Constitutional Palladium

During the campaign and then from the day of election it has been advanced that this administration, and Democrats in general, have a peculiar animosity towards the Second Amendment. I am not aware of any initiatives launched by the current Federal administration to alter or redefine the Constitutional status quo. What I see are local, usually urban, attempts to stem the proliferation of guns in their environments, which lead to philosophical debates on the appropriateness of elements of 18th century thinking and its universal application in 21st century America. There hasn’t been an administration in my lifetime where this issue hasn’t come up for judicial review at least once. It is a reliably controversial issue for partisan firebrands to hang their hats on and invoke fear of the dastardly intentions of the latest elected tyrants. But are our attentions properly focused?

I understand the various arguments, from questions of original intent posed by differing drafts of the Constitution where the right of the People or people, and a well regulated Militia or militia, were alternately capitalized, or implications drawn from the wording of the Articles of Confederation, to the contention that the right to bear arms pre-exists the Constitution and the amendment does not grant or invent the “ natural” right, but directly prevents infringement of it by the government coming into being. Our demotic contemporary conflict of opinion seldom touches on such legalistic esoterica, but usually center around personal protection from criminals and the perils posed by any and all governments disposed by the opium of power to tyranny.

The latter fear, recently stoked by Mrs. Palin, among others, is to me especially intellectually provocative. The juxtaposition of the fear of repressive government, and a society that blithely accedes to that government military funding that exceeds that of all the other nations on earth combined, is seemingly tempting fate. The increasing erosion of the restraints of posse comitatus under the guise of homeland security, and the unchecked powers afforded government by The Patriot Act, makes me wonder if the Rubicon of the Second Amendment has become an insignificant obstacle, whose breach can’t be stopped by the handguns and rifles of the people.