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2nd amendment & gun ownership
Gun control VS Second amendment rights
why gun control violates the second amendment
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“A well-regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed (Second Amendment – U.S. Constitution).” This stands as our second amendment in the U.S. Constitution and has been in there since December 15th, 1791. Unfortunately in recent years, this amendment has been disputed greatly in the latest government conferences. Modern occurrences of terrorism have generated doubt and questionability in reference to the second amendment. It has caused people to become uneasy at the fact that U.S. citizens are allowed to possess weapons in their home and use them for personal activities. On the other side of the fence, some people believe that in order to protect our country, it is necessary for the people of the United States of America to have the right to possess firearms in an attempt to provide personal protection and grant each individual the right to protect themselves if the situation happens to arise. Our forefathers built this nation with a picture of a nation that is powerful and fully capable of protecting ourselves if need be. In current news, it is obvious that the current government is trying to step in create turmoil in the country by trying to modify the second amendment and generate a nation that will lose its right to possess firearms in our own homes. If our nation decides to adjust the second amendment, then what else will the government try to change? It will only cause the validity of the U.S. Constitution to decrease dramatically and construct mass amounts of chaos in our nation. This is where the catch on our government system occurs. Where do we as a nation draw the line? In this paper, the situations of terrorism that have freshl... ... middle of paper ... ... one of the most important documents in our nation’s history, the U.S. Constitution. By providing examples, I hope that the right to bear arms should be a priority in our nation. An average group of individuals founded this nation, now it is up to the average American citizen to protect it. Works Cited DePalma, Anthony. City of Dust: Illness, Arrogance and 9/11. Upper Saddle River, NJ: FT, 2011. Print. Pearson, Michael. "Gunman Turns 'Batman' Screening into Real-life 'horror Film'" CNN. Cable News Network, 01 Jan. 1970. Web. 10 Nov. 2013. Saad, Lydia. "Self-Reported Gun Ownership in U.S." Self-Reported Gun Ownership in U.S. Is Highest Since 1993. N.p., 26 Oct. 2011. Web. 10 Nov. 2013. "Sandy Hook Elementary Shooting: What Happened?" CNN. Cable News Network, n.d. Web. 10 Nov. 2013. "Second Amendment - U.S. Constitution." Findlaw. N.p., n.d. Web. 10 Nov. 2013.
Robert E. Shalhope, author of “The Armed Citizen in the Early Republic,” explores the controversy regarding the Second Amendment and concludes that the Second Amendment guarantees United States citizens the right to keep and bear arms. Shalhope, a specialist in eighteenth and nineteenth century American political culture, has a strong background in history as he is the George Lynn Cross Research Professor of History at the University of Oklahoma. Even though there are many different interpretations of the amendment, the Second Amendment clearly states that individuals have the right to bear arms. Shalhope argues that the Second Amendment provides every citizen the right to bear arms in order to protect themselves in the face of danger as well as to maintain freedom and liberty in a society.
Linenthal, Edward Tabor. The Unfinished Bombing: Oklahoma City in American Memory. Oxford: Oxford UP, 2001. Print.
"Sandy Hook Elementary Shooting: What Happened?" CNN. Cable News Network, n.d. Web. 04 Dec. 2013.
United States is a country that has problems with gun control, and this issue has many debates between whether or not people should be allowed to carry a gun on them. This free county not only for speech and religion, but also allows people to have the right to bear arms. The Second Amendment of the United States was written by our Founding Fathers,“A well-regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed” (Government). The main purpose of the Second Amendment when our Founding Fathers wrote this amendment was to help the American citizens to defend themselves from the government at that time, and other countries from invading their properties. However, the Second Amendment could be the opposite of what our Founding Fathers wanted it to be in the twenty-first century, because many criminals are taking advantage of the right to carry guns, which in example results with the purpose of showing off with their friends, revenge for their gang’s members, or try to be like their favorite hero in the movie they had watched. On July 20, 2012, a massive shooting occurred inside of a movie theater in Aurora, Colorado. The tragedy happened during a midnight screening of the film The Dark Knight Rises which killed twelve people and injuring seventy others. In response, this alarmed our government to rethink about the current gun control law in America. In A Well Regulated Militia by Saul Cornell, the author informed to his audience the different views of gun ownership in early America, which part was the most important part of the debate, how did slavery affect the debate over militias in the South, the Continental army officer’s views, and the arguments be...
Margulies, Joseph. 2013. What Changed When Everything Changed: 9/11 and the Making of National Identity. Yale University Press.
