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The Inescapable Standard of “Reasonableness”

March 15th, 2008
By PAUL SILVER


In The Right Kind Of Gun Rights Jonathan Rauch writes about our central right to defend ourselves. He illustrates this with a story about a gay fellow who successfully defended himself from a gay bashing mob.

The Supreme Court is soon to decide a case that deals with the line between self defense and irrational excess. And it appears that the only reasonable option is to impose a standard of “reasonableness” on the Second Amendment.

That amendment…may have made sense in 1790, but today the insurrectionary rationale would seem to imply a right to keep and bear surface-to-air missiles and grenade launchers, among other things…the Court would clear up confusion about the Second Amendment by unambiguously identifying the core right it protects as reasonable self-defense by competent, law-abiding adults.

Reasonable self-defense leaves room for firearms regulation. Exotic and highly destructive weapons could be restricted or banned, because no one needs a machine gun or grenade launcher for protection against ordinary crime. Felons, not being law-abiding adults, could still be barred from gun ownership.

Most of the government’s gun laws, in fact, would have no trouble passing the self-defense test, …because most gun laws are reasonable and don’t leave people defenseless. As for the insurrectionary purpose of the Second Amendment, the Court could either repudiate it explicitly or pass over it in silence, consigning it to irrelevance.

The self-defense test is good policy, because it aligns the Second Amendment with modern needs and sensibilities. It is good law, because it rescues the amendment from being a dead letter or an embarrassment.

I would prefer that all guns were banned because I am more scared of being caught in crossfire than I am of being the object of an attack. And if I were the object of an attack my ability to anticipate it is so limited that I would have to live in constant paranoia for a gun to make a difference. It is not a life I choose to live.

But I accept that society evolves at its own pace and ours is not yet ready to let go of our gun legacy, while most other modern cultures around the world have. Unfortunately things may have to get much worse before they get better. And I am sad for the inevitable heartbreak.



This entry was posted on Saturday, March 15th, 2008 at 5:50 am and is filed under Gun Control. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

Viewing 13 Comments

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    Personally, I have little opinion on the subject of gun-ownership rights.
    However, I do love the insinuation that gun owners are simply less evolved.
    Perhaps we should start cracking open the skulls of gun owners and measuring brain volume. Maybe we can prove that gun owners are actually the remnants of an earlier species on the human evolutionary ladder. Then we can basically declare them animals and pass all kinds of legislation “because we Homo sapiens sapiens know what is best for you.”
    • ^
    • v
    I think gun ownership is one of those controversies, like affirmative action, that would go away if given enough serious scrutiny. Both sides have every reason to exaggerate it for their own political purposes.

    I find the gun culture, as presented in the media, is often weird and unhealthy. But I know a few hunters and they seem normal to me. So what do I really know? I admit it, not very much.

    The right to own a gun is in the Bill of Rights.

    I believe the odds of being killed by a gun are infinitesimally small, unless you're doing something criminal. (Although I believe the odds go up if you actually have a gun in your house. Unfortunately, the only reasonably neutral thing I can find about guns is this Wikipedia article.)

    I'd imagine the likelihood that you'd actually have to defend yourself with a gun is microscopic.

    I think gun ownership should have about the same amount of regulation as car ownership: pass a written test, demonstrate proficiency through a practical test, have a bunch of insurance. Although I also favor background checks for evidence of criminal activity and psychological problems.
    • ^
    • v
    Gun ownership is not in itself an reflection of lesser evolution. I respect the sport of marksmanship and the love of craftsmanship and even hunting for food. But to me a culture that embraces the violent resolution of conflict is retarded. Particularly when so many modern societies have learned to move forward. What will make this issue even more compelling will be as technology offers us more non lethal ways of defending ourselves. Then the notion of rights to lethal force will become even harder to justify.
    • ^
    • v
    Again, I have no horse in this race, but I have to laugh.

