Adding Words, Subtracting Rights

by Will

LibertyMinute April 16 2014

 Where the U.S. Constitution is concerned, rights can be subtracted through addition ? in this case, by adding five words to the Second Amendment.

Former Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens, a long-time opponent of the right to armed self-defense, insists that gun rights supporters misrepresent the clear intention of the Framers by saying that the Second Amendment protects an individual right to own firearms. Stevens also insists that the same Framers somehow neglected to make that intention clear in the plain language of that amendment.

Thus he suggests that the phrase, ?when serving in the Militia? should be added to the Second Amendment, which would then read: ?A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms when serving in the Militia shall not be infringed.?

In this way, Stevens says, government would be able to enact measures ?designed to minimize the slaughter caused by the prevalence of guns in private hands.? It would also create a state monopoly on firearms ownership that is the necessary precursor to mass slaughter carried out by government officials.

Not even a sophist as accomplished as Stevens can plausibly argue that the Framers intended to equip the government with the means to commit genocide. 

 

Let us take back the liberty wherewith Christ has made us free. 

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