Just received an alert from JFPO regarding comments by Chuck Schumer, famous Second Amendment scholar. Read and Enjoy!!
Note the date on his comments. Nothing changes with age.
ALERT: Lest We Forget
A power-hungry government hate-monger shows contempt for the
Bill of Rights and the U.S. Marine Corps:
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
April 5, 1995
Statement of Rep. Charles B. Schumer
Ranking Member, House Subcommittee on Crime
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Today's hearing on the Second Amendment comes the day after
the National Rifle Association conference on the same topic.
Is that a coincidence?
I think not.
In fact, at least one of the professors we will hear from today
was billed as a "discussion leader" at that NRA conference.
Is that another coincidence?
Of course not.
Newt Gingrich and the Republican leadership are working hand
in hand with the NRA and the gun lobby to use this committee
to stage yet another pep rally for guns and gun nuts.
But the intellectual content of this hearing is so far off the
edge that we ought to declare this an official meeting of the
flat earth society.
Because the pro-gun arguments we will hear today are as flaky
as the arguments of the tiny few who still insist that the
earth is flat.
Like flat earth fanatics, Second Amendment fanatics just
don't get it.
Facts are facts. The earth is not flat.
And Constitutional law is Constitutional law.
The Second Amendment is not absolute.
It does not guarantee the mythical individual right to bear
arms we will hear argued for today.
The gun lobby and its friends in Congress can line up
professors of history and law from here to NRA headquarters
and back.
They can all swear what they think the Second Amendment means,
and how many angels can dance on a pinhead.
But the settled law is flatly against them. The courts have
uniformly, consistently, and unanimously ruled against them.
There is no room to argue with the leading Supreme Court
cases -- United States v. Miller (1939), United States v.
Cruikshank (1876), and Pressler v. Illinois (1886) -- and
tens of lower federal court and state court cases following
their precedent.
You don't have to take my word for it.
I'd like to take a moment here, Mr. Chairman, to play very
brief excerpt from a television interview of a distinguished
American on this subject.
[Excerpt played from video]
For anyone who may not have known, that was former Chief
Justice Warren Burger, not exactly a raving liberal and not
a gun banner. In case you could not understand the audio
part of this video, the Chief Justice said that the NRA and
its leaders "have trained themselves and their people to
lie ... and I can't use any word less than 'lie.'"
That's not me. That's a distinguished American jurist calling
these argument lies. He has also said:
"There is no Constitutional question here. The NRA has
convinced a lot of people that the right to bear arms is an
absolute right. It is not, any more than the right to have
an automobile is an absolute right."
So there it is. If anyone tried to sell the baloney we'll
hear today, they would be arrested for consumer fraud.
The NRA's Second Amendment is an empty cereal box in the
market place of ideas.
I note also, Mr. Chairman, that the fans of an absolute
reading of the Second Amendment do not extend the same
absolute reading to the other parts of the Bill of Rights.
They are among the first to carve the edges off the right
to free speech guaranteed in the First Amendment, to shave
the Fourth Amendment's protection against unreasonable
search and seizure, or to restrict the Sixth Amendment's
guarantees of due process.
For the NRA Flat Earth Society, the Constitution consists
of the Second Amendment and the Second Amendment only.
Now, one might say, so what? The NRA and its friends in
academia and the Congress are entitled to their opinions,
aren't they? What harm can come from peddling these phony
opinions?
The answer is that plenty of harm comes from it.
The first -- and most serious -- harm is the poisoning of
our political dialogue.
The NRA and its friends -- some of whom serve in this body --
have planted a poisonous weed of political paranoia in the
minds of hundreds of thousands of Americans.
This barrage of cynical, fund-raising NRA propaganda about
the Second Amendment has convinced many people that there is
a vast plot to seize their guns and "take away their rights."
The sickening fruit of this poisonous lie are obvious in our
society.
Right wing hate groups are arming themselves to answer a
purely imaginary plot with real gun violence.
And every day, members of this body receive in the mail the
most vicious, hate-filled mail imaginable, inspired by this
biggest of NRA lies.
This is dangerous sickness.
I charge the NRA and others who encourage this rasping
political hatred to take heed.
You are sowing seeds that will bear the bitterest of fruit.
The second harm is that decent Americans are bamboozled into
opposing even modest laws designed to keep guns away from
violent criminals, children, and the mentally dangerous.
They are stampeded even into opposing simple gun safety laws
that would protect gun owners from the kind of accidents that
every year cost the lives and limbs of hunters and recreational
shooters.
Just one look at what the American people do for recreation
makes this point clear.
According to a Roper poll published last week in the New York
Times, 40 percent of Americans relax by driving for pleasure.
Another 26 percent go fishing.
Only 8 percent go hunting. And only 8 percent engage in target
shooting.
What's wrong with this picture?
Well, the 40 percent who drive put up gladly with a little
inconvenience in exchange for our common safety. Their cars
are titled and registered. They get driver's licenses.
And the 26 percent who fish endure the minor inconvenience of
getting fishing licenses.
But the NRA and the gun lobby go nuts when society seeks to
impose even the slightest inconvenience by way of licensing
or registration on the minority who own and use guns.
This is madness.
A tiny minority of people fascinated with guns -- and something
they call the "gun ethic" -- is bullying a much bigger majority
on vital issues of health and safety.
Mr. Chairman, I'll listen to the flat earth arguments we'll
hear today with as much interest as I can. But I say to the
NRA and those who push the gun lobby's absolute view of the
Second Amendment:
Get over it. The earth is not flat.
