Dakota Beacon

Yesterday we explored the First Amendment and some of the current issues surrounding it.  Today we move on to our Second Amendment, equally contentious right now, and equally vital to the survival of our freedom.  Here it is:

Amendment II:

 A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.

Let’s examine this amendment, lately so maligned.  It begins with the phrase, “A well regulated Militia being necessary to the security of a free State . . . “  This opening idea has created a good deal of misunderstanding of the meaning of the people who wrote this and voted to accept it as law.  In the 18th Century, a Militia was usually an ad hoc group of citizens who patrolled an area, watching out for danger from various sources.  It is difficult to picture the life of the average colonist from among whom our Founders were drawn. We had many enemies at the time, in some places, Indians. In others, the French.  Later, it was our former colonial masters, the British whom we were to confront. The men who met the British in Concord, Massachusetts, were a group of citizens - farmers, shopkeepers, tradesmen, laborers, school teachers, etc., who stood in the road and said, “No further.”  And fired the “shot heard ‘round the world”. In fact, the British, growing increasingly uneasy about the dissatisfaction of the colonists, were on orders to confiscate arms from them. This is when the colonists said a resounding “no”. We all know the rest. Our people were not disarmed.  Instead, they organized a revolution which eventually resulted in the Constitution. The Framers of this Constitution were informed by their experiences. They deeply feared being disarmed by the “authorities”. In this new nation, which would be governed by the people themselves, there was no place for an authority which had the power to strip them of their arms.

The idea of a “militia” was that of the people themselves, protecting themselves against all comers, whether they be former British overlords or marauding Indians or the French or Spanish who were watching for an opportunity to move into this new country.  Many did not expect the new nation to survive long.  

The key phrase is, “the right of the people to keep and bear Arms shall not be infringed”.  This means “the people”. It cannot be read to mean anything else. It is the people who have this right.  The Founding Fathers did not contemplate an elaborate “National Guard” system. They had an Army - which had recently defeated the British Army.  The Amendment does not refer to an “army”. It refers to the people. The founders were as deeply concerned about a tyrannical government of our own as they were of that of another colonial power or our previous masters.  They reasoned that as long as the people were armed they would remain free.  

Let’s look at the grammar alone - an important factor, as the writers weighed every word.  Let’s diagram it. There are two phrases: “A well regulated Militia being necessary to the security of a free State,” a dependent clause, and the primary clause:  “. . . the right of the people to keep and bear Arms shall not be infringed.” The second clause stands alone. The first is just the reason why this is important - the security of a “free State”.  It is the “free State” which necessitates the people’s right. Not hunting deer, not shooting clay pidgeons, not for burglars. It is a matter of freedom.  

Our Second Amendment has come under attack in the past few years due to the criminals who have used guns in mass shootings.  Instead of blaming the criminals, the press and the left have blamed their tools. This is illogical. We can use a baseball bat to hit balls out of the park or in batting practice, or we can use them to club someone to death.  Is it the fault of the bat when someone does the latter? We use knives to cut steak, to cut bread, to pare potatoes. Knives are also used to kill. Is it the fault of the knife or the fault of the killer? A hammer is intended to pound nails, but it could also kill.  There is little in our world from box cutters to nail files, from electric hair dryers to eye drops that cannot be used for good as intended or ill. Recently there was a case where a man was charged with murdering his wife of many years, killing her by lacing her tea or coffee with Visine.  It seems that whatever “gets the red out” also can stop the human heart. We can’t outlaw every tool or product used by a criminal to kill or harm another. If we did we’d be back in the cave, and that wouldn’t help either. Cavemen usually could find a club.  

It is the invariable experience that when a tyrant rises to power one of his first acts is to disarm the people.  Germany’s people had been disarmed by the fumbling Weimar Republic. No one feared their government there. No doubt the people of Germany had had enough of guns, reeling from the experience of the Great War as are so many Americans when we have a mass shooting.  Adolf Hitler was then elected - in a landslide - by the German people themselves. He was able to take advantage of their defenselessness later when he became the tyrant we all know. But by then it was too late for the people of Germany. He couldn’t have people defending theselves - and each other - against his storm troopers.  Stalin famously said, “We don’t let them have ideas; why would we let them have guns?” Check this out. No totalitarian dictatorship allows the people to “keep and bear arms”. Be sure to let this writer know if you find one.

Right now we have many nascient dictatorships, governments which pretend to be “free” and “of the people” but which have seized people’s weapons.  Britain comes to mind as one of them. The average citizen there has no means whatsoever of self-defense. A few weeks ago, a malefactor just out of prison and taking part in a writing project supposedly a “rehabilitation” effort, began slashing people randomly on London Bridge.  If this had happened in the United States, most likely another citizen with a gun would have stopped this attack. The attacker would have been shot. Instead, would-be victims frantically grabbed anything they could find - fire extinguishers, finally a tusk of a narwhal which had hung in the maritime museum nearby.  A relic, a decoration, if you will. It there had been no maritime museum and no narwhal tusk nearby it would have to have been something else - a shoe, perhaps? Remember, the man was slashing about with a large knife or machete. How close would you have approached to stop him? He managed to kill two people, stabbing them to death, on that bridge.  The police were minutes away and praised the man who used the tusk. He had to have been pretty courageous.  

What is the point of this?  Why deprive innocent, normal people of their weapons of self-defense?  The point is that their self-defense doesn’t matter to those who would take their guns away.  When no one is armed even a man with a box cutter or steak knife has the advantage and the ability to kill.   

Be that as it may, there is tremendous pressure from the media and other quarters, to enact strict gun laws in the United States.  School children are particularly targeted, for as with anything else, they are the future. If they can be convinced or steered away from our founding principles in their youth, it will be easy to re-shape America in a generation or two into somethng more like a European nation, where freedom has never been a priority.  