    Because I find that nothing leads to more civil debate and reasonable solutions than calling those with opposing opinions violent and retarded.
    • ^
    • v
    The audience for my point of view is not those who like our gun culture the way it is. It is the broader community that recoils with horror at the regular reports of innocent gun victims who rarely would benefit from being armed themselves. It is this broader community that needs to voice its opinion at the ballot box.
    • ^
    • v
    35 states, as of my last check, have shall issue concealed carry laws, which means that the state must issue a CC-conceal carry-permit to every law abiding person who wants & qualifies for one. There is no "blood in the streets" as most antigun groups predicted, there have been numerous cases where an alert citizen has either saved a law enforcement person, or another citizen who was being attacked. These facts are not in dispute. A county by county study of the entire US has been done on gun violence both before and after the counties had either gotten CC laws, or who still banned CC. Big surprise to the people who conducted the study, the violent crime rate, the carjacking and the home invasion rates were significantly down after the counties had enacted CC laws, they expected to see no difference.
    Face it, the US is a very violent country, and criminals carry guns. If the rest of the citizens are forbidden to have a gun to protect his or her life, what is to prevent those criminals from doing what they want? Everyone mentions England as a safe country with no guns, where even the police don't carry guns. This has been changing quite a lot over the last 10-20 years. Many policemen now carry guns routinely, and criminals of all kinds are now getting guns on the black market. NYC has outlawed handguns, yet I can get a handgun on the blackmarket in NYC,with ammunition for less than $100 and in less than 8 hours-probably within 1-2 hours.
    Finally, the police are not there to protect you in advance of a crime. I know of at least 2 cases, 1 in Co. the other in Mi. where a woman got a PPO against a former husband-co. or boyfriend-mi., In both cases, when a credible threat was made against these two women, and the police were notified, they stood by and did nothing, they would not enforce the PPO. In Mi( a small city of about 15,000 people), the woman was killed by the boyfriend, after which the police arrested him. In Co. The husband kidnapped their 2 children, and even tho the woman spotted her husband, the police refused to arrest him. Result, the husband killed both children, and crashed his pickup into the police station, where he died.
    Remember, the police are not there to protect you from crime, they are there to protect society by enforcing the laws that society wants enforced,they will come after the crime has been committed, and just maybe they will arrest the criminal. Look at arrest and conviction records, their record is not all that good. So you have to be able to protect yourself. Doing that is, IMO not being paranoid, it is being careful. National headlines were made last week when 2 co-eds were killed near their campuses. I am not blaming the victims, but I have seen way to many people who walk around blindly, paying no attention to their surroundings. Big cities are not safe in many places, and at night they are less safe. BTW, over the past 30 years I have lived in Chicago, WaDC, LA, Dallas, San Antonio, NO, Seoul Korea, Tokyo Japan, London England, and several places in Germany. While in both Korea and Germany I carried a .45 cal. M1911 military service semiautomatic pistol, issued by the US Army to protect my self. I am currently licenced in Texas, Michigan and Florida and when I travel in certain areas, I go armed.
    Also, just to get this off my chest, the 10 year ban on assult weapons, was not in point of fact a ban on assult weapons. Because of the basic ignorance of congress(read the majority of the democratic congresspersons at that time)they simply banned weapons based on their cosmetic relationship to actual assult weapons. Fully automatic weapons have been banned from private ownership-unless several laws are followed-since 1935. What the congress did ban- and in doing so showed their basic ignorance of all things concerning both weapons and existing laws was SEMI AUTOMATIC-weapons that fire one round for each pull of the trigger-rifles that LOOKED like assult weapons, an assult weapons ban it was not, and 10 years later, several lawmakers were smart enough to understand the difference. And guess what. Many democrats hunt, collect, and shoot weapons.A lot even have CC permits.
    Like I said, this is a violent country, people die by violence, either thru auto accidents or by being killed-guns are just one way- and to deny these basic facts is to bury your head in the sand. Ignoring something will not make it go away, but by showing your dislike and distain for both guns and gun owners you are making a major mistake. By pretending that guns, and personal threat from criminals don't exist, you are telling the world that you are a pigon to be plucked. Body language alone can tell a halfway smart crook whether or not you will fight back if attacked. I lived or traveled in fairly high crime areas in several major cities, I have never been mugged or attacked. I do, whether I am armed or not, stay aware of my surroundings. If you go around blind, deaf, and dumb to what is around you, you will at sometime, become the victim of a crime. That is not being paranoid, that is being an aware human being.
    • ^
    • v
    I live NYC, where every mayor in memory has supported gun contol laws, only to be thwarted in their efforts to control the preence of guns on the streets by neighbofring states and the feds.

