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<DIV><FONT face=Calibri>Thank you. I just wanted to hear something exponentially
more unworkable than the NRA plan.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Calibri></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Calibri>A few questions for you if I may:</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Calibri></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Calibri>1. Were you planning on compensating the owners of all
of the legally purchased firearms, magazines and associated accessories? Where
will that money come from?</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Calibri></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Calibri>2. What are your plans for all the companies that you
plan on putting out of business? I can think of two dozen manufactures just off
the top of my head, I'm sure there are more.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Calibri>Lets not forget sporting goods stores and ammunition
makers. I assume that you will be compensating these owners/stockholders for
their loss.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Calibri></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Calibri>3. What will you criminalize, do away with, make illegal
when the next tragedy occurs with a shotgun (like yours) or a 10 round or less
handgun? </FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Calibri></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Calibri>4. What do you propose be done with all
the newly created felons who refuse to obey such a blatantly unconstitutional
edict?</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Calibri></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Calibri>5. Are you struck by the irony that every time
someone like you seriously proposes measures such as these gun sales and
NRA memberships climb precipitously?</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Calibri></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Calibri>I anxiously await your answers to these questions
and please k</FONT><FONT face=Calibri>eep up the good work.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Calibri></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Calibri>g</FONT></DIV>
<DIV style="FONT: 10pt Tahoma">
<DIV><FONT size=3 face=Calibri></FONT><BR></DIV>
<DIV style="BACKGROUND: #f5f5f5">
<DIV style="font-color: black"><B>From:</B> <A title=thansen@moscow.com
href="mailto:thansen@moscow.com">Tom Hansen</A> </DIV>
<DIV><B>Sent:</B> Saturday, December 22, 2012 6:11 PM</DIV>
<DIV><B>To:</B> <A
title="mailto:jampot@roadrunner.com
CTRL + Click to follow link"
href="mailto:jampot@roadrunner.com">Gary Crabtree</A> </DIV>
<DIV><B>Cc:</B> <A title=scooterd408@hotmail.com
href="mailto:scooterd408@hotmail.com">Scott Dredge</A> ; <A
title="mailto:bear@moscow.com>
CTRL + Click to follow link"
href="mailto:bear@moscow.com>"><bear@moscow.com></A> ; <A
title="mailto:vision2020@moscow.com
CTRL + Click to follow link"
href="mailto:vision2020@moscow.com">viz</A> </DIV>
<DIV><B>Subject:</B> Re: [Vision2020] And just something to think
about......</DIV></DIV></DIV>
<DIV><BR></DIV>
<DIV>For the umpteenth-plus time . . .</DIV>
<DIV><BR></DIV>
<DIV>CRIMINALIZE THE SALE AND/OR POSSESSION OF . . . DO AWAY WITH . . . MAKE
ILLEGAL . . . COLLECT AND DESTROY ALL . . . SEMI-AUTOMATIC ASSAULT RIFLES AND
HIGH-CAPACITY AMMUNITION MAGAZINES (more than ten rounds).</DIV>
<DIV><BR></DIV>
<DIV>Understand? Comprende? Verstehen sie?<BR><BR>
<DIV>Seeya round town, Moscow, because . . .</DIV>
<DIV><BR></DIV>
<DIV>"Moscow Cares"</DIV>
<DIV><A href="http://www.MoscowCares.com">http://www.MoscowCares.com</A></DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>
<DIV>Tom Hansen</DIV>
