By looking at the words of the 2nd Amendment thoroughly and critically it can be determined that gun control laws are an infringement of our rights. The 2nd Amendment states, “ 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”. The 2nd Amendment clearly states, the right of “the people”, as in every citizen of the U.S. has the right to keep a gun since it is necessary for the citizens safety and the safety of the states of the union. The founding fathers clearly created the 2nd Amendment, for our own good to ensure that we have the necessary means to protect ourselves against all enemies, whether they come from within the U.S. or outside of the U.S.. If it is made difficult or illegal to take our own guns outside of our homes for protection purposes, where most crimes are committed, then how are we in any way secure from criminals who may try and harm us? How in any way are we a free society?
Criminals are always going to have guns whether gun control laws are in effect to prevent them from buying weapons at a licensed dealer or not. In 2007, ABC News correspondent, John Stossel interviewed convicted felons within the U.S. prison system. All members interviewed clearly stated that gun control laws do not stop them from obtaining guns; they get them from the black market, or in other words; illegitimate arms dealers who obtain guns illegally from within and outside of the United States. With these statements being presented from criminals in the penal system it would also be fair to say that a criminal is more likely to commit a crime against an individual who is not armed since the mere presence of a gun would deter a criminal from committing a heinous act. The school shootings at Columbine and college campuses come to mind when one thinks of individuals committing murderous acts of violence with guns. The media and citizens alike were upset at the fact that these apparently insane individuals were able to obtain such weapons and commit these crimes. On those school campuses at Virginia Tech and Columbine High School guns were not allowed. Had guns been allowed on these school campuses it is likely that someone would have had a gun on the campus and been able to stop the loss of life or the heinous acts entirely. Gun control laws themselves not only infringe upon the American’s rights and make them less safe; they also set up a system in which the government, if it decided, could take away the guns almost immediately.
The registration of guns is part of a slippery slope that can and in many cases has lead to the confiscation and complete ban of guns throughout history. The slippery slope argument is commonly seen as a fallacy but not when it is based on historical facts. The federal government mandated, through The Gun Control Act of 1968, that all guns be registered with registration numbers being placed in a national database. This mandate and other provisions within the Gun Control Act of 1968 were very similar to the Nazi Gun Control Act of 1938 which disarmed the entire population of German Jews. Seeing all of these adverse affects of gun control; there could not be any benefit to having more gun control laws in the United States.
The Liberal
The founding fathers never intended for the right to bear arms to extend to every American citizen, especially without regulation. The 2nd Amendment clearly states that it is a “well-regulated militia” that is necessary for the security of a “free state”. The state organized militias today are considered the National Guard of each state. The 2nd Amendment here states that it is the militia is necessary for the security of the state ; not necessarily the individual citizen, therefore the need for the civilian population to own guns is very minimal (Herz, 1995). Looking back to when the 2nd Amendment was written, in the late 1780’s, guns were a necessary part of everyday life through hunting. In the early colonial American days guns were necessary to kill animals to put food on the table but now the majority of the people do not need a gun to help put food on the table; therefore making the necessity to own a gun close to obsolete. Not only does the 2nd Amendment allow gun control laws to be place; they also protect citizens from clinically insane people and criminals from being able to purchase guns and use them for destructive purposes.
Gun control laws are in place to protect citizens from criminals or the mentally-ill people who may use them to harm innocent people. In 1994, a federal assault weapons ban was passed which made it illegal to possess and or transfer certain automatic weapons and “high-capacity”
magazines” (Koper,C. & Roth, J. 1999). In the ten years that this law was valid; Americans had seen the gun violence rate fall. Seeing the effects of automatic weapon bans allows one to make the analogical conclusion as such; if the assault weapons ban lead to a decrease in violent gun crimes then a ban on the weapons used in the school shootings could also prove to have the same effect. If a weapons been had been placed it could have prevented those students from gaining access to those weapons that killed many innocent people. The most logical solution to prevent school shootings is to ensure that school campuses have police officers who are armed, and permanently stationed on campus. If a mere presence of a gun is likely to deter a criminal as many of those against gun control laws say it is; then a police officer who is well trained in the use of their firearm is likely to be the best deterrent of gun violence. Finally, gun control laws not only help in the prevention of crime; but they also help solve crimes.
The registration of guns has been under much criticism in the past. Gun registration has done many things for the benefit for the American society. First and foremost it has allowed police officers to track weapons used by criminals in violent crimes which provides nearly undisputable evidence that have put those criminals in prison. Therefore, without the gun registration system in place; it is safe to assume their would be more unsolved cases still open today registration could not be considered an infringement upon a gun owner’s rights since the gun owner is still able to keep his weapon as long as the gun owner has not committed any felonies. Gun control laws have been an effective tool in curbing crime by preventing criminals and individuals not mentally stable enough to own guns to purchase them. With gun control laws in place we have clearly left a better place for the future generations of the United States with much more work to be done. Enacting more gun control laws will only further the cause for a safer society with less guns.