    'Gun control' has never meant,, for any of NYC's governemtns that no one can own a gun. It's more to do with licensing i.e. to know who owns what guns and for what purpoese.

    Somewhere betweeen NO GUNS and NO CONTROL, reasonble solutions are possible.

    The problem is that the gun lobby, amazingly well funded and powerful in Washington, takes an extreme position and a reasonable solution is the last thing they want.

    When it comes to Constituional protections, the section dealing with guns is the worst text in the Constiturion, in that it can be reasonbley read in different ways.
    It amounts to arguing about the meaning of a passage ub tge Bible. It's clear and obvious only to those who think that theri personal take
    • ^
    • v
    Sorry, I cut my sentence short, somehow.

    ..... It's clear and obvious only to those who believe that their interpretation is the ultimate truth and no other reading of the text is possible.

    .
    • ^
    • v
    Actually, the NYC gun laws do mean that, in fact I had problems with my long guns-ie;rifle & shotgun-to say nothing of my handguns. I tried, like a good citizen, to register my weapons, never mind getting a CC permit-which in NYC is totally unavailable unless you are politically connected-and the police in NYC wanted to confiscate my guns.
    BTW, different states have different laws re protecting your life & property. Tx has the my home is my castle, and I don't have to retreat law, while in Mi, a store owner fired his shotgun IN THE AIR-WELL AWAY FROM A RUNNING PERSON WHO HAD BROKEN INTO HIS STORE, a court convicted him of attempted murder, saying that while they have to give out CC permits, you can not use your gun to stop any crime., you can carry a gun, but if you use it to protect your life or property, you will be arrested. Meanwhile, in the solved property crimes for that county, 85% get away with the crime-IOW, the police over a 10 year period solved only 15% of property crimes.
    • ^
    • v
    tmr,

    The problem is that your castle is right next door to mine. How can I tell if your collection of weapns iis harmless or you sell them to hoodlums on the street or you are manaic ready to wipe out the neighborhood.?

    Your freedoms impact on my freedoms. We don't live in separate univeses. What you do can cause what happens to me. Thus the need for reasonable, refereeing, gun laws.
    • ^
    • v
    I believe that people have the right to own guns. I believe that right protected in the second amendment. Some people do feel the need to own guns for recreation, hunting, protection or whatever.

    However given the nature of guns, I also agree with GeorgeSorwell that gun owners should have training, pass tests, obtain licenses and have background checks performed before they are allowed to purchase guns. I also believe the guns should be stored safely.

    Lastly, even though I do believe people have the right to own guns, I find them very repugnant. I agree with domajot that we need reasonable gun laws. But I also think society should move away from guns and pass laws which encourage that (without infringing on actual rights to own). Perhaps people can take self-defense classes (free). Maybe we can have responsible discussions on guns, perhaps greater fines for people who break the gun training/licensing/etc. laws.

    I agree with timr, that the US is very violent and criminals will get guns if they want them. We need to take reasonable precautions to protect ourselves. Some people feel the necessity to own guns for protection (and if you live in a high crime area, you may need to), other folks keep aware of their surroundings.

    So I'm against guns- but that's my choice. If someone else has a legitimate reason to own a gun, then so be it, that's their choice.
    • ^
    • v
    Because I find that nothing leads to more civil debate and reasonable solutions than calling those with opposing opinions violent and retarded.

    LOL. Oh my yes.
    • ^
    • v
    We needn't refuse to say being gay or lesbian. We need to face the real of us. "I can say i am a bisexual proudly and loudly to others" often said by my bisexual friends knew at http://www.bimingle.com . Happiness is not only belongs to you straight people but also to us LGBT. So do it proudly.

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