I feel the need to address the overreaction and just plain nonsense coming from the Second Amendment's
more frenetic defenders. There is a hysteria coming from the most
strident advocates who refuse to recognize any limitation on the right
to keep and bear arms and overemphasize the Second Amendment as a check on
governmental tyranny.
I do not subscribe to the "slippery slope" argument that any regulation will end in gun confiscation. Prohibitions of machine guns began in 1934 with the National Firearms Act, and the Feds have yet to see fit to confiscate my pistol. I strongly believe that no citizen needs or has a right to military style weapons. Heller v. District of Columbia established in 2008 that the Second Amendment has limits; Justice Antonin Scalia, hardly a liberal, wrote for the majority "Like most rights, the Second Amendment right is not unlimited. It is not a right to keep and carry any weapon whatsoever in any manner whatsoever and for whatever purpose."
President Obama's recent executive orders on background checks and the call to ban assault weapons and high capacity clips are common sense measures that do not nullify the Second Amendment. Most Americans and even most NRA members support universal background checks to purchase a firearm. It's time we move beyond simplistic arguments fueled by NRA leaders and borderline seditious demands for assault weapons. A robust right to keep and bear arms can be regulated without being infringed.
I do not subscribe to the "slippery slope" argument that any regulation will end in gun confiscation. Prohibitions of machine guns began in 1934 with the National Firearms Act, and the Feds have yet to see fit to confiscate my pistol. I strongly believe that no citizen needs or has a right to military style weapons. Heller v. District of Columbia established in 2008 that the Second Amendment has limits; Justice Antonin Scalia, hardly a liberal, wrote for the majority "Like most rights, the Second Amendment right is not unlimited. It is not a right to keep and carry any weapon whatsoever in any manner whatsoever and for whatever purpose."
President Obama's recent executive orders on background checks and the call to ban assault weapons and high capacity clips are common sense measures that do not nullify the Second Amendment. Most Americans and even most NRA members support universal background checks to purchase a firearm. It's time we move beyond simplistic arguments fueled by NRA leaders and borderline seditious demands for assault weapons. A robust right to keep and bear arms can be regulated without being infringed.
