you may have to register your precious firearms,  the law will come not from a tyrant but from the American people, speaking through their elected representatives.    The system is fair, is respectful of and embodies the Peoples' will,  and provides the means for peaceful redress and justice because our Constitution, uniquely, declares the government's role is to secure our rights, not abrogate them.     

Yet you declare yourself above the law; not only will you not comply,  you are prepared for "bloodshed" against peace officers.    That is a travesty, sir,  a slap in the face to every decent conservative who believes in the goodness and potential of this nation.  IMO, you are a selfish disgrace to the good name and reputation of this board.

   

[Jazzhead]

The liability for harm comes from the one that actually causes the harm.

If someone steals my car and runs down a pedistrian, no one would reasonably consider me responsible.

Your post piqued my curiosity, @thackney , so I looked it up.   

The common law rule is the "permissive use" rule;  as a car owner you are responsible for mayhem caused by those who you expressly or impliedly permit to use your car.    So mayhem caused by a car thief is not your legal responsibility.  The thief didn't have your consent to use your car.

The common law rule has been modified by statute in some jurisdictions,  providing for the owner's liability if the owner's negligence made the theft of the vehicle reasonably foreseeable.  In New York, for example, if you leave your keys in the car with the engine running, and the car is stolen, you're on the hook.   The idea is that by leaving the keys in the ignition you have created an attractive target for theft.   As one case put it,  to depart from the principle that a car owner is not responsible for the actions of a thief "involves the balancing of a number of considerations, the major ones are the foreseeability of harm to the plaintiff, the degree of certainty that the plaintiff [would] suffer injury, the closeness of the connection between the defendant's conduct and the injury suffered, the moral blame attached to the defendant's conduct, the policy of prevent future harm,  the extent of the burden to the defendant and consequences to the community of imposing a duty to exercise care with resulting liability for breach, and the availability, cost, and prevalence of insurance for the risk involved".   Kiick v. Levitas,  (Ct. App. 1980)   

I leave it to you to apply similar principles and factors to the responsibility of a gun owner for the dangerous tool he chooses to possess.