That "Wild Bill" Douglas quote again.

There is under our decisions no reason why stiff state laws governing the purchase and possession of pistols may not be enacted. There is no reason why pistols may not be barred from anyone with a police record. There is no reason why a State may not require a purchaser of a pistol to pass a psychiatric test. There is no reason why all pistols should not be barred to everyone except the police.

Critics say that proposals like this water down the Second Amendment. Our decisions belie that argument, for the Second Amendment, as noted, was designed to keep alive the militia.

Justice William O Douglas, Adams v. Williams, 407 U.S 143, 150 -51 (1972).

I have this thing for "Wild Bill" since he was instrumental in preserving the C&O Canal as a park, a opposed to a Parkway. He also had a nice house on Capitol Hill that I looked at when it was for sale. That's just personal and has no bearing on the validity of this quote.

Although, He is the longest-serving justice in the history of the Supreme Court with a term lasting 36 years and 209 day. In 1975, a Time article called Douglas "the most doctrinaire and committed civil libertarian ever to sit on the court."

If you are familiar with U.S. v. Miller, 307 U.S. 174 (1939), you know that JUSTICE DOUGLAS took no part in the consideration or decision of this cause. This was the Justice Douglas in question. Justice Douglas was not part of the consideration since the case was heard on 30 Mar 1939 and Justice Douglas wasn't confirmed until 4 Apr 1939.

Now, given his reputation and experience, I think he would know whether the Second Amendment applied to a personal right, not common defence purposes.

No, this is not argumentum ad verecundiam, but I would think that a Supreme Court Justice who was a part of the Miller court would have some understanding about that decision. Don't you?

Additionally, my saying that I am a lawyer is not argumentum ad verecundiam, but a statement that I might have some idea of what I am talking about.

More Melanie Hain

I think this comes directly to the point:

The paper also quotes one neighbor, Debbie Mise, as saying she feared something bad would eventually happen at the Hain home. "She just wasn't right," Mise said of Meleanie Hain, the paper reports. "You don't bring a gun to a kids' soccer game, and you don't wear a gun when you go shopping at Kohl's."

Gun control means effective tools to keep firearms from disqualified persons. Melanie Hain should not have had a firearm let alone, a permit to carry a concealed weapon.

I know the usual, but disingenous, litany is to enforce the gun laws on the books, but the "gun rights" people have done everything in their power to make the laws unenforcable.

Besides, it is much easier to prevent than deal with the outcome of situations such as Melanie Hain's. It costs far less to prevent than to deal with the costs of medical care, police investigations, and suvivors.

There are three children who are now orphaned by a foolish attempt to bring "protection" to her family. Instead, the weapon was used to kill her.

Enough is enough,

I have long been tired of hearing talk of "gun rights". There are no such rights.

There is under our decisions no reason why stiff state laws governing the purchase and possession of pistols may not be enacted. There is no reason why pistols may not be barred from anyone with a police record. There is no reason why a State may not require a purchaser of a pistol to pass a psychiatric test. There is no reason why all pistols should not be barred to everyone except the police.

Critics say that proposals like this water down the Second Amendment. Our decisions belie that argument, for the Second Amendment, as noted, was designed to keep alive the militia. But if watering-down is the mood of the day, I would prefer to water down the Second rather than the Fourth Amendment. I share with Judge Friendly a concern that the easy extension of Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1, to "possessory offenses" is a serious intrusion on Fourth Amendment safeguards. "If it is to be extended to the latter at all, this should be only where observation by the officer himself or well authenticated information shows `that criminal activity may be afoot.'"

Both from Justice William O Douglas, Adams v. Williams, 407 U.S 143, 150 -51 (1972).

In 1991, Warren E. Burger, the conservative chief justice of the Supreme Court, was interviewed on the MacNeil/Lehrer NewsHour about the meaning of the Second Amendment's "right to keep and bear arms." Burger answered that the Second Amendment "has been the subject of one of the greatest pieces of fraud-- I repeat the word 'fraud'--on the American public by special interest groups that I have ever seen in my lifetime." In a speech in 1992, Burger declared that "the Second Amendment doesn't guarantee the right to have firearms at all. " In his view, the purpose of the Second Amendment was "to ensure that the 'state armies'--'the militia'--would be maintained for the defense of the state."

I am amazed that The Supreme Court could have produced the Heller decision since it is based upon fraud and fallacy.

The dissent in Heller was correct.

I only hope that McDonald v. Chicago can correct the error made in Heller v. DC.