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    Gun Violence: How the 2nd Amendment can violate Civil Rights
    Gun Violence: How the 2nd Amendment can violate Civil Rights
    Gun Violence: How the 2nd Amendment can violate Civil Rights
    Ebook170 pages1 hour

    Gun Violence: How the 2nd Amendment can violate Civil Rights

    By Brent Waterbury

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    About this ebook

    This book is about our civil rights, gun violence, courts and the 2nd Amendment. As many realize, gun violence in America is off the charts compared to other industrialized nations. Over 70,000+ Americans a year are a victims of gun violence either through death or injury. This ebook argues that gun violence violates our civil rights and "liberty" which has been presumably guaranteed by the 5th/14th Amendments.
    This book dives into the history of our 2nd Amendment and explores relevant court cases from the 1800's up to today's cases. Our Constitution claims that no laws can contradict one another but this book claims that the 2nd Amendment conflicts with other Bill of Rights.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherBrent Waterbury
    Release dateDec 20, 2013
    ISBN9781311091666
    Gun Violence: How the 2nd Amendment can violate Civil Rights
    Author

    Brent Waterbury

    I've lived in 6 states but mainly grew up in Midwest, moved to California in 70's, studied psychology and music at 3 different colleges/university. Initially I wrote movie scripts for professional attention and only years later thinking in a more historical and non-fiction way.

    Read more from Brent Waterbury

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    • 1/5
      What a pathetic excuse of a book. I honestly can't believe someone wasted the money to publish it.
    • 1/5
      Author starts by neglecting to note that gun control legislation was initially aimed at non-white immigrants, especially those whose immigration was non-voluntary, and their descendants. It was expanded to include voluntary immigrants from other ethnic groups that were considered by some to be unsuitable because of cultural differences. Arabian, Chinese, Irish, Italian, and Japanese, among others. Free blacks, in particular, were not allowed firearms many places, even in the North, particularly in the South, and rather spottily in the West. Thomas Jefferson said in his rough draft of the Declaration of Independence: "We hold these truths to be sacred & undeniable; that all men are created equal & independant, that from that equal creation they derive rights inherent & inalienable, among which are the preservation of life, & liberty, & the pursuit of happiness;" but only intended it for whites.
      For much of the past three centuries, we've been generalizing more and more. Our country is not perfect yet, but I quite agree with Malcolm X, who said " The Constitution of the United States of America clearly affirms the right of every American citizen to bear arms. And as Americans, we will not give up a single right guaranteed under the Constitution."

      In District of Columbia v. Heller, the United States Supreme Court said, "1. The Second Amendment protects an individual right to possess a firearm unconnected with service in a militia, and to use that arm for traditionally lawful purposes, such as self-defense within the home.Pp. 2–53.
      (a) The Amendment’s prefatory clause announces a purpose, but does not limit or expand the scope of the second part, the operative clause. The operative clause’s text and history demonstrate that it connotes an individual right to keep and bear arms. Pp. 2–22.
      (b) The prefatory clause comports with the Court’s interpretation of the operative clause. The “militia” comprised all males physically capable of acting in concert for the common defense. The Antifederalists feared that the Federal Government would disarm the people in order to disable this citizens’ militia, enabling a politicized standing army or a select militia to rule. The response was to deny Congress power to abridge the ancient right of individuals to keep and beararms, so that the ideal of a citizens’ militia would be preserved. Pp. 22–28.
      (c)
      The Court’s interpretation is confirmed by analogous arms-bearing rights in state constitutions that preceded and immediately followed the Second Amendment. Pp. 28–30.
      (d)
      The Second Amendment’s drafting history, while of dubious interpretive worth, reveals three state Second Amendment proposals that unequivocally referred to an individual right to bear arms. Pp. 30–32.
      (e)
      Interpretation of the Second Amendment by scholars, courts and legislators, from immediately after its ratification through the late 19th century also supports the Court’s conclusion. Pp. 32–47.
      (f)
      None of the Court’s precedents forecloses the Court’s interpretation.
      Neither United States v. Cruikshank, 92 U. S. 542, 553, nor Presser v. Illinois, 116 U. S. 252, 264–265, refutes the individual-rights interpretation. United States v. Miller, 307 U. S. 174, does not limit the right to keep and bear arms to militia purposes, but rather limits the type of weapon to which the right applies to those used by the militia, i.e., those in common use for lawful purposes. Pp. 47–54."

