Guns and the Constitutional Question

Last week, an Oklahoma woman shot and killed an intruder as he attempted to break into her house. In the state of Oklahoma, as with many other states, there is a “castle” law that allows for people to use deadly force when intruders force their way into a house. International observers often site this as part of the “barbarism” of American society (along with capital punishment). Indeed, there are some Americans who feel the same way. They use this argument as part of an overall philosophy against guns and its possession. It is short sighted and without thought of its natural consequences.

Gun advocates point naturally to the second amendment to the U.S. Constitution. Gun opponents point to the same document, the same amendment for their beliefs. For those not familiar, the second amendment to the Constitution reads, “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.” It is the first clause of this statement that is the source of much debate and consternation. Gun opponents argue that since we have no need for a militia, there is no need for the ownership of guns. However, my friends on the left choose this issue as the only one where they will read the Constitution literally. Typically, they will take a broader view of a constitutional question but not with regards to the ownership of guns. It makes their argument specious and therefore, invalid.

The discovery and settlement of our country was done with a gun either in hand or very close by. I believe the assumption of the founding fathers was the ownership of guns in perpetuity, notwithstanding a militia. At no point in the first 150 years or so of our country’s history was there a serious challenge to the idea of gun ownership. However, in the last forty years, there has been a concerted effort to nullify the constitutional protection. Typically, the rhetoric becomes more shrill after a horrific incident like a school shooting. It makes the argument of gun opponents seem reactionary, a reaction without thought. A person willing to kill with a gun will also kill with a knife. What are we really attempting to ban?

In several cities in the United States, strong anti-gun legislation has been attempted. However, it is interesting that these places, Baltimore and Washington, D.C. to name a couple, have also had some of the highest percentage of violence in the country. To hear gun opponents speak, it does not make sense that restrictive access to weapons should equate to greater gun violence. However, the only people who do not have access to weapons in such an environment are law abiding citizens. Bad people obtain their guns illegally, outside the restrictions of the state. If the Oklahoma woman had lived in the U.S. capital, she would likely have been killed in the defense of her baby son, with nothing more to fight with than her hands against two men.

When gun opponents make their cases, they typically bring up sub-machine guns or some other military-oriented weapon but their laws focus on pistols or rifles (laws on the more extreme weapons are already on the books). They are using the extreme to outlaw or heavily restrict the ordinary. Thankfully, these efforts are not working. Over the last couple of years, the Supreme Court has validated the tradition and has struck down as unconstitutional the laws that unduly restrict access to or ownership of guns. In District of Columbia v. Heller (2008) and McDonald v. Chicago (2010), the Supreme Court not only rejected the excessive restrictions on gun ownership but ensured it applied at all levels of the federal and state governments.

In the United States, we measure our freedoms by the amount of choices we have. We have economic freedoms, political freedoms and many social freedoms. The group that purports to defend as many freedoms as possible, the liberals, recoil at the freedom to own weapons. Their arguments are riddled with inconsistencies and irrationalities. I own a gun and would like to own a rifle. I have no reason to own anything beyond that but in a free society, I have no right and the government certainly has no right to dictate what law abiding citizens can and cannot have. When laws specifically put these same people in jeopardy, then the government has crossed the line. Our laws might not work for other countries. Perhaps my international readers could comment. However, for the United States, it is part and parcel to how we define our freedoms and our democracy.