Why don't we demand that states with 10 round magazine limits apply them to police too?

Oh absolutely! It isn't like those fantasizing about a great new world get exactly what they wanted. They get whatever mangled and adulterated version manages to squeeze through the molding fingers of the society they're working in, and if they manage to obtain power through the enactment of their dreams, by the changes in the dream that evolve through it's enacting and whatever temptations that power brings to deviate from its most lofty goals.

I don't want to get either: (a) too far afield in this thread; or (b) too "inside baseball," as Frank Ettin likes to say. However, their legal protection (qualified immunity) and indemnification are technically separate issues, and adherence to departmental policy is only one part of the equation.

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Thanks! I don't know what possible value this thread's going to have beyond explaining things in more detail than most people care to hear. So, if you care to fill in the blanks there, I'd love to hear the explanation.

Sure would go a long way to answer the griping we see so often about how the police have a license to kill and immunity from prosecution for their actions.

How about this?

Why don't we "demand" that states do away with the ten-round restriction,,,
It would have about as much chance as "demanding" police have the same restriction.

Aarond

.

Frank Ettin wrote:
...(1) sufficient political power behind the change...

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Oh yeah, that pesky "We the People" thing again.

• Go out and talk to your neighbors.
  
• Get everyone organized.
  
• Find a suitable candidate to support.
  
• Donate to the candidate instead of buying a new gun.
  
• Volunteer to work on the campaign rather than going to the range.
  
• Help turn out the vote for the primaries and general election instead of reloading..

Boy, this all sounds like hard work.

aarondhgraham said:

How about this?

Why don't we "demand" that states do away with the ten-round restriction,,,
It would have about as much chance as "demanding" police have the same restriction.

Aarond

.

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I'm still stuck on the concept, "Shall not be infringed." Design restrictions, mag capacity restrictions, etc, are infringement. Period.

I'm still stuck on the concept, "Shall not be infringed." Design restrictions, mag capacity restrictions, etc, are infringement. Period.

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Oh! Is that how it works?

Hmm...how's that working out for ya?

You feel that since you see it that way, we're all good then?




These comments boggle my mind. As if these pithy saying make a hill of beans difference to anybody.

It wasn't meant as "snark". It's obviously the Constitutional law of the land. Why are we settling for a diluted version, as citizens? Example: Why can't we keep foreign nationals out of our country that want to instigate and practice terrorism?

Frank Ettin said:

Ah, another soul living in a fantasy world

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Ah, renown counselor, you misunderstood me, my intent was to reference OP's inability to note the beam occuling his vision despite your best intents (and attempts) to the contrary.

With the added fillip of inflation spoiling a perfectly good analogy. Sigh.

It wasn't meant as "snark". It's obviously the Constitutional law of the land.

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And what that Constitutional law of the land means -- how and to what extent it is applied and practiced -- is ultimately up to what the Justices say. As noted before, their decisions aren't final because they're right. They're right because they're final (sort of). What the Constitution MEANS is whatever they say it means, because they are the ones given the power to say what it means, period.

(Until society moves far enough to ripple up the changes that put justices of a different view in power and they deign to revisit and revise the issue.)

Why are we settling for a diluted version, as citizens?

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A) Because this is the view that the citizens WANT. (The will of the citizens being ultimately being expressed by whom is elected to what public offices and who those electees appoint as Judges -- a process that takes years or decades to bear fruit.)
B) Because those tasked with deciding what "version" of a Constitutional interpretation we're to live under say so.

Example: Why can't we keep foreign nationals out of our country that want to instigate and practice terrorism?

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Well, that's a very different and much broader question that doesn't have direct relevance to the 2nd Amendment. But the answer there would be a combination of differences in opinion about who to keep out and with what authority and by what means to do so, coupled with the sheer practically insurmountable problems figuring out who is a threat and who isn't, and the likewise practically unrealizeable dream of having actual control about 20,000 miles of coastline and border and about 330 ports of entry into the US.

Especially when you consider that we don't have any concrete idea of how many people enter (and/or leave) the US each year, but it's more than one HUNDRED million.

It was naive of the founding fathers, to expect a few ideas drafted on hemp, about limiting the avarice of overlords, to constrain power mongers and expect future generations to have the cajones to exercise it's enforcement proviso.

It needed some interpretin.

It was naive of the founding fathers, to expect a few ideas drafted on hemp, about limiting the avarice of overlords, to constrain power mongers and expect future generations to have the cajones to exercise it's enforcement proviso.

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That's one way of looking at it, but I actually can't agree. Re-read what Frank summarized about the process by which the founding fathers actually put those "few ideas" down in our Constitution:

Frank Ettin said:

Indeed, It's fatuous to presume to know how the Founding Fathers intended our system to work, just as it is fatuous to believe that even they all agreed on exactly what they meant and how the Constitution would apply.

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Why say that? Well...

Frank Ettin said:

... although fifty-five delegates attended the Constitutional Convention in 1786-87, only thirty-nine signed the proposed Constitution. Thirteen left early without signing, and three refused to sign. There was then a bitter fight over ratification by the States. And it indeed looked like the Constitution would fail ratification until the Massachusetts Compromise was hashed out -- giving us the Bill of Rights after the Constitution was ratified without the Bill of Rights.

