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USM Forum -- Message Board -> AAUP-USM MESSAGE BOARD -> H.A.--In Brief: USM Faculty oppose wire tapping law
Post Info TOPIC: H.A.--In Brief: USM Faculty oppose wire tapping law
Aunt Josephine

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RE: H.A.--In Brief: USM Faculty oppose wire tapping law
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joright wrote:

Aunt Josephine wrote: joright wrote: Regarding the thing in the suitcase.  Just take my previous post and extend it further.  You'll have my position on the suitcase thing. I have no confusion about what "militia" means, and it's not "the army (the gov't)." I think I understand your interpretation of the constitution, Joeright, although I may not agree.  However, I didn't understand your last sentence.  What do you think militia means?  Why didn't they just say citizen if they mean the general public? One more question, would you like to have the Supreme Count rule on this once and for all to end the debate? If I am not mistaken, the rights in the first few bill deal with speech, assembly, press, religion, etc., and they are given to citizens.  Another way to think of them is that they pose restraints on how government can treat citizens.  Why, slap dab in the middle of that grocery list of citizens' rights to be free of government control, would the Founders have given the government a right?  That is, why would they has said, "citizens, you don't have this right..." in the middle of a list of rights they were enumerating for citizens. Put another way, why would they put slap dab in the middle of a grocery list of things the government couldn't take away from people (speech, etc.) something they could take away (guns)?

One possible answer to your question that I can think of rather quickly is the following:  The country had "citizen soldiers".  The constitution is giving the citizens that make up the militia the right to bear arms.  (Not the general public and not for any reason what-so -ever.)


Your interpretation concerns me because I would see no legal reason for your to be concerned if a citizen (of Moslem decent? ) decided to exercise there right to possess a small nuclear device to protect themselves from our oppressive (in their view) government.  Isn't this what the founding fathers gave them the right to do?  Or is that reserved only for the Christians?



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joright

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Were only those citizens in the citizen militia given the right to free speech, free worship, free assembly?  "The Bill of Rights" is an enumeration of rights held by citizens, not citizens in all but one, and citizen militia members in the remaining one. 


The rest of your post seems to be an attempt to bait me onto a side trail re Christians vs. Muslims.  I would address it but I fear that we'll end up down some unproductive avenue if I do so. 



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Aunt Josephine

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joright wrote:

Were only those citizens in the citizen militia given the right to free speech, free worship, free assembly?  "The Bill of Rights" is an enumeration of rights held by citizens, not citizens in all but one, and citizen militia members in the remaining one.  The rest of your post seems to be an attempt to bait me onto a side trail re Christians vs. Muslims.  I would address it but I fear that we'll end up down some unproductive avenue if I do so. 

Concerning the Bill of Rights, the enumeration of the rights apparently has no qualifications until the mention of the militia in one.  I didn't put the word there, but it is there.  For me, the logical statement for your interpretation to hold would be if rights were listed and no mention of militia was made in that one.  There would be no need to mention militia if the right to bear arms was just another one in the list, as you interpret it.  So I guess we can't go further on this, and must agree to disagree, until the Supreme Court rules.


I put in Moslem and Christian to get attention, sorry.  The point I tried to make was that would be the logical extension of the citizen's right under your interpretation, as I understand you.  Is that a correct assessment? 


 



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joright

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Look at use of the word "people" in I, II and IV Amendments.  Also, notice the phrase "except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the Militia, . ." in the V Amendment.  If you follow the comment about "land forces" with and an additional one about "Militia," as in the above statement, aren't you being redundant?


 



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joright

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joright wrote:

Look at use of the word "people" in I, II and IV Amendments.  Also, notice the phrase "except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the Militia, . ." in the V Amendment.  If you follow the comment about "land forces" with and an additional one about "Militia," as in the above statement, aren't you being redundant?  
Addendum: that is, if Militia means land forces (or army), doesn't the statement have a redundancy?

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Aunt Josephine

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joright wrote:

joright wrote: Look at use of the word "people" in I, II and IV Amendments.  Also, notice the phrase "except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the Militia, . ." in the V Amendment.  If you follow the comment about "land forces" with and an additional one about "Militia," as in the above statement, aren't you being redundant?   Addendum: that is, if Militia means land forces (or army), doesn't the statement have a redundancy?

Well, yes, but doesn't that support my interpretation? They just wanted to make it crystal clear.  Obviously it isn't crystal clear, so I agreed we disagree on this, Joeright.  How about my suggestion that your interpretation could lead to citizens legally possessing WMD?



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Little old lady

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Y'alls attempt to decide what weapons and how many of them are legal for a citizen to own is like the debates on pornography. Everybody knows there are rights, and also limits to those rights, it's just an arm-wrestle to decide where to set the boundaries. Most law-abidin' gun-totin' citizens even here in the Great State of, would not want personal nuclear devices, bombs, etc. to be legal.

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Aunt Josephine

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Little old lady wrote:

Y'alls attempt to decide what weapons and how many of them are legal for a citizen to own is like the debates on pornography. Everybody knows there are rights, and also limits to those rights, it's just an arm-wrestle to decide where to set the boundaries. Most law-abidin' gun-totin' citizens even here in the Great State of, would not want personal nuclear devices, bombs, etc. to be legal.

With all due respect for another, Little Old Lady, the debate is not about "What we want". The debate is about what the constitution says is legal.  If it were about what we want, then there wouldn't be a debate.  Everybody has an opinion, so what?  What does the constitution say, is the question.


A side question to Little Old Lady, do people interpret the bible by discussing "What they want to be true"?


 



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LeftASAP

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This discussion sure beats those CoB threads. 

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Little old lady

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Aunt Josephine wrote:
Little old lady wrote:
Y'alls attempt to decide what weapons and how many of them are legal for a citizen to own is like the debates on pornography. Everybody knows there are rights, and also limits to those rights, it's just an arm-wrestle to decide where to set the boundaries. Most law-abidin' gun-totin' citizens even here in the Great State of, would not want personal nuclear devices, bombs, etc. to be legal.

With all due respect for another, Little Old Lady, the debate is not about "What we want". The debate is about what the constitution says is legal.  If it were about what we want, then there wouldn't be a debate.  Everybody has an opinion, so what?  What does the constitution say, is the question.
A side question to Little Old Lady, do people interpret the bible by discussing "What they want to be true"?
 


Auntie dear, everybody interprets everything in terms of "what they want." What the Constitution says, and what the Bible says (proper noun, dear) get re-interpreted from one age to the next. It used to be legal and biblical to burn old ladies at the stake.

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Aunt Josephine

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Little old lady wrote:

Auntie dear, everybody interprets everything in terms of "what they want." What the Constitution says, and what the Bible says (proper noun, dear) get re-interpreted from one age to the next. It used to be legal and biblical to burn old ladies at the stake.


I thought they only burned old bitches...err..witches at the stake.    If everyone interprets the Bible the way they want there would be an infinite number of religions.  Oh, wait there are a very large number of religions.  Well, I guess you’re right about that.


However, if we do that with our constitution we are going to have a number of different "countries".   I don't want civil wars so I will let the Supreme Court decide what the constitution says (and the theologians decide what the Bible says.)


 


 



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