The Firearm Freedom Rebuttal
Going back to the 2nd Amendment one can realize that the founding fathers meant that this right to keep and bear arms applied to the individual citizen and not to the rights of a state or state government run militia as gun control advocates would say. When the 2nd Amendment states as it does in the final line, “the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed”, they clearly mean the right of each and every citizen; key words being “the right of the people”. Had the founding fathers meant what gun control advocates claim the 2nd Amendment should have read more like this: the right of the militia or the right of the states “shall not be infringed”. In 1976 this most clear interpretation was met in the case District of Columbia v. Heller where a low federal court recognized the 2nd Amendment as an individual right and not a “collective right” (Curfman, G., Morrissey, S., & Drazen, J.. 2008). When this fundamental right is infringed upon by overregulation or regulated the American people in turn become less safe.
During the ten year automatic weapons ban era, which was from 1994-2004, and did not entirely ban all automatic weapons, there was a decrease in gun related crimes throughout the United States which is still continuing today. However the automatic weapons ban of 1994 did not have much if anything to do with it since automatic weapon related deaths are very miniscule compared to the use of semi-automatic guns in the United States therefore it is clear that gun control laws can be pointless in the fact that they do nothing to lower gun-related crime rates and only prevent law abiding citizens from obtaining firearms they have a right to own.
In American homes and schools the police departments are depended upon to serve and
protect their communities. The fact of the matter is that the police cannot be everywhere at once and very rarely will they ever be able to respond to a call from a victim within seconds. Gun control advocates will argue to simply call the police if an intruder breaks into your home but on many occasions that intruder is in fact armed with a gun. Picking up the phone and calling the police will give the intruder, in most cases, at least a few minutes to rob and possibly hurt or murder a victim. Showing the gun to the criminal alone can and in many documented cases around the U.S. has been effective in preventing the criminal from becoming a physical threat to the individual or their property by causing them to leave the scene immediately. The progression of gun control laws including the registration of guns has started a slippery slope in the quest for gun control advocates to make owning a weapon nearly impossible.
The anti-gun advocates were clearly aware that the Gun Control Act of 1968 could open up the door for the confiscation of certain types of guns if not all guns. Once again, the D.C. v. Heller case comes up as a climatic battle between pro-gun control and anti-gun control individuals. The founder of the Brady Center, an anti-gun group, had at one point before the Heller case decided said this, “The first problem is to slow down the increasing number of handguns being produced and sold .... The second problem is to get handguns registered. And the final problem is to make possession of all handguns . . . -except [those] for the military, policemen, licensed security guards, licensed sporting clubs, and licensed gun collectors- totally illegal (Levy,R., 2010). There is also no doubt that the registration of guns has lead to the arrest of thousands of murderers across the nation, but trading “liberty for safety”, is not the best idea. Gun registration, in many states, requires paperwork, fees and in the state of California there is a 10 day waiting period which can make someone who would want to buy a gun less likely to do so.
Also, one must look at history so that they do not make the same mistakes of the past. Gun registration has led to the disarmament of many people with whom a tyrannical government wanted to silence, such as the Jews during Hitler’s reign, non-communists during Lenin and Stalin’s reign; and non-communists Fidel Castro‘s Cuba. The disarmament of these oppressed people under these tyrannical governments left them defenseless and eventually imprisoned or
killed these non-conformists. Although gun registration has helped solve murders here in the United States it has also oppressed people abroad time and time again. Having the right to own and use a gun freely without it being regulated by the government, which includes the government not knowing if an individual has guns or not, will not only protect one from an individual a criminal who intends to rape, rob, or murder them; it will also protect or at least give them a fighting chance against a tyrannical government that would become oppressive. Gun control laws have not and will not make Americans safer. The 2nd Amendment states that the right should not been infringed in any way and regulation infringes on this right and opens up the door to allow an even greater infringement on this right. Criminals will always be around to compromise our safety and it is the ability to obtain, and use the gun for self-defense purposes in any environment that will allow Americans to be the safest in the highest degree. Registration opens up another gateway towards the possibility of a tyrannical government to confiscate guns as it has on numerous occasions. When it comes it gun control laws; less is indeed more. The less gun control laws Americans have the more freedom and security flourishes.
References
Curfman, G., Morrissey, S., & Drazen, J.. (2008). Handgun Violence, Public Health, and the Law. The New England Journal of Medicine, 358(14), pgs.1503-4. Retrieved May 24, 2010, from the Proquest databaseHerz, A. (1995) Gun Crazy: Constitutional False Consciousness and Dereliction of Dialogic Responsibility. The Boston University Law Review, 75 (57)
Levy, R.. (2010). Second Amendment Redux: Scrutiny, Incorporation, and The Heller Paradox. Harvard Journal of Law and Public Policy, 33(1), pgs. 203-216. Retrieved May 24, 2010, from the Proquest database
Koper, C. & Roth, J. (1999, March). Impacts of the 1994 Assault Weapons Ban: 1994-1996. Retrieved May 22, 2010 from the U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Justice Programs Web site: http://www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles1/173405.pdf