An example is this article, presented in a website for school children - describing the glowing success of a gun confiscation program in Australia.  This is compelling because superficially, Australia has a lot in common with America - vast open spaces, a post-colonial history, a British cultural background of ostensible “freedom”.  So, the reasoning is, if Australians can be sensible and give up their guns, why shouldn’t Americans? As with most freedoms lost, this came about as a reflex action following a mass shooting in Port Arthur, Tasmania, where 35 people were killed and 18 wounded in 1996.  Supposedly, as of the date of this article, that was the end of all mass shootings in Australia. The law outlawed “semi-automatic” guns. “Semi-automatic” - sounds like Machine Gun Kelly, doesn’t it? Well, a “semi-automatic” gun is one where you need to pull the trigger for each individual shot, unlike an automatic weapon which might shoot off a spray of bullets when you pull the trigger.  The semi-automatic gun simply loads the next shot as you fire one, unlike a musket, where you fire, then stop and put a ball in the muzzle, tamp it down there in the barrel and then shoot again. Such a weapon is extremely dangerous, by the way. Hardly any gun today is not semi-automatic, unless you count the duelling pistols on the fireplace mantle.  

A gun which reloads is a potential life-saver.  If you are attacked you will not get a chance to stop and reload.  Such a weapon would be a quaint antique (as would you).

In any case, the Australian experiment has not gone well.  The main reason that gun-control laws don’t work to stop crime is that criminals, by definition, do not obey laws.  Pretty much every country with a government has outlawed murder, including Australia and the U.S. So why do we have mass shootings and murder?  Because we have criminals. Not because there are guns or Visine. We have outlawed crime already. There are dozens of stories about gun-free zones - movie theaters, malls, churches, parks - where a mass shooter comes in and shoots helpless people.  Once in a whiile someone makes a mistake and violates the gun-free zone by carrying a gun inside. Thank God. This “error” has saved many hundreds of lives. A shooter in a mall in Portland, Oregon, was stopped by a shopper who had brought his gun into the mall.  If he had not many would have been killed before security could have been summoned. In a department store in Salt Lake City an unarmed man entered, went to the housewares department, took a knife and began slashing people. Another shopper came into the store, saw the scene and drew on him.  Not a shot was fired but the slasher was stopped. In Texas we have seen two stark examples. In 2017 a shooter killed 26 people in a church in a small Texas community.  He was finally stopped after he left the church, by a man who had his gun with him.  Too late for the unarmed victims inside. But in December of last year, in another small-town church in Texas, a shooter found a different scenario.  He took a shotgun out from his coat and shot a worshipper. Instantly five others drew down on him, one shot was fired by a volunteer security guard and the attempted mass shooting ended, albeit with two dead, a tragedy, to be sure, but 2, not 26.  Had no one been armed in this church the result could have been worse than the 2017 event. Perhaps the gunman did not know people inside would armed. If he had known, he most likely would not have attempted to shoot them.

If we use logic there is no way to arrive at the conclusion that disarming innocent, law-abiding citizens will decrease crime.  It can only leave people vulnerable to crime. Not all criminals use guns, as with the London Bridge example above, but a gun can stop it almost instantly.  

The American Founders were particularly sensitive to the possibility of governmental tyranny.  They had seen it before. We have all seen it since, in the old Soviet Union, in East Germany, in China, in Cuba, in Hitler’s Third Reich.  In all of these cases, the people were defenseless against it. One thing we should have learned by now is that there is no such thing as a government which could not go rogue.  Hitler, after all, was elected by the people in a landslide. Cuba’s revolution against a corrupt government was a populist revolt which ended in tyranny. There is no such thing as a government immune to this kind of perversion.  The surest way to prevent it, however, is an armed populace.  

So-called “Red Flag” laws passed by some states are particularly concerning.  The intention of them is to take guns out of the hands of criminals and the mentally unstable.  Here again, we have an attempt at outlawing criminal behavior which is already outlawed. If you have watched any of the recent impeachment hearings you must have become aware that we are entering into an era where proof is no longer required when one is accused of something.  The accusation seems to be enough. Witnesses need not appear. We can convict someone just because we can persuade the public that we shouldn’t like him. If someone wants to punish an innocent person all that is needed now is an accusation - or a record of serving our country.  Due process has become a thing of the past.  Red Flag laws will only make matters worse - people in need of psychological counseling will not seek it, for one thing, for fear of being labeled “unsound”..  Also, remember that from the earliest grades in school our children have been prescribed dangerous mind-altering drugs for “ADHD”. Will they be disqualified from owning guns?  Perhaps, because they will have been judged not mentally sound. So some of our people will be “less equal” than others through no fault of their own. (ADHD drugs are a topic all their own. If we are afraid of people under the influence of these drugs then the thing to do is quit prescribing them.) 

Today we are seeing two sides forming - those who would disarm peaceful citizens and those who are resisting this.  In answer to some new state laws local jurisdictions are deputizing whole populations and some communities are setting themselves up as “Second Amendment sanctuary cities”, in imitation of cities which are defying immigration laws.  It is clear that we will have to be willing to stand up for our constitutional and natural rights.  Let us hope that our rights will prevail without a violent confrontation.

As an answer to those concerned about unqualified gun owners, it might be worth proposing that schools, especially private and charter schools, provide mandatory gun training and practice on a firing range, along with other forms of self-defense.  As America has aged, as our culture has provided less immediate physical challenge, our people have become sanguine and over-confident that they will always be “safe”. This is the surest way to become less safe.  

Responsible gun training and gun culture combined with a healthier resistance to the acceptance of drugs as a panacaea, would have greater impact on reducing gun crime than any laws we could concoct to outlaw guns.

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