"Framing" gun control debates in liberal terms shuts down leftists. Examples inside.

[brighamr]

jlbraun - perfectly articulated response.

OP - great thread. Gives me good ideas for the next anti I run into.

 

[Ske1etor]

"Gun owners are infantile and paranoid."

Response : Who is more paranoid? Me, a firearm owner or you, the guy who wants to ban and destroy all firearms because he doesn't trust law abiding citizens?

 

[BBroadside]

Good question from alexanderplatz: "So what was the legal status of artillery in the 1700s? Were individual citizens allowed to own cannon, or were they soley the domain of governments?"

This I don't know. I've heard it asserted that they could be owned by anyone, and I don't see any reason to disagree, but that doesn't mean the founders thought owning crew-served weapons should necessarily be a protected right. The aforementioned link talks about people bearing cannon, but they can't be carried. So there is some vagueness that requires some sensitive interpretation.

Part of the problem is that the idea of the state has changed so much over time. States had very few employees. Per the Federalist Papers, the militia consisted of the entire body of armed citizens, yet the sole power to appoint militia officers rested with state governments. Militia members wouldn't have earned a dime in salary, of course, but I don't know about officers. Furthermore, authority to organize, arm, and discipline the militia lies with the Federal government (Article I Section 8).

With crew-served weapons, there is a little subtlety going on. A private citizen (individual militia member) couldn't operate a cannon on his own, at least not in a way that would make it an effective battlefield device. He'd need a crew, and I see no reason to think he'd have the authority to pick his crew. Army privates don't pick who is in their squad. Basically, a state-appointed officer (probably a well-respected neighbor, in the 18th Century) would be picking whoever he thought would reasonably serve in the cannon crew.

The point is, when more than one person is operating a weapon, responsibility is much more complicated than someone pointing a musket or swinging a sword. If someone misses with a musket and hits a friendly soldier, you know who to blame. With a cannon...? I have no clue. It stands to reason that even if someone could go out and buy a cannon in 1790 (which I think they could) they wouldn't have complete freedom to move it wherever they wanted, or take it out for practice with their unorganized undisciplined buddies, or whatever.

The small number of private cannon-owners were probably quite well-coordinated with the militia officers, which isn't the same thing as belonging to a semi-professional National Guard, but also isn't the same as the way muskets and pistols and fowlers would have been regulated (which is to say, almost not at all).

When the Supreme Court considers the big pending RKBA case, I hope they make some decision along the lines of: any weapon small enough to be carried, that doesn't have a brain* (e.g., a Stinger missile), should be pretty much unregulated. I think laws regarding other weapons should be left at the status quo, except that I believe states should have the right to arm their non-professional state guards (which can't be taken under Federal/Presidential command) about like National Guards (which aren't much different from regular Army, in Constitutional terms, especially considering the President can send them to any country on earth without a declaration of war, or so much as a how-do-you-do).

I believe every state should pass a law creating a permanent state militia officer class (basically well-trained gun-owners, especially those with military/police training/experience). This is not supposed to be an innovation but a return to James Madison's vision. These officers would be responsible for the deployment, training, etc. associated with heavy weapons held at the level of the state militia. For an individual to buy these weapons would constitute a donation, more or less, to the militia. Not a transfer of ownership, and not to the state government (but rather, to their peers among the citizenry), but if the weapon is moved and fired by a state-organized crew, individualism is out of place.

Really, I don't think it is Constitutional for a group of individuals to arms themselves like a small army without recognizing the authority of their state-appointed officers. If they don't have any officers (and they generally don't, really), it's not entirely their fault since states are pretty vague about this. I think they distinction between individual self-defense and collective military defense was probably so obvious the founders glossed over it. So if you want M16-type weapons for your gun club, I think you're on good Constitutional ground as the document was intended; if you want a 155mm howitzer, you need to be in some chain of command terminating with your governor.

Like it or not, the Federal government does have some say here - they can prescribe organization and discipline for your state militias beyond the level of individuals carrying individual weapons. The states train and command them. (And all of this is just my humble opinion.)

* Electronically-guided weapons are a Constitutional nightmare, IMHO. There is no precedent for them. If you fire a guided missile, you're not picking your target - an engineer at some military contractor is, in a strange way. Individual responsibility is messy at best. I just don't think there is an absolute Constitutional right to owning a particular computer chip. I point this out because finessing this matter by limiting the definition of arms to weapons that can be borne still allows a whole lot of modern technology which is not even lineally descended from what the framers would have considered.