Here’s a little thought game:
Suppose there were a bill in congress called “The Right To Keep and Bear Arms Infringement Act of 2013” (We’ll call it The Schumer Act for short) and it read simply: “The right of the people to keep and bear arms may be infringed.”
Suppose further that it passed both the House of Representatives and the Senate and was signed into law by President Obama. Would it be constitutional?
The Second Amendment says that the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall NOT be infringed. The Schumer act would clearly be in conflict with the Constitution. Constitution wins. The Schumer Act would be unconstitutional as written.
But suppose The Schumer Act were written to say: “The right of the people to keep and bear arms may be fifty percent infringed.” Would only a fifty percent infringement pass constitutional muster? Seems like a bit much. I think a fifty-percent infringement would be just as unconstitutional as a 100 percent infringement.
What about twenty-five percent? Ten percent? One percent? At what point would such an act no longer be unconstitutional?
Exactly how much infringement does “shall not be infringed” permit?
The Second Amendment sounds kind of absolute. It sounds like it permits no infringement whatever. The words are clear enough. How then is the current infringement justified and how, oh how, is the currently contemplated further infringement even considered by a Congress, all of whom swore an oath to defend the Constitution? What am I missing here?
How much wiggle room is there in the Constitution? Can we just set it aside when there’s enough public clamor? Is it really more just a set of guidelines than hard and fast rules? Can we, for example, elect a president who’s just 33 instead of the Constitutionally mandated 35 years old, if he’s a really nice guy? You know, make allowances for the current political climate?
I believe that the Constitution means what it says. I don’t see much wiggle room built into the Constitution.
I believe that the Constitution does not permit any infringement of the Right to Keep and Bear Arms.
I believe that, just as the Constitution’s First Amendment Freedom of Speech protection exists to protect political speech, so too the Constitution’s Second Amendment protects the right to keep and bear military style firearms. Miller v. U.S. made that clear.
I believe that any legislation that infringes the Right to Keep and Bear Arms by any amount is unconstitutional, and those who vote for such infringement are in violation of their oath of office.