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Biden: 'The Second Amendment is not absolute'

President Joe Biden said Wednesday that the Second Amendment is not absolute as he called for new limitations on guns in the wake of this weeks massacre at a Texas elementary school. (May 25)

AP

The Second Amendment must be understood in the context of the time it was proposed. A single shot, muzzle-loading weapon that took more than 60 seconds to arm is quite different from a weapon of war designed not just to kill but to obliterate the victim.

A wide-open frontier with dangers from the British and other groups attacking, and the necessity for hunting to feed a family is quite different from our current reality. An environment in which a "standing militia" was needed to provide immediate defensive protection is quite different from today's reality of police departments, National Guard units and a large standing military.

Landmark gun ruling: Supreme Court strikes down New York gun law, making it easier for Americans to carry handguns

The first 10 Amendments, the so-called Bill of Rights, each had historical antecedents causing many to raise issues that would prevent the approval of the Constitution. Madison worked hard to formulate them and ultimately the document went into effect. There is nothing sacred about anything in the Constitution. Imperfect humans, trying to do the best they could, created a government on paper. No one has the absolute right to own any weapon they want. The good of "The People" supersedes any individual's desires to have what they please.

Jerry Ragan, Eugene

Two days after the massacre of 19 children and two teachers in Uvalde, Sen. Ted Cruz was asked by a British reporter as to why there are so many mass shootings in America. Cruz just walked away without answering.

The answer is obvious. America has the Second Amendment and no other Western country has an equivalent in its constitution. Meanwhile, America continues to have its all too frequent mass killings while the rest of the world rarely experiences such tragedies.

Bipartisan gun deal: Gun safety bill clears key procedural hurdle, setting up final vote in Senate

It is painfully clear that the Second Amendment provides an impenetrable buffer against any sensible gun control legislation. The NRA has basically unfettered license to sell any weapons to anybody reaping huge profits. Our politicians, mostly Republicans, hide behind the Second Amendment to justify their stance in blocking any sensible gun laws, and, at the same time, have their hand-out accepting sickening amounts of campaign money from the NRA.

The only way we will ever curb this utterly predictable carnage in our society is to repeal the Second Amendment or at least revise it to permit some weapons under certain conditions. Are we willing to do this? Sadly, the alternative is more of the same Only in America.

Geoff Colvin, Eugene

Gun safety law, what a farce. There is nothing different about guns, ammo, etc. The mental health component just reinforces the NRA stance that it is crazy people who kill people, not guns. This is not progress, but a slap in the face to the victims and their families.

Don French, Eugene

To, provide for the common defense is in the preamble of U.S. Constitution, listed as one of the six reasons why, in 1783, the Constitution was written.

Common defense is what the militia did in those days, and the need for a a well-regulated militia was why the Second Amendment was added in 1791.

The confusion comes in the last line, which says, to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed. To bear arms? In 1791, arms were borne by the militia. To keep arms? In 1791, arms were kept in the armory of the militia.

Arms manufacturers and sellers have become wealthy with the help of the Supreme Court mis-reading in 2008 of the 27 words of the Second Amendment. Its mis-reading it to mean that it was talking about individual rights, not the militia. That mis-reading has also been central in the gun related death of more than 30,000 people every year from suicide, accident and murder.

We must start thinking of gun ownership the way we think of smoking cigarettes in public places: considered reprehensible by almost everyone. Only then can enough like-minded politicians be elected and a solution to the gun problem be found.

Lionel Youst, Coos Bay

Based upon the criteria that you dont destroy what you love or lie to those you respect, Fox News has demonstrated its complete and utter contempt for the truth, our country and its own viewers by refusing to air the first Jan. 6 hearing. To think that anybody would consider it a viable source of information after that is mind boggling.

David Hixson, Springfield

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2nd Amendment gun laws draw strong letters from readers - The Register-Guard

WASHINGTON, D.C.Today, House Republican Whip Steve Scalise (R-La.) issued the following statement regarding his opposition to the gun control bill on the House Floor today:

On the day after the Supreme Court once again affirmed the right to self-defense provided by the Second Amendment, it is more important than ever that we protect that right from another assault in Congress by Washington Democrats who want to punish responsible gun owners and take away those rights.

