Amendment VXIII

(MLA)

Proposal Authored By Sammuel S. Tracy

Abstract

The 28th Amendment declares: It shall be the right of the state, not withstanding the provisions of the Second Amendment, to license, register, and regulate the sale and ownership of arms. I feel that this Amendment is necessary to give the government more control over the sale, use, and ownership of fire arms, and I believe this increase in regulation will be a positive change for several reasons. Primarily, a majority of Americans desire gun control laws that are stricter according to the most recent polls. Secondly, the Supreme Court may have incorrectly interpreted the Constitution in regards to The District of Columbia v. Heller case. Lastly, I think that the Supreme Court is in support of an illogical ruling. Each of these contentions is supported by evidence, and in my opinion, each is satisfactorily dealt with by the 28th Amendment.

3 Amendment XXVIII

Within the past two years the Supreme Court has been interpreting the Second Amendment of the Constitution in a manner that systematically removes federal, state, and local authority to provide gun control because the Court has ruled the right to bear arms is an individual right rather than a state right. The court ruling from The District of Columbia v. Heller on June 26, 2008 made the courts decision to reinterpret the Constitution clear by ruling, "The Second Amendment protects a personal right to keep and bear arms for lawful purposes, most notably for self-defense within the home."(District of Columbia v. Heller) The Supreme Courts ruling only specifically restricted Federal institutions. After the case of McDonald v. Chicago on June 28, 2010, that ruling has now been extended to include State and Local government institutions as well. The Washington Post published that It was the first time the court had said there was an individual right to gun ownership rather than one related to military service and so, with a very close five to four spilt in favor of extending the dominion of The District of Columbia v. Heller, Americans gained the legal right to keep and bear arms for lawful use without government infringement. I think the Supreme Court erred in its interpretation of the Constitution and is leading the nation down the wrong path. There is evidence in support of increased gun related crime in Chicago in the wake of the Courts ruling, and that it is the opinion of the majority of Americans that we should have stricter gun laws. Additionally, I believe the Court has misinterpreted the U.S. Constitution, and that five of the nine Judges supported an illogical ruling. As such, I believe that there should be a 28th Amendment. The 28th

4 Amendment states: It shall be the right of the state, not withstanding the provisions of the second amendment, to license, register, and regulate the sale and ownership of arms. The 28th Amendment gives the state government back the authority to determine what weapons are allowed to be sold and purchased within its borders, determine which citizens are allowed to hold licenses to sell or own firearms, and to pass and enforce policies and regulations such as Chicagos Hand-Gun Ban to serve and protect state citizens. With all of this accomplished, I believe that Americans will be able to look back to this time two years from now and say that they are pleased with the direction of the 28th Amendment and all that it managed to accomplish for the United States of America. According to the Federal Bureau of Investigations Annual Crime Report from 2009 (This is currently the latest year that data is available from but is apparently missing statistics from Florida) there were 13,636 murders, 9,146 of which were caused by firearms totaling 67%, and that is just the statistic for murder (Rogers). There is a substantial level of other gun crimes that could be committed including assault, breaking and entering, and armed robbery. If the state government passed legislation banning stores from selling firearms to people without a license given by the state, the state could greatly benefit from having a majority of unsuitable candidates barred from owning a firearm. This would work to ensure that guns are going from the hands of a certified and regulated business into the hands of responsible, right-minded individuals, not from shady pawn shops into the hands of shadier thugs. Online restrictions, something the founding fathers probably never would have conceived, could also be enforced by the state government. The option to have guns delivered to your mail box is insecure enough, but online forms do not check credentials like a person. In some cases they only require a

5 name, address, some basic information confirmed, some boxes checked, and then in two days you have yourself a gun. I was skeptical of this rumor myself, but I personally researched the possibility. I went online, went to my Google browser and typed in the search word AK-47. I received an immediate link to 13 different online stores selling these man-killers starting at just $330 dollars Factory New! The onsite advertisement claimed that with the option to buy online I could also have it delivered right to my mail box. All I had to do was click a box that asked if I had a class two license (Not even the license number, just a simple yes or no question) just click the box that says I have a class two weapons license. The best deal I found included a 24 round magazine and a coupon for ammunition. The whole process took me less than four minutes, and it is my opinion that anyone possessing a credit card, a penchant for dishonesty, and a basic working knowledge of computers could buy themselves an automatic rifle. With regulations and restrictions on the purchase and ownership of guns, it is easier to connect people to any crimes involving guns, and with those people dealt with by the justice system, gun-related crime should drop, saving American lives. All of these new technologies available to us, like the internet, global next-day delivery, and rocket propelled grenade launchers were all too far in the future for the founding fathers to foresee. The same men who wrote the founding documents for this great country would likely have you institutionalized if you told them could get an R.P.G. delivered to you by an airplane over night so it could be given to you the very next day, all from your Blackberry. The Constitution is worded in such a way that the founding fathers surely meant that we all have the right to bear arms, in defense of the freedom of our state, as a militia. I am certain they did not mean that everyone has a right to own a

