The 2nd Amendment

Hook Activity What values do you have regarding the 2nd Amendment? Discuss with your shoulder partner your top three? Why did you choose those values? Some stats: 30,000 Americans die each year from guns, 50,000 wounded Over 270 million guns in America today 34% of households own a gun 50% of rural resident own a gun, 25% of urban residents

The 2nd Amendment 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. Does the 2nd Amendment allow Americans to own guns? Keep them in their homes? Does the 2nd Amendment allow Americans to carry concealed weapons? What about ghost guns? https://www.cbsnews.com/video/untraceable-ghost-guns-pose-challenge- for-law-enforcement/

Where does the 2nd Amendment Come From? In both England & colonial America men 16- 60 were required to be in the militia & required to own a gun. Virginia Declaration of Rights: XIII. That a well regulated militia, composed of the body of the people, trained to arms, is the proper, natural, and safe defence of a free state; that standing armies, in time of peace, should be avoided, as dangerous to liberty; and in all cases, the military should be under strict subordination to, and governed by, the civil power. The Continental Congress required every state to have “a well- regulated & disciplined militia, sufficiently armed & accoutered (equipped)”. Original Constitution contained no Bill of Rights, James Wilson reasoned that Congress could not take these away.

Where does the 2nd Amendment Come From? During the Constitutional Convention only 4 of 13 states protected the right to bear arms. Boston had a law against keeping loaded gun in the home. Some states banned “dangerous people” from owning guns. Rhode Island had a door to door gun registry. William Blackstone believed people had the natural right of resistance & self- preservation through arms. The Framers focused on the military need to keep and bear arms, not private citizens.

Challenges to the 2nd Amendment Presser v. Illinois (1866) Miller v. Texas (1894) National Firearms Act of 1934 U.S. v. Miller (1934) Gun Control Act of 1968 D.C. v. Heller (2008) McDonald v. Chicago (2010)

D.C. v. Heller- Majority Decision Justice Antonin Scalia delivered the opinion for the 5-4 majority. The Court held that the first clause of the Second Amendment that references a “militia” is a prefatory (intro) clause that does not limit the operative (effective) clause of the Amendment. Additionally, the term “militia” should not be confined to those serving in the military, because at the time the term referred to all able-bodied men who were capable of being called to such service. To read the Amendment as limiting the right to bear arms only to those in a governed military force would be to create exactly the type of state-sponsored force against which the Amendment was meant to protect people. Because the text of the Amendment should be read in the manner that gives greatest effect to the plain meaning it would have had at the time it was written, the operative clause should be read to “guarantee an individual right to possess and carry weapons in case of confrontation.”… Therefore, banning handguns, an entire class of arms that is commonly used for protection purposes, and prohibiting firearms from being kept functional in the home, the area traditionally in need of protection, violates the Second Amendment.

D.C. v. Heller- Dissent In his dissent, Justice John Paul Stevens wrote that the Second Amendment does not create an unlimited right to possess guns for self-defense purposes. Instead, the most natural reading of the Amendment is that it protects the right to keep and bear arms for certain military purposes but does not curtail the legislature’s power to regulate non-military use and ownership of weapons. Justice Stevens argued that the Amendment states its purpose specifically in relation to state militias and does not address the right to use firearms in self-defense, which is particularly striking in light of similar state provisions from the same time that do so. Justice Breyer also wrote a separate dissent in which he argued that the Second Amendment protects militia-related, not self-defense-related, interests, and it does not provide absolute protection from government intervention in these interests. 

What do you notice about “school shootings”?

How Are School Shootings Defined? Read the article silently Highlight or underline the different ways school shooting are defined Make note of who defines what a school shooting is? Why does it matter how we define school shootings? How should school shootings be defined?

Sec. of Education Betsy Devos on Gun Violence in Schools

So Why Does Nothing Ever Change? Write down examples you hear why gun control has have little traction in the U.S.

Do a Google search on Uganda gun control? What do you notice during your search? Why might this impact the gun control debate?