I voted against the gun control bill on the House Floor because it undermines the Second Amendment and infringes on the right of law-abiding Americans to defend themselves at a time when crime is skyrocketing across the country.

We will not eliminate gun violence or prevent mass shootings by making it harder for law-abiding citizens to exercise their right of self-defense.

All of us can agree that we need to secure schools and help those who are a risk to themselves and others, but shredding the Constitution is not the solution.

Earlier this week, I helped pass the Restoring Hope for Mental Health and Well-Being Act, which will provide real help to those struggling with mental health and substance abuse issues, especially children. I remain committed to solving the root causes of violent crime and helping those who need it, but doing so must not violate the constitutional rights of law-abiding citizens.

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Scalise: We Must Protect the Second Amendment, Due Process, and the Rights of Law-Abiding Gun Owners - Congressman Steve Scalise

Virginia governor speaks on guns, crime

Republican Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin sounds off on progressive policies on crime, Second Amendment rights and protests at Supreme Court justices homes on One Nation.

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Gov. Glenn Youngkin, R-Va., said politics has "crept into" discussions of the Second Amendment and gun control Saturday on "One Nation."

GOV. GLENN YOUNGKIN: I'm a staunch defender of our Second Amendment, and I think what's happened is politics has crept into this issue. It doesn't mean that we shouldn't have a discussion about how we keep our kids safe in school, which is why we went to work right away.

SUPREME COURT GUN DECISION SHOOTS DOWN NY RULE THAT SET HIGH BAR FOR CONCEALED CARRY LICENSES

I brought our secretary of education, I brought our secretary of public safety, our secretary of health and human resources together literally the next morning. We immediately pushed harder to get in our budget funding for school resource officers so every school can have one. We signed a bill that said that every school is going to have a safety audit prepared with law enforcement in order to keep kids safe.

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Politics has 'crept into' debate on guns, Second Amendment rights: Virginia governor - Fox News

President Joe Biden may assure the American people that hisprogressive gun control effortswould not in any way impinge on the Second Amendment, but other far-left pundits are more honest about their agenda.

Bill Press, radio host and former co-host of CNNs Crossfire, recently made headlines with an op-ed published by the cable outlet calling for repeal of the Second Amendment. In it, Press declares that the right to keep and bear arms has nothing to do with self-defense, originally was meant to authorize state militias, and is anti-black in its origins.

Press may be more forthcoming about what he wants, but theres still not much that his analysis gets correct.

The right to keep and bear arms belongs to the people, not to the militia.

The phrase the people everywhere else in the Bill of Rights refers to individual citizens. The people may be called upon to employ their private arms in the collective defense of state or nation, and that collective defense should be well-regulated in the sense that the militia should be trained, organized, and efficient. But far from being well-regulated, the underlying individual right shall not be infringed.

Meanwhile, it is not the Second Amendment that was historically racist,but gun control lawsthat stripped certain segments of the population of any meaningful method of defending their rights. The fact that slaves were disarmed belies Press pointtheir oppressors knew all too well that armed slaves would defend their inalienable rights to life and liberty.

As the numbers prove, the Second Amendment continues to serve today as a bulwark of individual liberty, enabling Americans to protect themselves and others from criminals.

Almost every major study on the issue has found that Americans use their firearms in self-defense between500,000 and 3 milliontimes annually, according to the most recent report on the subject by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

For this reason, The Daily Signal each month publishes an article highlighting some of the previous months many news stories on defensive gun use that you may have missedor that might not have made it to the national spotlight in the first place. (Read other accountsherefrom 2019, 2020, 2021, and so far in 2022.)

The examples below represent only a small portion of the news stories on defensive gun use that we found in May. You may explore more by using The Heritage Foundations interactiveDefensive Gun Use Database. (The Daily Signal is the multimedia news organization of The Heritage Foundation.)

Bill Press is wrong in his CNN commentary. Repealing the Second Amendment wont make Americans safer. Far from it.