<DIV>Moscow, Idaho</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV></DIV></DIV>
<DIV><BR>On Dec 22, 2012, at 5:58 PM, "Gary Crabtree" <<A
href="mailto:jampot@roadrunner.com">jampot@roadrunner.com</A>>
wrote:<BR><BR></DIV>
<BLOCKQUOTE type="cite">
<DIV>
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<DIV><FONT size=3 face=Calibri>Since I have to suppose that I am numbered
amongst the "ilk," before I walk away I would just love to hear the imagined
remedy for the "concerns." Please tell me in no uncertain terms just exactly
what measures you imagine would solve the problem of "<SPAN>semi-automatic
weapons and/or high-capacity ammunition magazines."</SPAN></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=3 face=Calibri><SPAN></SPAN></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=3 face=Calibri><SPAN>g</SPAN></FONT></DIV>
<DIV style="FONT: 10pt Tahoma">
<DIV><BR></DIV>
<DIV style="BACKGROUND: #f5f5f5">
<DIV style="font-color: black"><B>From:</B> <A
title="mailto:scooterd408@hotmail.com
CTRL + Click to follow link"
href="mailto:scooterd408@hotmail.com">Scott Dredge</A> </DIV>
<DIV><B>Sent:</B> Saturday, December 22, 2012 5:24 PM</DIV>
<DIV><B>To:</B> <A
title="mailto:thansen@moscow.com
CTRL + Click to follow link"
href="mailto:thansen@moscow.com">thansen@moscow.com</A> ; <A
title="mailto:bear@moscow.com
CTRL + Click to follow link"
href="mailto:bear@moscow.com">bear@moscow.com</A> </DIV>
<DIV><B>Cc:</B> <A title=vision2020@moscow.com
href="mailto:vision2020@moscow.com">viz</A> </DIV>
<DIV><B>Subject:</B> Re: [Vision2020] And just something to think
about......</DIV></DIV></DIV>
<DIV><BR></DIV>
<DIV dir=ltr>Tom,<BR><BR>I'm guessing at some point, Wayne and others you
clump in with his ilk will simply just walk away and leave you hanging with
your 'concerns with <SPAN>semi-automatic weapons and/or high-capacity
ammunition magazines'. You can all agree (or not agree) to disagree with
each other which is tantamount to status quo. Area Man already summed it
up in one word: 'Impasse'.<BR><BR>-Scott<BR></SPAN><BR>
<DIV>
<DIV id=SkyDrivePlaceholder></DIV>
<HR id=stopSpelling>
From: <A href="mailto:thansen@moscow.com">thansen@moscow.com</A><BR>Date: Sat,
22 Dec 2012 16:58:32 -0800<BR>To: <A
href="mailto:bear@moscow.com">bear@moscow.com</A><BR>CC: <A
href="mailto:vision2020@moscow.com">vision2020@moscow.com</A><BR>Subject: Re:
[Vision2020] And just something to think about......<BR><BR>
<DIV>Mr. Price - </DIV>
<DIV><BR></DIV>
<DIV>Fascinating article, but . . .</DIV>
<DIV><BR></DIV>
<DIV>What has it got to do with semi-automatic weapons and/or high-capacity
ammunition magazines?</DIV>
<DIV><BR></DIV>
<DIV>I have absolutely no argument against hunting rifles and/or shotguns.
Heck! I own a 12-gauge shotgun (great home security) and a
single-shot .410/.22 over-under, for which I am still trying to locate a
retainer spring for the hand guard, that my grandfather used to hunt with 100+
years ago.</DIV>
<DIV><BR></DIV>
<DIV>This article simply doesn't address my concerns
with <SPAN>semi-automatic weapons and/or high-capacity ammunition
magazines.</SPAN></DIV>
<DIV><BR></DIV>
<DIV>Good read, though.</DIV>
<DIV><BR>
<DIV>Seeya round town, Moscow, because . . .</DIV>
<DIV><BR></DIV>
<DIV>"Moscow Cares"</DIV>
<DIV><A href="http://www.MoscowCares.com"
target=_blank>http://www.MoscowCares.com</A></DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>
<DIV>Tom Hansen</DIV>
<DIV>Moscow, Idaho</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV></DIV></DIV>
<DIV><BR>On Dec 22, 2012, at 4:38 PM, Wayne Price <<A
href="mailto:bear@moscow.com">bear@moscow.com</A>> wrote:<BR><BR></DIV>
<BLOCKQUOTE>
<DIV>This was sent to me by someone that I hold in high regards and often
disagree with, but listen to and respect their opinions.
