While I appreciate when governments express support for natural human rights, I wonder if they really understand the rights they claim to support.
Roosevelt County was recently declared a "Second Amendment Sanctuary" by the county commission. How serious are they?
Are they only concerned with additional violations of the Second Amendment by the state? What about enforcement of all the violations on the books beginning in 1934 with the National Firearms Act?
Do they understand the only purpose of the Second Amendment was to make it a crime to pass or enforce any laws against weapons?
Do they understand that the Second Amendment recognizes and protects the right to own and to carry weapons however you see fit, everywhere you go, without asking permission?
Do they understand this right existed before the first government was established and will still exist unchanged long after the last government has been forgotten?
These are rhetorical questions because I know the answers. I also realize they call the resolution "not legally binding"; a symbolic nothing.
I wonder how seriously anyone would have taken politicians in the 1850s had they "symbolically" declared their region to be a sanctuary for escaped slaves, yet continued to allow slavery in their communities, and allowed slave catchers to brutally capture and return runaways to the individuals who claimed them as property.
You aren't a Second Amendment Sanctuary if you allow even the slightest anti-gun "law" to be enforced on your watch.
To posture over additional infringements if they are "unnecessary, duplicate, and possibly unconstitutional" is to miss the point of the Second Amendment. To try to weasel out of responsibility, claiming you "cannot determine the constitutionality of a law" is dishonest.
As pointed out in a previous column, the Supreme Court stole the power to be the final arbiter of constitutionality-- this power was not theirs to claim. Constitutionality is yours to judge. Would you wait to see if the Supreme Court says the Constitution permits the federal government to murder a peaceable neighbor over the church he attends before you know it's unconstitutional? The federal government will never allow unconstitutionality to stand in the way of established rules and bureaucracies.
No one needs to fight unconstitutional "laws" since even the Supreme Court has ruled that a law which violates the Constitution isn't a law at all, and no one is obligated to obey. All who enforce such non-laws are criminals.
Don't stop at symbolism. Respect human rights; all of them, completely without reservation or hesitation. It's the right thing to do.
Nice article. Reminds me of a time there was a "legalize pot protest" we had at a state liquor store and the nice enforcers taped off a "free speech zone" for us.
ReplyDeleteAfter we were done laughing, we ignored the taped area and stood and handed out literature etc wherever we wanted to. It's always funny when no government types have to explain to statists the nuances of their constitution.
Pointing things like that out to statists is the only utility to the Constitution.
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