6 weapon that can be used to take out armored cars filled with money. The exact wording of the second amendment of the Constitution 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. In 1791 a well regulated militia referred to the good boys and men of the appropriate age that had to sleep with rifles in their homes so they could be ready to be called upon to fight the British and to confront other threats. It was the duty of the militia to fight for their country as they were, Necessary to the security of a free State, and because the founding fathers did not want the congress to infringe upon the rights of the militia to continue serving their state (and country), they wrote it into the Constitution that the right of the people to keep and bear Arms shall not be infringed. To further debunk the Supreme Courts interpretation, its choice to interpret the people as everyone is illogical as most other documentation written by the founding fathers referring to the people seems to have been exclusive of certain ethnicities and minorities present in the country. In the Constitution alone there are the 13th, 15th, and 19th Amendments that abolished slavery, gave black men the right to vote, and finally gave women equal rights with men. If these Amendments were necessary, then it is clear that in the Preamble of the Constitution, We the People was an exclusive term. Justice J. Stevens declared in his dissent of McDonald v. Chicago that, The original meaning of the clause (the clause being the submission that the individual right to bear arms is inclusive of the 14th Amendment) is not as clear as they suggestand not nearly as clear as it would need to be to dislodge 137 years of precedent. . I seriously think that the Supreme Court should reconsider the intentions of the Second Amendment from a historical point of view, because there is such a long standing precedent.

7 Easy access to weapons threatens to extinguish American lives on a daily basis. This and other questions of misinterpretation, lead me to question the logic of the Supreme Court decision in The District of Columbia v. Heller case and its subsequent expansion. I can not easily determine why the Supreme Court would make such a monumental ruling so quickly without giving much consideration to the laws and statures already in place, or the policies of many states and local authorities. This point is directly addressed in the Washington Post which claimed, No cities have laws as restrictive as the handgun bans in the District and in Chicago and its suburb of Oak Park. Although the court's decision did not specifically strike down those laws so if they did not mean to fully change their interpretation of the amendment why were they not clear on setting guidelines for state and local authorities to follow? The current mayor of Chicago, Richard M. Daley, said [The Supreme Courts decision] will make the city's 28-year-old law (the Hand Gun Ban) unenforceable." I believe that the 28th amendment provides a logical solution to the problems that have been left in the wake of the Supreme Courts decision. The 28th Amendment declares that the State government has the authority to act, not withstanding the provisions of the Second Amendment, to license the sale of firearms so that they arent just sold anywhere. It allows the State to license the purchase of firearms so they wont be bought by people who should not have them, and to register all weapons and their users so that one is linked to the other and the owner is responsible for. This will at least help authorities resolve any wrong doing committed with firearms, and help to serve and protect the American people. Currently, the state government may not necessarily be able to disallow some types of weapons; they may not be able to register

8 guns for regulating gun traffic and gun crimes. As long as the weapon in question is in ones home, it is loudly protected by the Supreme Courts decision. In response to the Supreme Courts ruling on the June 28, 2010, I find the 28th Amendment to be a logical answer to the issues and problems raised by the wake of the court decision. With lowered gun-related deaths as a result of licensing owners, lower gun crime, higher convictions rates from registering weapons, fewer illegitimate dealers by regulating businesses, and other beneficial outcomes from tighter regulations and changes in licensure and legislature, the Supreme Court will find that they have been a part of steering America back on course, back towards a road forward with less gun violence, keener interpretations of the law and the Constitution, and logical choices made by the Judicial branch. If that is the case then in two years people will see the positive growth that has been achieved and take pride in their Justice System. In my opinion, which is based from evidence and the writings of the Washington Post and the United States Constitution itself, I firmly believe that the 28th Amendment will right the wrongs of the Supreme Court ruling and that a majority of American voters would agree, in essence, with my assessment of the amendments effectiveness therein.

Bibliography & Works Cited

Barnes, Robert, and Dan Eggen. "Supreme Court Affirms Fundamental Right to Bear Arms." The Washington Post: National, World & D.C. Area News and Headlines - The Washington Post. June-July 2010. Web. 23 Apr. 2011. <http://www.washingtonpost.com/wpdyn/content/article/2010/06/28/AR2010062802134.html>. Newport, Frank. "In U.S., Continuing Record-Low Support for Stricter Gun Control." Gallup.Com - Daily News, Polls, Public Opinion on Government, Politics, Economics, Management. 22 Nov. 2010. Web. 23 Apr. 2011. <http://www.gallup.com/poll/144887/Continuing-Record-Low-Support-Stricter-GunControl.aspx>. Rogers, Simon. "Gun Crime Statistics by US State." Latest News, Comment and Reviews from the Guardian | Guardian.co.uk. Guardian.co.uk, 10 Jan. 2011. Web. 23 Apr. 2011. <http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/datablog/2011/jan/10/gun-crime-us-state> The District of Columbia v. Heller. No. 07290. Supreme Ct. of the US. June 26, 2008 McDonald v. Chicago. No. 081521. Supreme Ct. of the US. June 28, 2010