<DIV><BR></DIV>
<DIV><SPAN style="FONT-FAMILY: Verdana, Geneva, Tahoma, sans-serif"
class=ecxApple-style-span>
<P style="COLOR: rgb(0,51,51); FONT-SIZE: small" align=center><A
style="COLOR: rgb(0,102,153)" href="http://davekopel.org/"
target=_blank><iilogo.jpg></A></P>
<H1
style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; FONT-FAMILY: Verdana, Geneva, Tahoma, sans-serif; COLOR: rgb(0,51,51); FONT-SIZE: xx-large; FONT-WEIGHT: bold">The
American Revolution against British Gun Control</H1>By David B. Kopel<A
title=""
href="http://www.davekopel.org/2A/LawRev/american-revolution-against-british-gun-control.html#_ftn1"
name=_ftnref1 target=_blank><SPAN
class=ecxMsoFootnoteReference>*</SPAN></A><BR><EM>Administrative and
Regulatory Law News </EM>(American Bar Association). Vol. 37, no. 4,
Summer 2012. More by Kopel on the <A
href="http://www.davekopel.org/RKBA-Law-History.htm#Founding_Era"
target=_blank>right to arms in the Founding Era</A>.<BR>This Article reviews
the British gun control program that precipitated the American Revolution:
the 1774 import ban on firearms and gunpowder; the 1774-75 confiscations of
firearms and gunpowder; and the use of violence to effectuate the
confiscations. It was these events that changed a situation of political
tension into a shooting war. Each of these British abuses provides insights
into the scope of the modern Second Amendment.<BR>Furious at the December
1773 Boston Tea Party, Parliament in 1774 passed the Coercive Acts. The
particular provisions of the Coercive Acts were offensive to Americans, but
it was the possibility that the British might deploy the army to enforce
them that primed many colonists for armed resistance. The Patriots of
Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, resolved: “That in the event of Great
Britain attempting to force unjust laws upon us by the strength of arms, our
cause we leave to heaven and our rifles.” A South Carolina newspaper essay,
reprinted in Virginia, urged that any law that had to be enforced by the
military was necessarily illegitimate.<BR>The Royal Governor of
Massachusetts, General Thomas Gage, had forbidden town meetings from taking
place more than once a year. When he dispatched the Redcoats to break up an
illegal town meeting in Salem, 3000 armed Americans appeared in response,
and the British retreated. Gage’s aide John Andrews explained that everyone
in the area aged 16 years or older owned a gun and plenty of
gunpowder.<BR>Military rule would be difficult to impose on an armed
populace. Gage had only 2,000 troops in Boston. There were thousands of
armed men in Boston alone, and more in the surrounding area. One response to
the problem was to deprive the Americans of gunpowder.<BR>Modern “smokeless”
gunpowder is stable under most conditions. The “black powder” of the 18th
Century was far more volatile. Accordingly, large quantities of black powder
were often stored in a town’s “powder house,” typically a reinforced brick
building. The powder house would hold merchants’ reserves, large quantities
stored by individuals, as well as powder for use by the local militia.
Although colonial laws generally required militiamen (and sometimes all
householders, too) to have their own firearm and a minimum quantity of
powder, not everyone could afford it. Consequently, the government sometimes
supplied “public arms” and powder to individual militiamen. Policies varied
on whether militiamen who had been given public arms would keep them at
home. Public arms would often be stored in a special armory, which might
also be the powder house.<BR>Before dawn on September 1, 1774, 260 of Gage’s
Redcoats sailed up the Mystic River and seized hundreds of barrels of powder
from the Charlestown powder house.<BR>The “Powder Alarm,” as it became
known, was a serious provocation. By the end of the day, 20,000 militiamen
had mobilized and started marching towards Boston. In Connecticut and
Western Massachusetts, rumors quickly spread that the Powder Alarm had
actually involved fighting in the streets of Boston. More accurate reports
reached the militia companies before that militia reached Boston, and so the
war did not begin in September. The message, though, was unmistakable: If
the British used violence to seize arms or powder, the Americans would treat
that violent seizure as an act of war, and would fight. And that is exactly
what happened several months later, on April 19, 1775.<BR>Five days after
the Powder Alarm, on September 6, the militia of the towns of Worcester
County assembled on the Worcester Common. Backed by the formidable array,