And the Second Amendment is not absolute.
You are wrong.
Note the date on his comments. Nothing changes with age.
ALERT: Lest We Forget
A power-hungry government hate-monger shows contempt for the
Bill of Rights and the U.S. Marine Corps:
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
April 5, 1995
Statement of Rep. Charles B. Schumer
Ranking Member, House Subcommittee on Crime
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Today's hearing on the Second Amendment comes the day after
the National Rifle Association conference on the same topic.
Is that a coincidence?
I think not.
In fact, at least one of the professors we will hear from today
was billed as a "discussion leader" at that NRA conference.
Is that another coincidence?
Of course not.
Newt Gingrich and the Republican leadership are working hand
in hand with the NRA and the gun lobby to use this committee
to stage yet another pep rally for guns and gun nuts.
But the intellectual content of this hearing is so far off the
edge that we ought to declare this an official meeting of the
flat earth society.
Because the pro-gun arguments we will hear today are as flaky
as the arguments of the tiny few who still insist that the
earth is flat.
Like flat earth fanatics, Second Amendment fanatics just
don't get it.
Facts are facts. The earth is not flat.
And Constitutional law is Constitutional law.
The Second Amendment is not absolute.
It does not guarantee the mythical individual right to bear
arms we will hear argued for today.
The gun lobby and its friends in Congress can line up
professors of history and law from here to NRA headquarters
and back.
They can all swear what they think the Second Amendment means,
and how many angels can dance on a pinhead.
But the settled law is flatly against them. The courts have
uniformly, consistently, and unanimously ruled against them.
There is no room to argue with the leading Supreme Court
cases -- United States v. Miller (1939), United States v.
Cruikshank (1876), and Pressler v. Illinois (1886) -- and
tens of lower federal court and state court cases following
their precedent.
You don't have to take my word for it.
I'd like to take a moment here, Mr. Chairman, to play very
brief excerpt from a television interview of a distinguished
American on this subject.
[Excerpt played from video]
For anyone who may not have known, that was former Chief
Justice Warren Burger, not exactly a raving liberal and not
a gun banner. In case you could not understand the audio
part of this video, the Chief Justice said that the NRA and
its leaders "have trained themselves and their people to
lie ... and I can't use any word less than 'lie.'"
That's not me. That's a distinguished American jurist calling
these argument lies. He has also said:
"There is no Constitutional question here. The NRA has
convinced a lot of people that the right to bear arms is an
absolute right. It is not, any more than the right to have
an automobile is an absolute right."
So there it is. If anyone tried to sell the baloney we'll
hear today, they would be arrested for consumer fraud.
The NRA's Second Amendment is an empty cereal box in the
market place of ideas.
I note also, Mr. Chairman, that the fans of an absolute
reading of the Second Amendment do not extend the same
absolute reading to the other parts of the Bill of Rights.
They are among the first to carve the edges off the right
to free speech guaranteed in the First Amendment, to shave
the Fourth Amendment's protection against unreasonable
search and seizure, or to restrict the Sixth Amendment's
guarantees of due process.
For the NRA Flat Earth Society, the Constitution consists
of the Second Amendment and the Second Amendment only.
Now, one might say, so what? The NRA and its friends in
academia and the Congress are entitled to their opinions,
aren't they? What harm can come from peddling these phony
opinions?
The answer is that plenty of harm comes from it.
The first -- and most serious -- harm is the poisoning of
our political dialogue.
The NRA and its friends -- some of whom serve in this body --
have planted a poisonous weed of political paranoia in the
minds of hundreds of thousands of Americans.
This barrage of cynical, fund-raising NRA propaganda about
the Second Amendment has convinced many people that there is
a vast plot to seize their guns and "take away their rights."
The sickening fruit of this poisonous lie are obvious in our
society.
Right wing hate groups are arming themselves to answer a
purely imaginary plot with real gun violence.
And every day, members of this body receive in the mail the
most vicious, hate-filled mail imaginable, inspired by this
biggest of NRA lies.
This is dangerous sickness.
I charge the NRA and others who encourage this rasping
political hatred to take heed.
You are sowing seeds that will bear the bitterest of fruit.
The second harm is that decent Americans are bamboozled into
opposing even modest laws designed to keep guns away from
violent criminals, children, and the mentally dangerous.
They are stampeded even into opposing simple gun safety laws
that would protect gun owners from the kind of accidents that
every year cost the lives and limbs of hunters and recreational
shooters.
Just one look at what the American people do for recreation
makes this point clear.
According to a Roper poll published last week in the New York
Times, 40 percent of Americans relax by driving for pleasure.
Another 26 percent go fishing.
Only 8 percent go hunting. And only 8 percent engage in target
shooting.
What's wrong with this picture?
Well, the 40 percent who drive put up gladly with a little
inconvenience in exchange for our common safety. Their cars
are titled and registered. They get driver's licenses.
And the 26 percent who fish endure the minor inconvenience of
getting fishing licenses.
But the NRA and the gun lobby go nuts when society seeks to
impose even the slightest inconvenience by way of licensing
or registration on the minority who own and use guns.
This is madness.
A tiny minority of people fascinated with guns -- and something
they call the "gun ethic" -- is bullying a much bigger majority
on vital issues of health and safety.
Mr. Chairman, I'll listen to the flat earth arguments we'll
hear today with as much interest as I can. But I say to the
NRA and those who push the gun lobby's absolute view of the
Second Amendment:
Get over it. The earth is not flat.
And the Second Amendment is not absolute.
You are wrong.
.
