Former Justice Stevens: Change 2nd Amendment to Improve
Constitution
by AWR Hawkins 22 Feb 2014
Former Supreme Court Justice John
Paul Stevens has released a new book focused, in part, on
"improving" the Constitution
through amending the Second Amendment--by making the rights protected therein
applicable only to a militia instead of the citizenry at large.
Stevens' book is titled Six
Amendments: How and Why We Should Change the Constitution.
As written, the text of the Second
Amendment is: "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."
According to Bloomberg
Businessweek, Stevens believes recent court decisions--notably District of
Columbia v Heller (2008) and McDonald v Chicago (2010)--placed too much
emphasis on individual rights, rather than on what he believes was the Founding
Fathers' primary goal: namely, to answer "the threat that a national
standing army posed to the sovereignty of the states."
His solution is to amend the text
of the Second Amendment so that it reads: "A well regulated Militia, being
necessary to the security of a free
State, the right of the people to keep and bear arms
when serving in the militia shall not be infringed."
In other words, the protection of
the right becomes collective and is only protected for those serving in the
militia.
Among the many problems with
Stevens' idea is the often overlooked fact that the Second Amendment did not
create a right when it was ratified in 1791. Rather, the Founding Fathers
created the Second Amendment to protect a portion of the "certain
unalienable Rights" with which man was "endowed by [his]
Creator."
The rights protected by the Second
Amendment are individual rights, as are the rights that are protected, but not
created, by the First, Third, Fourth, and Fifth Amendments, among others.
John Paul Stevens
John Paul Stevens
was a justice for the U.S. Supreme Court,
a judge for the U.S. Court of Appeals
for the 7th Circuit, David Barron,
Michael J. Gottleib, Kate Shaw, Richard B. Kapnick, Preeta
Bansal, Christopher J. Meade,
and Cliff Sloan were his clerks.
Note: David Barron was John Paul Stevens’s clerk, and the principal
deputy at the Office of Legal Counsel
for the Barack Obama administration.
Michael J.
Gottleib was John Paul Stevens’s
clerk, and is an associate counsel for the Barack
Obama administration.
Kate
Shaw was John Paul Stevens’s clerk,
is married to Christopher Hayes, and
an associate counsel to the president for the Barack Obama administration.
Christopher
Hayes is married to Kate Shaw, the
host of MSNBC, and was a fellow at
the New America Foundation.
Foundation
to Promote Open Society was a funder for the New America Foundation, the International Rescue Committee,
and the Aspen Institute (think tank).
George Soros
was the chairman for the Foundation to Promote Open Society.
Harold E. Ford Jr. is an overseer at
the International Rescue Committee, a political commentator at MSNBC, and a 2008 Bilderberg conference
participant (think tank).
Richard B.
Kapnick was John Paul Stevens’s
clerk, and is a senior counsel at Sidley
Austin LLP.
Barack
Obama was an intern at Sidley Austin
LLP.
Michelle
Obama was a lawyer at Sidley Austin
LLP.
R.
Eden Martin is counsel at Sidley
Austin LLP, and the president of the Commercial
Club of Chicago.
Newton
N. Minow is a senior counsel at Sidley
Austin LLP, and a member of the Commercial
Club of Chicago.
James S.
Crown is a trustee at the Aspen Institute (think tank), and a member
of the Commercial Club of Chicago.
Lester Crown
is a member of the Commercial Club of Chicago, and was a lifetime
trustee at the Aspen Institute (think tank).
Preeta
Bansal is a fellow at the Aspen Institute (think tank), and was John Paul Stevens’s clerk.
Christopher J.
Meade was John Paul Stevens’s clerk,
and partner at Wilmer Cutler Pickering
Hale and Dorr.
Cameron F. Kerry
was an associate at Wilmer Cutler
Pickering Hale and Dorr, John F.
Kerry’s brother, and is a fellow at the Brookings Institution (think tank).
John
F. Kerry is Cameron F. Kerry’s
brother, the secretary at the U.S.
Department of State for the Barack
Obama administration, and married to Teresa
Heinz Kerry.
Teresa Heinz
Kerry is married to John F. Kerry,
and an honorary trustee at the Brookings
Institution (think tank).
Lee
H. Hamilton is an honorary trustee at the Brookings Institution (think tank), and David F. Hamilton’s uncle.
David F. Hamilton
is Lee H. Hamilton’s nephew, a judge
for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the
7th Circuit, and was a canvasser for the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN).
John Paul Stevens
was a judge for the U.S. Court of
Appeals for the 7th Circuit.
Sidley Austin
LLP was the legal adviser for the Association
of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN).
Barack
Obama was an intern at Sidley Austin
LLP, and the attorney for ACORN vs.
Illinois State Board of Elections.
Association
of Community Organizations for Reform Now was the plaintiff for ACORN vs. Illinois State Board of Elections.
Michelle
Obama was a lawyer at Sidley Austin
LLP.
R.
Eden Martin is counsel at Sidley
Austin LLP, and the president of the Commercial
Club of Chicago.
Newton
N. Minow is a senior counsel at Sidley
Austin LLP, and a member of the Commercial
Club of Chicago.
Richard B.
Kapnick is a senior counsel at Sidley
Austin LLP, and was John Paul
Stevens’s clerk.
Cliff
Sloan was John Paul Stevens’s clerk,
and is a director at the American
Constitution Society.
Open
Society Foundations was a funder for the American Constitution Society.
George
Soros is the founder & chairman for the Open Society Foundations.
Faith Elizabeth
Gay was an attorney at Sidley Austin
LLP, and is a director at the American
Constitution Society.
Janet
Reno is a board of adviser’s member for the American Constitution Society, and was attorney general for the U.S. Department of Justice.
Eric H. Holder Jr.
was a board member for the American
Constitution Society, and is the attorney general at the U.S. Department of Justice for the Barack Obama administration.
No comments:
Post a Comment