the Worcester Convention took over the reins of government, and ordered the
resignations of all militia officers, who had received their commissions
from the Royal Governor. The officers promptly resigned and then received
new commissions from the Worcester Convention.<BR>That same day, the people
of Suffolk County (which includes Boston) assembled and adopted the Suffolk
Resolves. The 19-point Resolves complained about the Powder Alarm, and then
took control of the local militia away from the Royal Governor (by replacing
the Governor’s appointed officers with officers elected by the militia) and
resolved to engage in group practice with arms at least weekly.<BR>The First
Continental Congress, which had just assembled in Philadelphia, unanimously
endorsed the Suffolk Resolves and urged all the other colonies to send
supplies to help the Bostonians.<BR>Governor Gage directed the Redcoats to
begin general, warrantless searches for arms and ammunition. According to
the <EM>Boston Gazette</EM>, of all General Gage’s offenses, “what most
irritated the People” was “seizing their Arms and Ammunition.”<BR>When the
Massachusetts Assembly convened, General Gage declared it illegal, so the
representatives reassembled as the “Provincial Congress.” On October 26,
1774, the Massachusetts Provincial Congress adopted a resolution condemning
military rule, and criticizing Gage for “unlawfully seizing and retaining
large quantities of ammunition in the arsenal at Boston.” The Provincial
Congress urged all militia companies to organize and elect their own
officers. At least a quarter of the militia (the famous Minute Men) were
directed to “equip and hold themselves in readiness to march at the shortest
notice.” The Provincial Congress further declared that everyone who did not
already have a gun should get one, and start practicing with it
diligently.<BR>In flagrant defiance of royal authority, the Provincial
Congress appointed a Committee of Safety and vested it with the power to
call forth the militia. The militia of Massachusetts was now the instrument
of what was becoming an independent government of Massachusetts.<BR>Lord
Dartmouth, the Royal Secretary of State for America, sent Gage a letter on
October 17, 1774, urging him to disarm New England. Gage replied that he
would like to do so, but it was impossible without the use of force. After
Gage’s letter was made public by a reading in the British House of Commons,
it was publicized in America as proof of Britain’s malign intentions.<BR>Two
days after Lord Dartmouth dispatched his disarmament recommendation, King
George III and his ministers blocked importation of arms and ammunition to
America. Read literally, the order merely required a permit to export arms
or ammunition from Great Britain to America. In practice, no permits were
granted.<BR>Meanwhile, Benjamin Franklin was masterminding the surreptitious
import of arms and ammunition from the Netherlands, France, and
Spain.<BR>The patriotic Boston Committee of Correspondence learned of the
arms embargo and promptly dispatched Paul Revere to New Hampshire, with the
warning that two British ships were headed to Fort William and Mary, near
Portsmouth, New Hampshire, to seize firearms, cannons, and gunpowder. On
December 14, 1774, 400 New Hampshire patriots preemptively captured all the
material at the fort. A New Hampshire newspaper argued that the capture was
prudent and proper, reminding readers that the ancient Carthaginians had
consented to “deliver up all their Arms to the Romans” and were decimated by
the Romans soon after.<BR>In Parliament, a moderate minority favored
conciliation with America. Among the moderates was the Duke of Manchester,
who warned that America now had three million people, and most of them were
trained to use arms. He was certain they could produce a stronger army than
Great Britain.<BR>The Massachusetts Provincial Congress offered to purchase
as many arms and bayonets as could be delivered to the next session of the
Congress. Massachusetts also urged American gunsmiths “diligently to apply
themselves” to making guns for everyone who did not already have a gun. A
few weeks earlier, the Congress had resolved: “That it be strongly
recommended, to all the inhabitants of this colony, to be diligently
attentive to learning the use of arms . . . .”<BR>Derived from political and
legal philosophers such as John Locke, Hugo Grotius, and Edward Coke, the
ideology underlying all forms of American resistance was explicitly premised
on the right of self-defense of all inalienable rights; from the