      The 2nd Amendment is not a late addition to the Bill of Rights. It was placed there as the People's guarantee that they would be able to defend themselves from an over-reaching Federal Government. And it is now incorporated to the states, since those governments have proven themselves willing to deprive Citizens of their rights.

    Book preview

    Gun Violence - Brent Waterbury

    [Type text]

    Gun Violence: How the 2nd Amendment can violate civil rights

    By Brent Waterbury

    Smash words edition, copyright 2014

    Intro

    More guns in a community lead to more homicide.

    Harvard Criminologist David Hemenway

    (sourced from The Last Gun: how changes in the gun industry are killing Americans)

    Recently, holiday travelers returning from a trip at a Ft. Lauderdale airport were greeted not by Santa waving but by another crazy with a 9 mm:

    Everyone started screaming and running...The shooter made his way down through a baggage claim. He emptied his 9 mm clip into a crowd. Alarms blared and security struggled to open emergency exits. Everybody just plowed through them, packed like sardines, shoving and pushing and screaming. Eyewitness Bruce Wagner

    (5 Die in Florida airport shooting; suspect is held, LA Times Jan. 7, 2017)

    This ebook is new in its approach which makes a legal and somewhat scholarly claim that victims of gun violence are being denied their freedom and liberty as stated in the Constitution.

    Fortunately, this is not another emotional argument for the dissolution of guns but rather many different arguments but all based on our existing constitutional laws.

    This ebook explores how the more guns, less crime philosophy proposed by the NRA and other pro-gun groups hasn't worked to the average citizens advantage. It delves into the Colonist history of how the 2nd Amendment evolved and the later 14th Amendment which oddly contradict one another. Finally, I touch on the criminal psychology of free-floating guns in our society and dive into landmark court cases which over time have both negated and affirmed our civil rights:

    With respect to handguns it's not easy to understand why the 2nd Amendment, or the notion of liberty, should be viewed as creating a right to own a weapon that contributes to the shocking number of murders in our society. Former Justice Powell

    (remarks to Criminal Justice Society, ABA 10, Oct. 7, 1988)

    The Founder's who wrote the 2nd Amendment never had problems where citizens were shot to death for no reason at all other than to cause mayhem and publicity. But read or hear anything today about gun rights and the 2nd Amendment and you will see the only consensus is wild disagreement on both sides. For example, the pro-gun right will sit smugly on the 2nd Amendment alone--while the left sees the devastation regardless of people's rights. Unfortunately in post-Newton America little has still been accomplished regarding the devastation of our guns and a lot needs to be changed.

    Can the 2nd Amendment break our civil rights?

    All Courts, lower/upper, both state and federal, have interpreted that Americans have the right to own guns depending on type. Unlike the left's argument I don't dispute that. But if you're one of the 71,000 people victimized or murdered by guns every year I maintains that the 2nd Amendment has broken your civil rights. How could this happen? Let's continue...

    1st/4th /5th/ 8th and 14th Amendments combined

    First off, laws in America cannot contradict one another. Thus they should be able to be combined without contradictions. Here's an example:

    To insure domestic tranquility, Congress shall make no law...which deprives the People of life, liberty and privacy without due process (courtroom trial). Trespassing by the police or torture by the state is not allowed before or after a trial.

    Right under our noses our government, both federal and state, cannot design laws which takes away our life and liberty without a prior court trial. If they do then the laws are in conflict with one another which laws cannot do. For instance, the 2nd Amendment hardly ensures domestic tranquility...

    Obviously most (99%?) of gun owners are not lawless and obey gun laws. But we see that guns are bi-polar; they can be fun yet they can be very evil. In the wrong irresponsible hands bury the innocent and undeserving including our Presidents, civil rights leaders, the 1000's of random murders, spouses and teens around the country like Trayvon Martin. There are also 1000's of suicides with a gun each year. Without being hysterical, I believe that gun violence tears away at the fabric of civilized society pulling it apart. And until the gun violence stops America will continue to be criticized around the world as a rather scorned and juvenile nation, unable and unwilling to come to grips with its own problems...

