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Interpreting the 2nd Amendment

To the editor:

In reference to a recent letter to the editor regarding his interpretation of the 2nd Amendment, I respond as follows:

The Nazi gun control argument has been found to be counterfactual. It claims that gun regulations in the Third Reich rendered victims of the Holocaust weaker to such an extent that they could have more effectively resisted oppression if they had been armed or better armed. According to a Google Search of “Wikipedia gun control argument”: “Various mainstream sources describe the argument as historically ‘dubious,’ ‘questionable,’ ‘preposterous,’ ‘tendentious’ and ‘problematic.’ It not only has little support among legal scholars and historians, it also has little support among human rights advocates. Such counterfactual arguments are problematic because they reinvent the past to imagine the future. In fact, Jews were not well-armed and were not able to adequately defend themselves against Nazi aggression. Thus, reimagining a past in which they were and did does not provide a legitimate basis for arguments about what might have followed.”

Suggestions that the 2nd Amendment was written so as to allow Americans to bear arms as a means of self-defense against a possible battle against tyranny by our government may have been part of the reason why it was written as such by our Founding Fathers. However, logic tells me that ragtag militias would be no match for a well-trained platoon of Marines. Maybe we should have an arms race. Do you think our Founding Fathers would now want to allow its citizens to arm themselves with hand-held AT4’s (Anti-Tank Rocket System), or the anti-air FIM-92 Stinger? Kind of like the suggestion of putting more guns into the mix by arming teachers. Such stupid ideas for a peace-loving Christian nation.

Gun control efforts are just that; an effort by individuals to reduce the bloodshed that criminals with guns are inflicting on them and those they love. We need to control the use of them against the innocent. Our love affair with guns has gone too far (Hollywood). Our gun culture (The Wild Wild West) needs to become more civilized and legal. Too often the gun rights proponents turn this argument into a black and white issue; “they just want to take our guns away” is what they say. They then quote the 2nd amendment. This essentially removes them from becoming part of the solution. It removes them from the pain and suffering of others harmed by criminals with guns.

Thirteen years (1776) before the 2nd Amendment was written (1789) our Founding Fathers wrote that we as Americans are “… endowed by their Creator with certain Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness.” Gun violence in the United States is destroying lives, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. This is what motivates citizens to march in our streets to protest against violence involving guns. It is my opinion that our Founding Fathers would be proud of them.

Mark Berle

Gibbon

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