self-defense foundation was constructed a political theory in which the
people were the masters and government the servant, so that the people have
the right to remove a disobedient servant.<BR>The British government was
not, in a purely formal sense, attempting to abolish the Americans’ common
law right of self-defense. Yet in practice, that was precisely what the
British were attempting. First, by disarming the Americans, the British were
attempting to make the practical exercise of the right of personal
self-defense much more difficult. Second, and more fundamentally, the
Americans made no distinction between self-defense against a lone criminal
or against a criminal government. To the Americans, and to their British
Whig ancestors, the right of self-defense necessarily implied the right of
armed self-defense against tyranny.<BR>The troubles in New England inflamed
the other colonies. Patrick Henry’s great speech to the Virginia legislature
on March 23, 1775, argued that the British plainly meant to subjugate
America by force. Because every attempt by the Americans at peaceful
reconciliation had been rebuffed, the only remaining alternatives for the
Americans were to accept slavery or to take up arms. If the Americans did
not act soon, the British would soon disarm them, and all hope would be
lost. “The millions of people, armed in the holy cause of liberty, and in
such a country as that which we possess, are invincible by any force which
our enemy can send against us,” he promised.<BR>The Convention formed a
committee—including Patrick Henry, Richard Henry Lee, George Washington, and
Thomas Jefferson—“to prepare a plan for the embodying, arming, and
disciplining such a number of men as may be sufficient” to defend the
commonwealth. The Convention urged “that every Man be provided with a good
Rifle” and “that every Horseman be provided . . . with Pistols and Holsters,
a Carbine, or other Firelock.” When the Virginia militiamen assembled a few
weeks later, many wore canvas hunting shirts adorned with the motto “Liberty
or Death.”<BR>In South Carolina, patriots established a government, headed
by the “General Committee.” The Committee described the British arms embargo
as a plot to disarm the Americans in order to enslave them. Thus, the
Committee recommended that “all persons” should “immediately” provide
themselves with a large quantity of ammunition.<BR>Without formal legal
authorization, Americans began to form independent militia, outside the
traditional chain of command of the royal governors. In Virginia, George
Washington and George Mason organized the Fairfax Independent Militia
Company. The Fairfax militiamen pledged that “we will, each of us,
constantly keep by us” a firelock, six pounds of gunpowder, and twenty
pounds of lead. Other independent militia embodied in Virginia along the
same model. Independent militia also formed in Connecticut, Rhode Island,
New Hampshire, Maryland, and South Carolina, choosing their own
officers.<BR>John Adams praised the newly constituted Massachusetts militia,
“commanded through the province, not by men who procured their commissions
from a governor as a reward for making themselves pimps to his
tools.”<BR>The American War of Independence began on April 19, 1775, when
700 Redcoats under the command of Major John Pitcairn left Boston to seize
American arms at Lexington and Concord.<BR>The militia that assembled at the
Lexington Green and the Concord Bridge consisted of able-bodied men aged 16
to 60. They supplied their own firearms, although a few poor men had to
borrow a gun. Warned by Paul Revere and Samuel Dawes of the British advance,
the young women of Lexington assembled cartridges late into the evening of
April 18.<BR>At dawn, the British confronted about 200 militiamen at
Lexington. “Disperse you Rebels—Damn you, throw down your Arms and
disperse!” ordered Major Pitcairn. The Americans were quickly
routed.<BR>With a “huzzah” of victory, the Redcoats marched on to Concord,
where one of Gage’s spies had told him that the largest Patriot reserve of
gunpowder was stored. At Concord’s North Bridge, the town militia met with
some of the British force, and after a battle of two or three minutes, drove
off the British.<BR>Notwithstanding the setback at the bridge, the Redcoats
had sufficient force to search the town for arms and ammunition. But the
main powder stores at Concord had been hauled to safety before the Redcoats
arrived.<BR>When the British began to withdraw back to Boston, things got
much worse for them. Armed Americans were swarming in from nearby towns.