Anti-gun control activists believe that the constitutional right granted by the Second Amendment should never be taken away because it would completely violate the purpose the bill of rights (LaPierre, 1 of 2). Thomas Jefferson said, "The strongest reason for the people to retain the right to bear arms is, as a last resort, to protect themselves against tyranny in government." An unknown author once said, "An armed man is a citizen. An unarmed man is a subject."
“What Happened in Newtown, Connecticut? Eyewitness Accounts of Sandy Hook Elementary School Shooting.” WXYZ. N.p., n.d. Web. 5 Oct. 2015.
In the book Guns, Gun Control, and Elections: The Politics and Policy of Firearms, Wilson discusses the complex issue of gun control and the many debates and controversies regarding the issue. Many people throughout the United States feel it is the right as a citizen in the United States to own a weapon, and the government should have no say in the matter. These people believe this because of the part of the Second Amendment that states, “The right of the people to keep and bear Arms shall not be infringed.” People who are strong advocates against gun control use this part of the Second Amendment to drive their point across. Advocates against gun control believe that preserving the freedom of a state through a militia is not the only way it should be looked at, these people believe that the amendment also implies a clause that takes into account one’s right for self-defense.
Since the beginning of American history, citizens who resided the country lacked the basic civil rights and liberties that humans deserved. Different races and ethnicities were treated unfairly. Voting rights were denied to anyone who was not a rich, white male. Women were harassed by their bosses and expected to take care of everything household related. Life was not all that pretty throughout America’s past, but thankfully overtime American citizens’ civil liberties and rights expanded – granting Americans true freedom.
The United State of America, established by the Founding Father who lead the American Revolution, accomplished many hardship in order to construct what America is today. As history established America’s future, the suffering the United State encountered through history illustrate America’s ability to identify mistakes and make changes to prevent the predictable. The 2nd Amendment was written by the Founding Father who had their rights to bear arms revoked when they believe rising up to their government was appropriate. The Twentieth Century, American’s are divided on the 2nd Amendment rights, “The right to bear arms.” To understand why the Founding Father written this Amendment, investigating the histories and current measures may help the American people gain a better understanding of gun’s rights in today’s America.
According to Thomas Jefferson, all men are created equal with certain unalienable rights. Unalienable rights are rights given to the people by their Creator rather than by government. These rights are inseparable from us and can’t be altered, denied, nullified or taken away by any government, except in extremely rare circumstances in which the government can take action against a particular right as long as it is in favor of the people’s safety. The Declaration of Independence of the United States of America mentions three examples of unalienable rights: “Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness”. I believe these rights, since they are acquired by every human being from the day they are conceived, should always be respected, but being realistic, most of the time, the government intervenes and either diminishes or
“U.S. Gun Facts, Figures, and the Law.” Gun Policy. Gun Policy. 2. Jun. 2014. Web. 6 June 2015.
As violence and murder rates escalate in America so does the issue of gun control. The consequence of this tragedy births volatile political discourse about gun control and the Second Amendment. The crux of the question is what the founding fathers meant when they wrote, “A well-regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.” Since the writing of the Second Amendment the make and model of firearms has changed dramatically and so has the philosophies of the people. A rifle is no longer defined as a single shot, muzzle-loading musket used to primarily protect families or solely for food. Should the weapons we use today be protected by an amendment written nearly 222 years ago? Should the second amendment be rewritten? Does the Second Amendment apply to individual citizens? These questions spark extensive debates in Washington D.C. regarding what the founding fathers intended the amendment to be. The answer to this question lies in the fact that despite hundreds of gun control articles having been written , still the gun control issue remains unresolved. History tells us gun control debates will be in a stalemate until our judicial system defines or rewrites the Second Amend. This paper will examine the history of the Second Amendment, and attempt to define the framers intent, gun control legislation and look at factors that affect Americans on this specific issue...
This debate has produced two familiar interpretations of the Second Amendment. Advocates of stricter gun control laws have tended to stress that the amendment’s militia clause guarantees nothing to the individual and that it only protects the states’ rights to be able to maintain organized military units. These people argue that the Second Amendment was merely used to place the states’ organized military forces beyond the federal government’s power to be able to disarm them. This would guarantee that the states would always have sufficient force at their command to abolish federal restraints on their rights and to resist by arms if necessary. T...
For years proposals for gun control and the ownership of firearms have been among the most controversial issues in modern American politics. The public debate over guns in the United States is often seen as having two side. Some people passionately assert that the Second Amendment protects an individual's right to own guns while others assert that the Second Amendment does no more than protect the right of states to maintain militias. There are many people who insist that the Constitution is a "living document" and that circumstances have changed in regard to an individual’s right to bear arms that the Second Amendment upholds. The Constitution is not a document of total clarity and the Second Amendment is perhaps one of the worst drafted of all its amendments and has left many Americans divided over the true intent.