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So, they were naive and couldn't foresee that there would be factions and power struggles and reinterpretations and folks who wanted it to work the way they preferred, and/or to their own benefit?

Frank said:

The Founding Fathers well understood how people do disagree and how politics works. They were active, mostly successfully, in the commercial and political world of the time. Many were lawyers. A few were judges. Almost all were very well educated. They were generally politically savvy.

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As said, the ink was hardly dry on the document before the Court was having to sort out what the words meant and who was going to gain advantage by which reading of them.

oh well.............
As soon as we win a couple of lil domestic wars, Poverty, Drugs (and maybe some I don't recall), the po-po will prolly go back to six shot.38 S&Ws.

stoky said:

oh well.............
As soon as we win a couple of lil domestic wars, Poverty, Drugs (and maybe some I don't recall), the po-po will prolly go back to six shot.38 S&Ws.

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Let me ask you, do you think there has ever been a significant period of time in history when which ever group was tasked with keeping public order wasn't at least as well armed, if not almost always better armed, then the people than the general public? When the Cohortes Urbanae patrolled the streets of Rome, do you think they were less well armed than the average Roman Citizen? Do you think Shire Reeves were equipped as the mud farmers that lived on the shires they oversaw? Do you think that common folk were walking around with espantoons in the early 1800s?

Let me laugh harder.

As soon as we win a couple of lil domestic wars, Poverty, Drugs (and maybe some I don't recall), the po-po will prolly go back to six shot.38S&Ws.

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Ok, so that's a broad gripe, but not really anything helpful to understanding how the Constitution works, or why "we" (the people?) don't "demand" something from our government.

Sam1911 said:

Ok, so that's a broad gripe, but not really anything helpful to understanding how the Constitution works, or why "we" (the people?) don't "demand" something from our government.

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Again, the misconception of what federalism is and is not. The governments of other states is not "our" government. It is the government of the residents of those other states. Each US citizen should only be a registered voter in one state. That is "their state" - the only state about which they can say "our government."

The other 49 state governments are not theirs to say anything about, except in the cases where the state government itself is in violation of federal law, including the Constitution. But the game of pretending everything we don't like is "unconstitutional" is old, and the argument is worn thin.

The government of the other 49 states is not your business.

Hmmm...ok, well, that's interesting. But of course we're also citizens of the USA, meaning the Federal government is "our" government.

And something you really should consider when you say "the government of the other 49 states is not your business" is that we're also all citizens within various federal court districts, so decisions that have come up through a neighboring state and get decided in our district's high courts affect us too.

Not so simple as to say what happens in the next state isn't our business.



Further, there's the concept of giving aid to friends and allies "behind enemy lines," so to speak. Our power to change state laws in a state we don't live in is not very great, but there's no moral high ground to be held in refusing to do whatever is possible to fund, assist, instruct, aid, encourage, etc. those on our side who occupy a minority position wherever they are.

Sam1911 said:

Ok, so that's a broad gripe, but not really anything helpful to understanding how the Constitution works, or why "we" (the people?) don't "demand" something from our government.

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It is it helpful to understanding why the Constitution doesn't work, when "the people" demand something (that the LSM convinces us) can't be accomplished with out compromising the Bill of Rights?

I guess not. It's just a picture of some armed men and a statement with sarcastic overtones linking in an ephemeral way the war on drugs, the war on poverty, and the move away from revolvers among law enforcement.

It seems like a sentimental and nebulous lament about "the state of the world" without a direct point or a clear call to action.

It really doesn't explain why the Constitution doesn't work. And it doesn't answer the questions raised by the OP.

Sam1911 said:

And something you really should consider when you say "the government of the other 49 states is not your business" is that we're also all citizens within various federal court districts, so decisions that have come up through a neighboring state and get decided in our district's high courts affect us too.

Not so simple as to say what happens in the next state isn't our business.

Further, there's the concept of giving aid to friends and allies "behind enemy lines," so to speak. Our power to change state laws in a state we don't live in is not very great, but there's no moral high ground to be held in refusing to do whatever is possible to fund, assist, instruct, aid, encourage, etc. those on our side who occupy a minority position wherever they are.

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Fair enough, but the central question under discussion is "Why don't we demand that states ...?"

Bottom line is that we are only in authority to demand things in the state where we vote. We can encourage and support the citizens in other states in demanding things we believe to be to their benefit in protecting and securing their rights. But there is an important distinction between supporting citizens of other states (or nations, for that matter) in demanding things of their governments and demanding things of their governments.

The Constitutional requirement that each state have a republican government means that we only exert authority as voters and citizens in a single state.

The Constitutional requirement that each state have a republican government means that we only exert authority as voters and citizens in a single state.

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Ok, that seems quite clear. Is there confusion about that or some kind of problem we face because of it, in the gun rights fight? I mean, I don't know anyone who has ever admitted to going to another state and trying to vote in their elections or referendums on gun issues. (Or any other issues, actually.)

I've known a few people who went places to help in marches or whatever, but that's fine. No "authority" exerted in that act, and goes directly to freedom of expression.