They would soon outnumber the British 2:1. Although some of the Americans
cohered in militia units, a great many fought on their own, taking sniper
positions wherever opportunity presented itself. Only British reinforcements
dispatched from Boston saved the British expedition from annihilation—and
the fact that the Americans started running out of ammunition and gun
powder.<BR>One British officer reported: “These fellows were generally good
marksmen, and many of them used long guns made for Duck-Shooting.” On a
per-shot basis, the Americans inflicted higher casualties than had the
British regulars.<BR>That night, the American militiamen began laying siege
to Boston, where General Gage’s standing army was located. At dawn, Boston
had been the base from which the King’s army could project force into New
England. Now, it was trapped in the city, surrounded by people in
arms.<BR>Two days later in Virginia, royal authorities confiscated 20
barrels of gunpowder from the public magazine in Williamsburg and destroyed
the public firearms there by removing their firing mechanisms. In response
to complaints, manifested most visibly by the mustering of a large
independent militia led by Patrick Henry, Governor Dunmore delivered a legal
note promising to pay restitution.<BR>At Lexington and Concord, forcible
disarmament had not worked out for the British. So back in Boston, Gage set
out to disarm the Bostonians a different way.<BR>On April 23, 1775, Gage
offered the Bostonians the opportunity to leave town if they surrendered
their arms. The Boston Selectmen voted to accept the offer, and within days,
2,674 guns were deposited, one gun for every two adult male
Bostonians.<BR>Gage thought that many Bostonians still had guns, and he
refused to allow the Bostonians to leave. Indeed, a large proportion of the
surrendered guns were “training arms”—large muskets with bayonets, that
would be difficult to hide. After several months, food shortages in Boston
convinced Gage to allow easier emigration from the city.<BR>Gage’s
disarmament program incited other Americans to take up arms. Benjamin
Franklin, returning to Philadelphia after an unsuccessful diplomatic trip to
London, “was highly pleased to find the Americans arming and preparing for
the worst events.”<BR>The government in London dispatched more troops and
three more generals to America: William Howe, Henry Clinton, and John
Burgoyne. The generals arrived on May 25, 1775, with orders from Lord
Dartmouth to seize all arms in public armories, or which had been “secretly
collected together for the purpose of aiding Rebellions.”<BR>The war
underway, the Americans captured Fort Ticonderoga in upstate New York. At
the June 17 Battle of Bunker Hill, the militia held its ground against the
British regulars and inflicted heavy casualties, until they ran out of
gunpowder and were finally driven back. (Had Gage not confiscated the
gunpowder from the Charleston Powder House the previous September, the
Battle of Bunker Hill probably would have resulted in an outright defeat of
the British.)<BR>On June 19, Gage renewed his demand that the Bostonians
surrender their arms, and he declared that anyone found in possession of
arms would be deemed guilty of treason.<BR>Meanwhile, the Continental
Congress had voted to send ten companies of riflemen from Pennsylvania,
Maryland, and Virginia to aid the Massachusetts militia.<BR>On July 6, 1775,
the Continental Congress adopted the Declaration of Causes and Necessity of
Taking Up Arms, written by Thomas Jefferson and the great Pennsylvania
lawyer John Dickinson. Among the grievances were General Gage’s efforts to
disarm the people of Lexington, Concord, and Boston.<BR>Two days later, the
Continental Congress sent an open letter to the people of Great Britain
warning that “men trained to arms from their Infancy, and animated by the
Love of Liberty, will afford neither a cheap or easy conquest.”<BR>The Swiss
immigrant John Zubly, who was serving as a Georgia delegate to the
Continental Congress, wrote a pamphlet entitled <EM>Great Britain’s
Right to Tax . . . By a Swiss</EM>, which was published in London and
Philadelphia. He warned that “in a strong sense of liberty, and the use of
fire-arms almost from the cradle, the Americans have vastly the advantage
over men of their rank almost every where else.” Indeed, children were
“shouldering the resemblance of a gun before they are well able to walk.”
“The Americans will fight like men, who have everything at stake,” and their
motto was “DEATH OR FREEDOM.” The town of Gorham, Massachusetts (now part of
the State of Maine), sent the British government a warning that even “many
of our Women have been used to handle the Cartridge and load the
Musquet.”<BR>It was feared that the Massachusetts gun confiscation was the
prototype for the rest of America. For example, a newspaper article
published in three colonies reported that when the new British generals
arrived, they would order everyone in America “to deliver up their arms by a
certain stipulated day.”<BR>The events of April 19 convinced many more
Americans to arm themselves and to embody independent militia. A report from
New York City observed that “the inhabitants there are arming themselves . .