Without the right to keep and bear arms in self-defense, law-abiding Americans like those highlighted above would be more vulnerable than ever to criminals and would-be tyrants alike.

The history of disarming disfavored populations shows this all too well.

Armed people are harder to victimize.

This piece originally appeared in The Daily Signal

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12 Examples of Defensive Gun Use to Show CNN That Second Amendment All About Self-Defense - Heritage.org

The Heritage Foundation continues to influence state and federal decision-makers with impactful policy research, and the past two weeks were no exception with one Heritage expert testifying twice before Congress on Second Amendment issues.

Amy Swearer, a legal fellow in the Edwin Meese III Center for Legal and Judicial Studies, testified in front of the House Oversight Committee on June 8 to provide solutions to gun violence that do not infringe on the rights of law-abiding citizens.

Swearer also fielded outrageous statements from Rep. Katie Porter, D-Calif., including an accusation of perjury. In the exchange, Porter preferred to score political points and refused to let Swearer give any explanation. The exchange can be found here.

Swearers powerful opening testimony can be found here.

She noted:

I am fully aware that when youre burying your child, nuanced policy is irrelevant. It doesnt matter to a fourth grader hiding under a desk whether the real problem is a barrel shroud or the several dozen missed chances to intervene.

But it should matter to you.

Because you are the ones making policy decisions. Youre the ones implying that a lot of victims would be alive today but for a mass shooters pistol grip and a background check that he already passed. Youre the ones mocking anyone for talking about doors when a single locked door in Uvalde (Texas) would have saved 21 lives, and when all of us just walked into this building with its limited public access points, one-way locking security doors, and plethora of armed officers.

And she went on to explain why Heritage opposes many of the gun control policies being proposed by Congress and the president in response to recent mass shootings:

We oppose these policies precisely because the lives of these victims mattered, because the grief of their loved ones is real, and because we all want thriving communities where families are flourishing instead of burying their children.

The opposition has always been a genuine concern that those policies suffer from serious constitutional and practical defects. That they wont have the impact you promise people they will.

We have always proposed alternatives that would be more effective and less constitutionally suspect.

We have rarely been met with open ears.

Swearer testified again on June 15 in front of the Senate Judiciary Committee on juvenile gun violence.

You can watch her full opening statement here and read her testimony here.

She noted:

The vast majority of juvenile gun deaths are out-of-school suicides and homicides, neither of which receives nearly as much attention. And suggesting that problem is simply guns does everyone a disservice.

Our kids are suffering from a decades-long downward spiral of mental and emotional unwellness, and its leading them to take their own lives at increasing rates, especially since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic. Roughly 1,000 high school-aged teens killed themselves with a firearm last year. Roughly 1,000 more killed themselves without a firearm.

Our kids are also increasingly uninterested in going to school, with chronic absenteeism rates in major districts reaching as high as 40% this year. This, unsurprisingly, correlates with kids increasingly engaging in serious criminal behaviors that make it more likely theyll victimize others or become victims of gun violence themselves.

She explained further:

The root of the problem is not guns. Its the underlying causes that create violent environments in the first place.

Parents, and especially low-income and working parents, need more choices when it comes to accessing mental health care for their kids. They also need more choices when it comes to adequate learning environments.

Statistics show clearly that when parents can more easily remove their kids from schools where they are bullied, face violent threats, or are not receiving necessary resources, it alleviates the risk of suicide and the likelihood they will participate in criminal behaviors that are most associated with violent outcomes, like gun-related deaths and injuries.

Kids deserve educational environments where they feel safe and are more likely to develop into thriving adults, regardless of income or ZIP code.

Heritage continues to lead the way in policies that promote human flourishing, respect the Constitution, and hold the government accountable. The Heritage Foundation has provided real solutions for making our schools safer and dealing with gun violence while also continuing to stand boldly for and defending the constitutional rights of law-abiding Americans. We will continue to work with Congress and other policymakers to implement those solutions.

If you are not already following Amy Swearer on Twitter, you can do so here. And if you wish to receive more Heritage news and content, you can subscribe on the bottom of this page.

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Heritage Second Amendment Expert Testifies to Congress Two Times Within Two Weeks - Heritage.org