Americans are exceptional because they live by a constitution from the 1700s

Meanwhile, probably every other country has had theirs updated within the last 100 years.

So I ask, why? Why are you so afraid of updating your constitution?

 

We don't follow our Constitution anymore. That's part of our problem, actually.

 

We are exceptional because we create people like me.

#winners

But seriously we should probably update the Constitution.

 

If you did all gun owners would have to be part of a militia right? I am aware of the latest court ruling claiming the constitution meant anyone can have as many guns as they want but is that really what the founding fatherd meant when they said militia?

 

We pretty much just ignore it anyway, so what's the point?

 

Wouldn't all of these be considered updates?

Anyways, it is true that most countries in the world have amended their constitutions (or their equivalents) massively in the last 100 years, but that's because almost every country in the world has had a revolution, have collapsed, etc. in the last 100 years. The United States has not.

Now, I'd like to ask something. Why should the United States scrap a Constitution that has worked well for 225 years and make another just because almost every other country has had theirs (or their equivalent) drastically changed or abolished in the last 100 years?

 

The "militia" is just the people in their capacity as a native defense force.

 

The Constitution was amended as recently as 1992, so the OP is wrong.

 

Do natural human rights and freedom have an expiration date on them or something?

 

You have a point. After all, the current president considers himself a Constitutional scholar, and yet seems to think the US Constitution gives him the authority to both declare war and conduct war all on his own.

 

What they had in mind was making sure the Government was NEVER able to tyrannize the citizens.

Many (most) of the libs and Dems want an all powerful government because they can't imagine it being anything but benign.

Their lack of imagination or their failure to read and understand the lessons of history make them a danger to our liberty and our form of government and our way of life.

Obama wants an all powerful government because he is a power hungry despot on the ascension.

 

Actually yes it is what they meant, you need to find an article from someone who is a historian or a linguist expert. When the constitution was written the word "militia" literally meant all able bodied men. So men(women didn't fight back then) who were old enough but weren't too old. Pretty much teenage boys up until they were too crippled to be part of a fighting force. If you really care to know what they meant you could read any of the MANY WRITTEN WORKS where they express their opinions.

http://cap-n-ball.com/fathers.htm

Oh, and the ideas in the Constitution are still light years ahead of almost anything we have today. If you would ever get familiar with it you'd know it the greatest attempt at preserving HUMAN RIGHTS ever.

*waits for someone to bring up slavery as a rebuttal*

 

what court you gonna take that too?

 

Well, the natural right of self defense was upheld by the United States Supreme Court. So maybe that court then?

 

Basically not a standing military but every able bodied man who is not in jail is expected to maintain a weapon such that they can be called into service to defend the laws of the land and or the nation from invasion.



1828 webster
militia

MILI'TIA, n. [L. from miles, a soldier; Gr. war, to fight, combat, contention. The primary sense of fighting is to strive, struggle, drive, or to strike, to beat, Eng. moil, L. molior; Heb. to labor or toil.] The body of soldiers in a state enrolled for discipline, but not engaged in actual service except in emergencies; as distinguished from regular troops, whose sole occupation is war or military service. The militia of a country are the able bodied men organized into companies, regiments and brigades,with officers of all grades, and required by law to attend military exercises on certain days only, but at other times left to pursue their usual occupations.





bouviers 1856

MILITIA. The military force of the nation, consisting of citizens called forth to execute the laws of the Union, suppress insurrection and repel invasion.

2. The Constitution of the United States provides on this subject as follows: Art. 1, s. 8, 14. Congress shall have power to provide for calling forth the militia to execute the laws of the Union, suppress insurrections, and repel invasions.

3. - 15. to provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining the militia, and for governing such part of them as may be employed in the service of the United States, reserving to the states respectively, the appointment of the officers, and the authority of training the militia, according to the discipline prescribed by congress.

4. Under the clauses of the constitution, the following points have been decided.

1. If congress had chosen, they might by law, have considered a militia man, called into the service ot the United States, as being, from the time of such call, constructively in that service, though not actually so, although he should not appear at the place of rendezvous. But they have not so considered him, in the acts of congress, till after his appearance at the place of rendezvous: previous to that, a fine was to be paid for the delinquency in not obeying the call, which fine was deemed an equivalent for his services, and an atonement for disobedience.

