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Updates on Heller
Alan Gura is interviewed by Jurist.
And here's a YouTube interview. A lot of other views are linked there, too. In this interview he responds to arguments he didn't forcefully assert his position. The fact is that there is a distinctive Supreme Court style, which is calm, restrained, and dispassionate. It's not at all like a jury trial, where you are trying to fire up the jury, more like presenting a scientific paper.
And Mother Jones on it. I won't call it leftist, because I know some very pro-2A leftists who can explain their position well in terms of consistency (why disarm the working man while the elite have their bodyguards). The author buys the laughable claim that the 2A stems from the militia, and only got into the Bill of Rights because the slave states wanted to preserve the militia in order to hold down the slaves. Which doubtlessly explains why Sam Adams of Massachusetts was the first to propose adding a right to arms to the constitution, followed by a substantial minority of the Pennsylvania ratifying convention, and then by a majority of the convention in that well-known slave state, New Hampshire.
Then a digression into the 1988 case where black (and VERY antigun and antiNRA) columnist Carl Rowan shot and wounded a trespasser, who was in his backyard hot tub in the night, and was prosecuted for having an unregistered gun: "but the incident fueled a tremendous amount of racial tension in the city..." I was living in the DC area at the time, and cannot recall a speck of "race tension" over the incident. A lot of chuckling, given his antigun writings, but if anyone of any race was tense about that issue, I never heard or read about it. But this being Mother Jones, I suppose a columnist can't take a potshot at a trespasser without somehow creating racial tensions.
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The Mother Jones piece is by Stephanie Mencimer, who has never let facts or truth get in the way of her opinion pieces.
But I thought DC claimed that they don't prosecute people who shoot in self defense? Or must the home owner be using a rifle?
Anti-rights people who own guns, even illegally, are nothing new. They feel the same way about the 1st and they do about the 2nd - free speech for us, but not everyone else.
David, as I'm recalling the Carl Rowan event, it was not a hot tub, but an in-ground pool. Rowan's back yard was completely fenced with a six-foot fence, and any entry gate was locked. A group of at least three teenage males (over 16) jumped the fence to get to the pool. Rowan's bedroom had a sliding door that opened onto the area next to the pool. Rowan heard the noise, got his revolver (which his FBI-son had given to him), opened the door, and stepped outside.
Rowan was about 62 at the time, and pretty flabby and out of shape. One of the youths rushed towards Rowan, for whatever reason. Rowan shot, and the youth was hit in the arm.
The chit-chat at the time included that the "boys" were white, and from Whitman High School, so surely Rowan should have known that white boys from Whitman High School would not have harmed him, but only wanted to swim in his pool.
At the time, I remember wondering how much the young white "boys" in the prime of their lives could bench press, versus how much old Carl Rowan could bench press. And there were three of them, and one of him. And, even forgetting that they had jumped a six-foot fence, WHY was one of them so stupid as to move TOWARDS a man with gun? If the "boy" meant no harm, why didn't he go away from Rowan and exit the same way he'd gotten onto the man's property?
The "boys" were from Bethesda, and the attitude in Bethesda seemed to be, "But of course three white Bethesda 'boys' meant no harm."
Having raised my children in Bethesda, I'd say the response was typical of overly indulgent parents who should have taken their sons to the woodshed enough times that they would have had some fear and/or respect for authority and the rights of others.
I remember the Carl Rowan incident well. What hypocrisy.
The Mother Jones article also mentioned Carl T. Bogus and his article claiming that the Second Amendment was mainly intended to protect the Southern States' control of their militia to prevent slave rebellions. I was compelled to comment on the Mother Jones Article. This is a repeat of that comment. The title of Bogus' article was "The Hidden History of the Second Amendment". The only problem with Prof. Bogus' thesis is that the historical facts do not back him up. Only two southern states even proposed Second Amendment related additions to the Constitution, but FIVE northern states made such proposals. Also, the same two southern states did propose a non-bill of rights amendment that guaranteed each state control over its own militia. Only one northern state proposed an amendment like that. Obviously, Prof. Bogus has something mixed up - the Bill of Rights proposals and the militia powers amendments.
For those who would like to verify for themselves exactly how knowledgeable (or the opposite) Prof. Bogus is on the Second Amendment's history, here is a great opportunity. Carl T. Bogus is the counsel for the fifteen professional history/legal academics who filed an amicus brief supporting Washington DC's handgun ban in the Heller case. You can read Bogus' amicus brief and then compare it to my History News Network article that points out the numerous obvious historical errors and oversights within the brief.
The HNN article URL is: http://hnn.us/articles/47238.html
After reading the brief and HNN article, ask yourself why the 16 academics involved in that pro-DC Heller amicus brief need a Park Ranger from Michigan to correct historical information they provided to the U.S. Supreme Court.
>>>I was living in the DC area at the time, and cannot recall a speck of "race tension" over the incident.
I was living in DC during the Rowan fiasco, too. The only thing I remember wondering about was how light a slap on the wrist would be get seeing as he was a local media phenom being not only a Wash. Post columnist, but a perennial guest on the local news talk shows, and occasionally showing up on the national sunday shows. If I remember correctly, he was quite the marksman, hitting the trespasser in the finger.