By Nancy Thorner -
The Second Amendment is uniquely American. It was the work of the Founding Fathers – men who had to fight for their freedom from tyranny and who intended for the means of that fight to never be taken away from American citizens.
Following is an article by Matt Palumbo published February 18, 2018: 10 Essential Quotes On The 2nd Amendment From Our Founding Fathers.
The quotes are from men who wrote the Constitution or the Declaration of Independence or fought in the Revolutionary War.
At a time when the 2nd Amendment is again under fire after the recent Highland Park, IL mass 4th of July shooting, every American needs to see the quotes.
As the article states: "We’ve all heard it before: the second amendment never meant for citizens to have the sort of guns available today – it was just for hunting!
By that same logic the first amendment doesn’t apply to the internet (which didn’t exist at the time) so kiss your free speech rights online goodbye!"
- “The Constitution shall never be construed… to prevent the people of the United States who are peaceable citizens from keeping their own arms.” – Samuel Adams
- “…arms like laws discourage and keep the invader and the plunderer in awe, and preserve order in the world as well as property. The same balance would be preserved were all the world destitute of arms, for all would be alike; but since some will not, others dare not lay them aside… Horrid mischief would ensue were one half the world deprived of the use of them….” – Thomas Paine
- “To preserve liberty, it is essential that the whole body of people always possess arms, and be taught alike, especially when young, how to use them…”- Richard Henry Lee
- “The supreme power in America cannot enforce unjust laws by the sword; because the whole body of the people are armed, and constitute a force superior to any band of regular troops that can be, on any pretense, raised in the United States.” – Noah Webster
- “A free people ought not only to be armed, but disciplined; to which end a uniform and well-digested plan is requisite; and their safety and interest require that they should promote such manufactories as tend to render them independent of others for essential, particularly military, supplies.” – George Washington
- “What country can preserve its liberties if their rulers are not warned from time to time that their people preserve the spirit of resistance? Let them take arms.” – Thomas Jefferson
- “The laws that forbid the carrying of arms are laws of such a nature. They disarm only those who are neither inclined nor determined to commit crimes…. Such laws make things worse for the assaulted and better for the assailants; they serve rather to encourage than to prevent homicides, for an unarmed man may be attacked with greater confidence than an armed man.” – Thomas Jefferson
- “I ask who are the militia? They consist now of the whole people, except a few public officers.” – George Mason
- “A militia, when properly formed, are in fact the people themselves …” – Richard Henry Lee
- “The people are not to be disarmed of their weapons. They are left in full possession of them.”- Zachariah Johnson
Gun control as a losing strategy
Once again a cry is rising for more gun control. The media and the public need to understand that the ongoing emphasis on mass shootings and gun control is in the end a losing strategy.
Here is an excellent article published on June 6 by Matt Rosenberg, Four Things You Need to Know About Mass Shooting and The Mew Gun Control Landscape. Please take time to read the article.
As for the weapons used in the Highland Park shooting, a friend who is an authority on guns informed me of what seemed to him a deliberate vagueness about the weapon used, most likely because the gun didn't fit the “high-powered assault rifle” narrative.
My friend, in speaking about a news conference held by Highland Park police, stated how the police gave the primary weapon used by Robert Crimo as a Keltec Sub-2000 which uses 9 mm pistol ammunition and Glock magazines. The Sub-2000 folds very compactly.
The rifle found in Crimo's car was a Remington 700 (caliber unknown), a bolt action rifle. Neither fall in the broad category of “assault rifles” expressed by Highland Park ordinance, nor are they illegal in Illinois. However, both are deadly weapons, just not as described by politicians.
As usual, facts have no influence on political rhetoric.
The “assault weapon” of the 1700s was not the smooth-bore musket itself. The soldier fired it, then the “assault”was done with the BAYONET attached to the musket.
The British hated and feared the colonists’ Pennsylvania/Kentucky”long RIFLES” because they had greater accuracy at longer ranges, and easily picked off British officers.
To those officers, the long rifle would be considered aa an “assault weapon, unfair to use in civilized society.”
“Quemadmoeum gladuis neminem occidit, occidentis telum est.” (A sword is never a killer, it is a tool in the killer’s hands.)
– Lucius Annaeus Seneca, circa 4 BC – 65 AD
“Americans [have] the right and advantage of being armed, unlike the citizens of other countries whose governments are afraid to trust their people with arms”
– James Madison, considered the father of the US Constitution
“[T]he people are not to be disarmed of their weapons. They are left in full possession of them.”
– Zacharia Johnson, speech in the Virginia Ratifying Convention, 1788
“During World War II, six million Swiss had guns and six million Jews did not.”
– Author unknown
“…sort of like the people who repeat foolish slogans like “guns kill” – as though guns sprout little feet when no one is looking and run around shooting people all by themselves.”
– Doug Casey, financial columnist
“If you don’t have to give up your car because others drive drunk with theirs, then why do you have to give up your gun because others commit crimes with theirs?”
– Anonymous internet wag
“When a crime is committed, does the gun go to jail?”
– From BrotherJohn.com
“Let’s stop playing games. The problem is people, not guns. Our society suffers from a deficiency of personal responsibility – not from an excess of personal freedom.”
– Star Parker, African American writer and commentator
“The horrifying truth is this: we live now in a culture that not only does not respect life, but discards it like trash — not only at the beginning of life, but also at the end, and every place in between. What has happened to us?”
– Catholic Deacon Greg Kandra
“…we’re also going to make it clear that when a pig gets iced that’s a good thing, and that everyone who considers himself a revolutionary should be armed, should own a gun, should have a gun in his house.”
– Bill Ayers, leftist activist and confidant of gun control happy Barack Obama, in A Strategy
To Win, appearing in New Left Notes, September 12, 1969. Note: This quote is included
both show the hypocrisy of today’s anti-gun left, as well as expose them as the
purveyors of violence the left has always been. This in no wise implies support of Ayers,
and in fact this paper is utterly against what Ayers articulates here.
“The urge to save humanity is almost always a false front for the urge to rule.'”
| – HL Mencken
“No free man shall ever be debarred the use of arms. The strongest reason for the people to retain the right to keep and bear arms is, as a last resort, to protect themselves against tyranny in government”
– Thomas Jefferson, 1 Thomas Jefferson Papers, 334
“Blaming Newtown on guns is like blaming Chappaquiddick on the Oldsmobile.”
– Ben Crystal, Personal Liberty News
“An armed society is a polite society. Manners are good when one may have to back up his acts with his life.”
Robert A. Heinlein
“Eliminate guns and they go to bombs, eliminate bombs and they move to poison or something else. Bad people are just bad people.”
– “David,” otherwise anonymous internet poster.
“The trigger is in the head, not the gun.”
– Michael Howell