    A Few Gun Facts:

    Gun ownership globally: US ranks #1 ahead of Yemen:

    "From an international perspective the US clearly has a problem. Despite having less than 5% of the world's population it has almost 50% of the world's civilian-owned guns.

    (Control: exposing the truth about Guns, Glenn Beck, 2013)

    During the last 11 years of war in Afghanistan the death toll was just over 2,000 but in America during that time more than 175,000 people were murdered. This means that America, with its easy access to guns, has had more violence than a country in the midst of a civil war. Somewhat frightfully, 1 in 3 American's personally owns a gun while in 2012 the Freedom Group sold 2 billion rounds of ammo. Clearly, thanks to our story-driven negative media, America has morphed into a paranoid nation:

    (theguardian.com/datablog, September 17, 2013)

    In 2010, 338,000 non-fatal crimes were committed with guns.

    (Doctor's Target Gun Violence as a Social Disease, USA Today, Aug. 12, '12)

    In the 4 years between 2009 and 2013 more than 196,000 people died of gunshot wounds, according to CDC stats. In 2011, over 11,000 people were shot to death by a gun. Thankfully this is down about 40% over the past thirty years with people moving out of the cities and into suburbs. But this still means that if all the victims were laid end to end on a highway every year this line would stretch over 10 miles long. No less worse is that roughly 60,000 are injured by guns, many seriously including paralysis and brain damage. Now if we go back just a decade this 'human highway' would be over 700 miles long! This should be unthinkable in a civilized society--if we are in fact civilized like we think we are:

    (Crime & Punishment in America, Currie, 1998/2013), ( Mother Jones, Feb. 27, '13/factcheck.org), (Private Guns, Public Health 4, Hemenway)

    "American's under 40 are more likely to die from gunfire than disease."

    (Reducing gun violence in America: Informing Policy with evidence, Firearms and Violent Death in U.S., M. Miller, Webster/Vernick, ed., 2013)

    America is in red per 1 million

    (UNODC data, compiled by the Guardian.com, July 22, 2012/guns-homicides-ownership-world list)

    Since Columbine there have been 130 school shootings and over 200 mass shootings (over 4 victims) have occurred since 2006. In 2015 alone mass shootings at homes, parties or on the street have either killed or injured 1100 victims:

    (www.shootingtracker.com/2015/raw data/excel)

    Mass shooting are blended together into mass murder and what is missing is a moral response. USC prof Ron Astor

    (Crime & Punishment in America, Currie, 1998/2013), ( Mother Jones, Feb. 27, '13/factcheck.org), (Private Guns, Public Health 4, Hemenway), (Violence then resignation, LA Times, Dec. 3, 2015)

    In 2011, there were 19,000 suicides by gun and of those about 4000 were teens. Now if we read the Declaration of Independence this is not the true freedom the Founding Fathers envisioned nor the original history or intent of the 2nd Amendment. Naturally all these arguments will be explored...

    (www.shootingtracker.com/2015/raw data/excel), ( USA Today, Jan. 9, '13), (www.cdc.gov/2011)

    Criminals pop up overnight like mushrooms

    We have met the enemy and he is us... Pogo, comic strip

    Many of the stats above sound surreal and almost like distortion and lies but they're not. You or I do not hear most of this on CNN or the local news because about half of murders and violent acts with a gun are not broadcast or listed in newspapers. Apparently newscasters feel that murders and gun violence are just day in/day out retreaded stories so they just highlight the weird ones:

    (USA TODAY research reveals flaws in mass-killing data, USA Today, Dec. 3, '13)

    To the left, the 2nd Amendment is an unfortunate and vestigial remnant of a lost world. Antiquated and barbaric in its disregard for the value of human life...Guns divide the American people.

    (Uncertain Justice, pg. 156)

    But to the Right, 'knee-jerk' Republicans, the NRA, and strict Constitutionalist's like Glenn Beck don't buy this. To take away their guns is to take away their freedom--the freedom of the 2nd Amendment. And if that's taken away what's other freedom might be next? This is what the early Father's were afraid of also...

    Why is the 2nd Amendment so important?

    "To the Framers, our questions [about the Constitution] would make little sense. To us today, their answer makes little sense.

    (The 2nd Amendment: bio, Waldman)

    Statements like the above mean the Bill of Rights is upside-down and mostly antiquated. Yet despite its failures and short-comings that is what the federal government still uses as a basis for its laws

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