5. - 2. The militia belong to the states respectively, and are subject, both in their civil and military capacities, to the jurisdiction and laws of the state, except so far as these laws are controlled by acts of congress, constitutionally made.

6. - 3. It is presumable the framers of the constitution contemplated a full exercise of all the powers of organizing, arming, and disciplining the militia; nevertheless, if congress had declined to exercise them, it was competent to the state governments respectively to do it. But congress has ex- ecuted these powers as fully as was thought right, and covered the whole ground of their legislation by different laws, notwithstanding important provisions may have been omitted, or those enacted might be beneficially altered or enlarged.

7. - 4. After this, the states cannot enact or enforce laws on the same subject. For although their laws may not be directly repugnant to those of congress, yet congress, having exercised their will upon the subject, the states cannot legislate upon it. If the law of the latter be the same, it is inoperative: if they differ, they must, in the nature of things, oppose each other, so far as they differ.

8. - 5. Thus if an act of congress imposes a fine, and a state law fine and imprisonment for the same offence, though the latter is not repugnant, inasmuch as it agrees with the act of the congress, so far as the latter goes, and add another punishment, yet the wills of the two legislating powers in relation to the subject are different, and cannot subsist harmoniously together.

9. - 6. The same legislating power may impose cumulative punishments; but not different legislating powers.

10. - 7. Therefore, where the state governments have, by the constitution, a concurrent power with the national government, the former cannot legislate on any subject on which congress has acted, although the two laws are not in terms contradictory and repugnant to each other.

11. - 8. Where congress prescribed the punishment to be inflicted on a militia man, detached and called forth, but refusing to march, and also provided that courts martial for the trial of such delinquent's, to be composed of militia officers only, should be held and conducted in the manner pointed out by the rules and articles of war, and a state had passed a law enacting the penalties on such delinquents which the act of congress prescribed, and directing lists of the delinquents to be furnished to the comptroller of the United States and marshal, that further proceeding might take place according to the act of congress, and providing for their trial by state courts martial, such state courts martial have jurisdiction. Congress might have vested exclusive jurisdiction in courts martial to be held according to their laws, but not having done so expressly, their jurisdiction is not exclusive.

12. - 9. Although congress have exercised the whole power of calling out the militia, yet they are not national militia, till employed in actual service; and they are not employed in actual service, till they arrive at the place of rendezvous. 5 Wheat. 1; Vide 1 Kent's Com. 262; 3 Story, Const. 1194 to 1210.

13. The acts of the national legislature which regulate the militia are the following, namely: Act of May 8, 1792, 1 Story, L. U. S. 252; Act of February 28, 1795, 1 Story, L. U. S. 390; Act of March 2, 1803, 2 Story, L. U. S. 888; Act of April 10, 1806, Story, L. U. S. 1005; Act of April 20, 1816, 3 Story, L. U. S. 1573; Act of May 12, 1820, 3 Story, L. U. S. 1786 Act of March 2, 1821, 3 Story; L. U. S. 1811.




and of course since the US has its origin out of england you can see the feudal roots taking place which has grown into our society today.

 

while self defense may have been held up and they may even have referred to it as a natural right they have no jurisdiction over "natural" rights, only rights granted by the polity. (which is pretty much everything now days despite lack of jurisdiction)

the pecking order goes like this.

Kings (states) as Sovereign;

Divine,
Contract,
Conquest.

Well in the US we have a piece of paper that is the king so that wipes out the Divine, Leaving Contract and conquest.

It is impossible for them to prove contract so the bulk of the us jurisdiction over "its" citizens is conquest.

 

Brings up slavery as a rebuttal. Most Constitutional scholars say that slavery was a necessary compromise to get approval from the Southern states but what they really mean is approval from Virginia and most of them also agree leaving it was a major mistake, which necessitated a later Civil War and still has a legacy as among the worst domestic problems we have. It probably COULD have been phased out over the next 20-50 years as it was a dying institution at the time and it was not at all uncommon for wealthier slaveowners (who held the vast majority of slaves) to free their slaves in their wills.

Which just goes to show that the Founding Fathers were HUMANS and thus capable of making mistakes and/or responding to the necessities of the times rather than writing a document where all parts were seen as being perfect forever. They themselves recognized this and were careful to put in a clear Amendment process, which has been used quite often.