. forming companies, and taking every method to defend our rights. The like
spirit prevails in the province of New Jersey, where a large and well
disciplined militia are now fit for action.”<BR>In Virginia, Lord Dunmore
observed: “Every County is now Arming a Company of men whom they call an
independent Company for the avowed purpose of protecting their Committee,
and to be employed against Government if occasion require.” North Carolina’s
Royal Governor Josiah Martin issued a proclamation outlawing independent
militia, but it had little effect.<BR>A Virginia gentleman wrote a letter to
a Scottish friend explaining in America:<BR>We are all in arms, exercising
and training old and young to the use of the gun. No person goes abroad
without his sword, or gun, or pistols. . . . Every plain is full of armed
men, who all wear a hunting shirt, on the left breast of which are sewed, in
very legible letters, “<EM>Liberty or Death</EM>.”<BR>The British escalated
the war. Royal Admiral Samuel Graves ordered that all seaports north of
Boston be burned.<BR>When the British navy showed up at what was then known
as Falmouth, Massachusetts (today’s Portland, Maine), the town attempted to
negotiate. The townspeople gave up eight muskets, which was hardly
sufficient, and so Falmouth was destroyed by naval bombardment.<BR>The next
year, the 13 Colonies would adopt the Declaration of Independence. The
Declaration listed the tyrannical acts of King George III, including his
methods for carrying out gun control: “He has plundered our seas, ravaged
our Coasts, burnt our Towns, and destroyed the Lives of our people.”<BR>As
the war went on, the British always remembered that without gun control,
they could never control America. In 1777, with British victory seeming
likely, Colonial Undersecretary William Knox drafted a plan entitled “What
Is Fit to Be Done with America?” To ensure that there would be no future
rebellions, “[t]he Militia Laws should be repealed and none suffered to be
re-enacted, & the Arms of all the People should be taken away, . . . nor
should any Foundery or manufactuary of Arms, Gunpowder, or Warlike Stores,
be ever suffered in America, nor should any Gunpowder, Lead, Arms or
Ordnance be imported into it without Licence . . . .”<BR>To the Americans of
the Revolution and the Founding Era, the theory of some late-20th Century
courts that the Second Amendment is a “collective right” and not an
“individual right” might have seemed incomprehensible. The Americans owned
guns individually, in their homes. They owned guns collectively, in their
town armories and powder houses. They would not allow the British to
confiscate their individual arms, nor their collective arms; and when the
British tried to do both, the Revolution began. The Americans used their
individual arms and their collective arms to fight against the confiscation
of any arms. Americans fought to provide themselves a government that would
never perpetrate the abuses that had provoked the Revolution.<BR>What are
modern versions of such abuses? The reaction against the 1774 import ban for
firearms and gunpowder (via a discretionary licensing law) indicates that
import restrictions are unconstitutional if their purpose is to make it more
difficult for Americans to possess guns. The federal Gun Control Act of 1968
prohibits the import of any firearm that is not deemed “sporting” by federal
regulators. That import ban seems difficult to justify based on the
historical record of 1774-76.<BR>Laws disarming people who have proven
themselves to be a particular threat to public safety are not implicated by
the 1774-76 experience. In contrast, laws that aim to disarm the public at
large are precisely what turned a political argument into the American
Revolution.<BR>The most important lesson for today from the Revolution is
about militaristic or violent search and seizure in the name of disarmament.
As Hurricane Katrina bore down on Louisiana, police officers in St. Charles
Parish confiscated firearms from people who were attempting to flee. After
the hurricane passed, officers went house to house in New Orleans, breaking
into homes and confiscating firearms at gunpoint. The firearms seizures were
flagrantly illegal under existing state law. A federal district judge soon
issued an order against the confiscation, ordering the return of the seized
guns.<BR>When there is genuine evidence of potential danger—such as evidence
that guns are in the possession of a violent gang—then the Fourth Amendment
properly allows no-knock raids, flash-bang grenades, and similar violent
tactics to carry out a search. Conversely, if there is no real evidence of
danger—for example, if it is believed that a person who has no record of
violence owns guns but has not registered them properly—then
militaristically violent enforcement of a search warrant should never be
allowed. Gun ownership <EM>simpliciter </EM>ought never to be a
pretext for government violence. The Americans in 1775 fought a war because
the king did not agree.<BR>
<DIV>
<HR>
<DIV id=ecxftn1>
<P class=ecxMsoFootnoteText><SPAN class=ecxMsoFootnoteReference><A title=""
href="http://www.davekopel.org/2A/LawRev/american-revolution-against-british-gun-control.html#_ftnref1"
name=_ftn1 target=_blank>*</A> Research Director, Independence
Institute, and Adjunct Professor of Advanced Constitutional Law, Denver
University, Sturm College of Law. This is article is adapted
from <EM>How the</EM><EM>British Gun Control Program Precipitated the
American Revolution</EM>, 6 Charleston L. Rev. 283
(2012), <EM>available at</EM><A href="http://ssrn.com/abstract=1967702"
target=_blank> http://ssrn.com/abstract=1967702</A></SPAN>.</P></DIV></DIV></SPAN></DIV></DIV></BLOCKQUOTE>
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