The Second Amendment to the
United States Constitution is the part of the Bill of Rights that reads:
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.
It was adopted on December
15, 1791, along with the rest of the Bill of Rights. When our forefathers
included this clause, its purpose was to make sure that the federal government could
not disarm state militias, in other words to keep government in the hands of
the people.
Then in 1792, the Congress
enacted the Militia Acts of 1792 allowing "free able-bodied white male
citizen" into the militia and required such citizens to procure "a
good musket or firelock, a sufficient bayonet and belt, two spare flints, and a
knapsack, a pouch with a box therein to contain not less than twenty-four
cartridges, suited to the bore of his musket or firelock, each cartridge to
contain a proper quantity of powder and ball;..."
In the 2008, the Supreme
Court ruled that the Second Amendment protects an individual’s right to own a
gun for
personal use, unconnected with service in a militia. It also
specifically stated that individuals have the right to keep a loaded gun at
home for self-defense. This is a
deviation from the intentions of the Second Amendment.
Fast forward to 2012. Our country and the world just saw, once
again, that there will be mass shootings again and again, and we are not doing
enough to stop it from happening.
Why? Let’s start with
assault weapons. Many of these
sprees were carried out with assault weapons. The NRA has a lot of influence, power, and money and they
are against the Assault Weapon Ban. The NRA focuses on a citizen’s right to
defend oneself. Do they
believe that every household should have an assault weapon for protection? Banning assault weapons does not
infringe on our Second Amendment rights. Why can’t the NRA work with the legislators and use its
power and influence to make some needed changes for everyone’s safety? Seriouly NRA, assault weapons are ok?
It goes without saying that
James Holmes, a PhD student and the shooter in the recent Aurora spree, is
insane, as are all the other shooters in our string of mass murders. But what are also insane are our gun
laws. Why can’t we make that
connection? This should
not be a partisan issue.
We need to take a long hard look at our gun laws and update them to the
times we live in, to keep us safer.
Republicans can be good republicans and support gun control laws.
The United States is one of
the few developed countries that allow firearms in the hands of the
public. Astoundingly, about 45% of
American households have guns, and these are only the registered gun owners
that we know about.
Looking at some other
countries, Canadian gun laws are among the toughest in the world, especially
since the Firearms Act of 1995 has come into full effect. The UK also has some
of the toughest gun control laws in the world. If you want to own a gun, you
need to spend hours filling in paperwork and proving to police officers that
you are not a danger to society, whereas in the United States, you can declare
that it is your ‘constitutional right to bear arms’. As a matter of fact,
according to research from 2011, only South Africa, Colombia, El Salvador,
Jamaica, Honduras, Guatemala, Swaziland, Brazil, Panama, Estonia, and Mexico
had more fire-arm related deaths than the US. These
include homicide, suicide, and unintentional deaths. I am not happy that our country is grouped up there with
these countries in regard to their gun violence.
Almost anyone in the US can
buy a gun or an assault weapon, ammunition, and go on a shooting spree. The NRA
has fought tooth and nail not to allow proper thorough background checks on
people wanting to buy a gun.
Why? It certainly could not
hurt. Here is another suggestion
for the NRA – support thorough background checks. Even if there is no indication or record of this person
being crazy…yet...we allow the opportunity to provide him the means to do a
crazy thing, hurting and killing innocent people. It does not make sense. Although background checks are only one part of the process,
in my opinion, we also need to look closely at how many guns we allow, how many
one individual needs to protect himself, and the reasons for allowing these
guns in the hands of almost anyone over the age of 21.
I would also just like to
point out that the NRA also supports guns for hunting purposes. This has nothing to do with second
amendment rights. It is a separate
topic and I wish that it would be kept separate. Period.
So when is it going to
change? What can we do? For starters, don’t make gun control a partisan
issue. Vote in legislators
who ‘get it’ that the world has changed since 1791 in oh-so-many ways, and we
need to keep up with those changes.
We seem to be keeping up technologically; why can’t we keep up with safety? It is not simple and won’t be done
overnight, but we need to do all we can to make our country safer, not only
from mass shootings, but from homicides too. As always, this is my two cents.
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| I don't need any of these to protect myself. What about you? |