And even after that they recognized the SCOTUS as a device which could "tweak" their document as the times might require. Very human men, and positively brilliant.

The Second Amendment reflects the real reason the Revolution was fought. (Taxes, contrary to popular myth, really had little to do with it). This was because the British Army, called in to fight the French and Indians in 1754 had stayed on and was becoming an occupying force. The Founding Fathers saw large standing armies as opposed to freedom (wise men indeed) and sought to defend us with the same sort of army that had won our freedom. That is, an Army of citizen soldiers. They were quite cognizant, however, of the fact that a militia Army alone had not won the Revolution. That was mainly due to the French and we would have surely lost without their aid so they did make provision for a standing army, meant to be a small cadre of highly trained professionals. They trusted mainly in the width of the Atlantic, then still a trip of several weeks, to protect us and give us time to arm and train a large force.

What they didn't foresee was the time when the Atlantic would become a journey of mere hours (or minutes for missiles) and necessitate our entrance into the world community. We have now, and need, a fairly large standing Army ourselves, there really is no way around it, though it does threaten our freedom as much as the British Army did in 1776. A citizen militia might protect against an initial attack but would melt away if faced with a determined conqueror, professional soldiers and, really all importantly, modern weaponry, including nuclear bombs.

That being recognized, the need to arm the citizenry evaporates and, in fact, becomes a positive danger to us and to our freedom. The Founding Fathers DID foresee that this might happen, otherwise WHY would they have put in the all-important first clause of the 2nd Amendment "A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state"

This is the part which all gun advocates blithely ignore, even though they realize the FF were mainly lawyers, all keenly aware of the mischief causable by unnecessary words, and could have made their meaning unambiguous simply by omitting these.

Those who would arm themselves to protect our freedom against our own government are preparing to fight the wrong enemy.Our only real protection against our own government is our own participation in it. If it ever comes to the point where we need to fight it violently ourselves, we will have already lost.

 

look what the creators of the constitution did to the indians?

thats is simply not the case in fact they created what amounts to a plutocratic oligarchy by its design.

You give up all your rights in either a democracy or a republic if you are a "citizen".

 

The so called founding "fathers" (gag me with a (*)(*)(*)(*)ing spoon) were british esquires who did nothing more than parrot rights etc that were already on the record and in practice in britain from the magna charta forward.

No great feat of majic or cunning here.

The word free means franchise state. They would free a slave by taking the iron off his ankle and forcing him to swear [all Liege] to the king putting a slave collar around his neck. Promotion to what amounts to house slave is a slave nonetheless.

and who the hell gave SCOTUS the final say so on the constitution?

What a deal government writes a constitution between themselves and the people and they get to be the final arbitor of its meaning. What a deal can I write one for you all next and be the final judge of the meaning of the words that were never textually defined?

The civil war was a land grab, you dont muscle in on the kings turf.

 

If you have a decent amount of self control you won't let yourself become distracted by compelling, emotional sub-plots in our nation's history when trying to understand American exceptionalism. Nor should you get bogged down by long, drawn out minutiae when trying to understand the intent of the 2A.

 

mob rule?

 

2a existed for close to a century prior to the us. if you want to confine this to a surface understanding of history then I will leave you to your druthers if you are not up for an in depth account that includes the dirt.

In fact people today are the ones who are getting bogged down in minutia, I can sum up the long short and in between of this country in a few paragraphs but none of you would understand it if you have not just happened along the same lines of research.

and incidentally what I said about a democracy and a republic is a matter of law, not some bs emotional whatever you wanted to paint it as.

 

We will update it as soon as it's a big enough necessity that 2/3 congress and 3/4 of states decide it is, as we have been doing the whole time. When change is needed we do it. Ending slavery, female voting rights etc.

Currently, we are attempting to persuade such a proponderance again, as more change is needed. Check out https://movetoamend.org/

This is important, as we need to explicitely prohibit corporate representation and bribery in politics.

If you want to see something really silly, look at the "unwritten" Constitutions like they have in UK.. So what is it exactly? Free license to do whatever it is you fancy, that's what. Of course, based on how our politicians currently treat our written Constitution, this is essentially the same thing really.

 

Um... try using the correct terms.

They said "ARMS" not guns, in other words you have the right to own an arsenal of nukes.