Joe Joe Doakes from Como Park emails about an appeals court ruling of interest to Second Amendment supporters:
This article focuses on the important point: the battleground for Second Amendment rights is in the court-created rules, not the Constitution.
If firearms ownership is a constitutionally protected fundamental right, then any law infringing that right must pass “strict scrutiny” meaning the law must be narrowly tailored and the least restrictive means to further a compelling government interest. This is the same level of scrutiny given to restrictions on speech and religion and very few laws can meet that test. Which is as it should be – the whole POINT of constitutionally protected rights is to prevent the government from infringing on them.
The lower court applied “intermediate scrutiny” which is a lower standard: laws can infringe on rights if the law furthers an important government interest in some way that is substantially related to the government’s interest. This is the level of review given to sex discrimination laws: it’s easier to pass because the right being protected is not as important in the constitutional hierarchy.
The Court of Appeals got it right. Firearms belong with speech and religion on the top of the hierarchy of rights the Founders wanted to protect.
Yes, I know, the Court of Appeals is still applying the idiotic “home defense” notion instead of recognizing the Founders intent that the citizenry be as well-equipped as the government in order to resist tyranny; but that’s a battle yet to come.
Joe Doakes
But only if we keep the Supreme Court in rough balance.
Which is one reason why I will plug my nose and vote for Donald Trump if he’s nominated.
“Gov. Scott Walker is set to sign a bill that would allow people to carry concealed switchblades and knives.”
http://fox6now.com/2016/02/05/gov-walker-to-sign-bill-legalizing-concealed-switchblades-on-saturday/
Not nearly as effective as a Glock 40. Never bring a knife to a gun fight.
A society armed with switchblades is a polite society.
Glad to see this, thanks for the link, Emery. Governor Walker’s proposal is in line with the Wisconsin Court of Appeals’ November decision in State v. Herrmann holding that knives are “arms” protected by the Second Amendment, a point made in the Washington Post column by Eugene Volokh citing a paper by David Kopel, Clayton Cramer and Joe Olson.
Logically, if a person is responsible enough to carry a pistol, she’s responsible enough to carry a knife, so the Governor’s proposal is not only legal, it’s sensible, too. Kudos to him, for proposing it, and to you, for supporting him.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/volokh-conspiracy/wp/2015/11/24/home-possession-of-switchblade-knives-protected-by-the-second-amendment/
Never bring a knife to a gun fight
Never let a meme stand in the way of facts that a knife will beat a gun in close combat any time. But then it is all about the narrative, never facts for eTASS.
Had an idiot HISD teacher’s rep on the morning show here in Houston. He was responding to news that another municipality in OK allowed teachers to carry in classrooms. How do we know he is an idiot? Well, his main argument against having teachers in Houston carry in classrooms was that they can barely keep track of their phones and wallets and cannot be trusted with having to worry about carrying a weapon. He was very concerned that there were too many thefts of teacher’s cell phones and wallets and that carrying in classroom would lead to stealth of weapons. Libturd twisting of logic at its best – they can even rationalize communism!
You never know when you might need a concealed switchblade to prevent someone from taking away your concealed gun.
Vote for Trump? I think I’d rather swim a scorpion across the river on my back.
It’s less about “switchblades” than lock-bladed utility knives, the laws about which are confusing pretty much whereever you go.
The tittering class is yukking it up about switchblades – but you’d be amazed how bizarre laws about jackknives, lockblades and utility knives can be.
That was a bit of an odd restriction anyway. A concealed knife is just a knife small enough to be concealed. It doesn’t noticeably improve the harmful productive of malicious people. For example, you could literally circumvent a concealed knife restriction with a pointed rock, a small icepick, a screwdriver, etc… That implies a haplessness to the law that differentiates it, in kind, from gun laws.
I’m with NW. Trump seems to be Hilliary with a somewhat better sense of fashion and a worse haircut.
And EI….oh my goodness. Yes, you can do serious damage with the weapons you suggest, but you have to hit a critical area to kill. Not so with a well sharpened fixed blade. I take it that you’ve never watched how quickly an experienced hunter can gut a deer? How a well sharpened k-bar can even cut through the sternum with a bit of effort?
There are reasons that the Marines got them, and not icepicks, EI.
My sole defense of Trump is that at least he isn’t a PROVEN national security risk, a PROVEN incompetent on foreign policy, a PROVEN single payer health care believer, and a PROVEN advocate for arms confiscation.
… And those are Hillary’s good qualities. The guys I know who had to deal with her in Washington when Bill was in power are even less keen on her.
The electorate is as angry as I have ever seen it. Both left and right are angry at the status quo and are lashing out. Trump gives his voters empty rhetoric of winning and reclaiming America, whatever that means, and Sanders gives his voters a hope, however unrealistic, of greater liberalism that will never pass a Republican controlled congress or are simply pie in the sky. Both seek upheaval of the status quo.
Emotion rules the day.
Though it is very early in the process, one of these folks may be elected President. To their supporters I say be careful what you wish for: you just may get what you want.
I’ve been shot and stabbed, both. If I ever had to face a wound from either again, and had a choice, I’d take a gunshot any day.
A knife in the hands of someone who knows how to use one is a very effective deterrent to attack.
That being said, there are few automatic knives of a quality I’d find satisfactory enough to carry.
Nerd for the win.
BTW. I got shot walking in on a liquor store heist. It happened so fast, I have to admit having a pistol of my own probably wouldn’t have prevented my wound….
But it would definitely have prevented the guy that shot me from walking out the door.