Brewster
2018-05-12 20:15:53 UTC
Hunt them down and get rid of every single one of them. They are not
fit to enjoy the protections of this great country.
One consequence of the success of the National Rifle Association's
expansive gun-rights agenda and its lobbying power in Congress is
that groups favoring more gun control have pared down their ambitions
in recent years.
The Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, for instance, no longer
talks about banning handguns. Advocates have moved away from the term
gun control in favor of more specific language like gun violence
and gun safety. Democratic leaders in Congress have grown timid
about proposing significant new restrictions on gun ownership.
In that context it's a bit of a jolt to read an op-ed published
Tuesday by retired Supreme Court justice John Paul Stevens titled
Repeal the Second Amendment. Stevens is something of an expert on
the issue, having considered the proper scope of the Second Amendment
in the 2008 case District of Columbia v. Heller.
In his op-ed, Stevens praises the work of the March for Our Lives
organizers and urges the group to seek more effective and more
lasting reform via a repeal of the Second Amendment. He calls the
Second Amendment a relic of the 18th century, concerned more with
the balance of power between the states and the federal government
than with individual gun rights.
But public-opinion polling shows that it would take a lot of
persuading to bring the public around to that view. In February, for
instance, the Economist and YouGov asked Americans whether they
supported a repeal of the Second Amendment. Twenty-one percent said
they favored such a proposal, compared with 60 percent in opposition.
The poll does, however, show surprisingly robust support for Second
Amendment repeal (39 percent) among Democrats (by contrast, 8 percent
of Republicans would support a full repeal). Black Americans (30
percent) and Northeasterners (28 percent) also showed relatively high
levels of support.
One caveat is that other polls have shown that many Americans do not
know what the Second Amendment is. In 1999, for instance, a Hearst
Newspapers poll found that 59 percent of respondents said they did not
know the purpose of the Second Amendment. But national conversations
on gun rights since then have probably shrunk that number, and the
Economist/YouGov poll discusses the Second Amendment in the context of
guns.
Beyond that, the poll showed that a plurality of Americans do not see
the Second Amendment as something set in stone. Forty-six percent said
they favored modifying the Second Amendment to allow for stricter
regulations, compared with 39 percent who were opposed. More than
three-quarters of Democrats said they supported modifying the Second
Amendment, as did more than one-quarter of Republicans.
Those numbers are surprising, given that virtually no political
leaders in the country are publicly advocating for a repeal or
modification of the Second Amendment. Democrat Hillary Clinton made
gun control a focal point of her presidential bid but spoke of the
need to balance legitimate Second Amendment-rights concerns with
preventive measures and control measures. In 2016, President Barack
Obama felt compelled to publicly state that I believe in the Second
Amendment as he announced a set of extremely limited executive
actions on guns.
Even Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), who has for years been a
leading proponent of gun control in the Senate, wrote in 2012, let me
be clear: If an individual wants to purchase a weapon for hunting or
self-defense, I support that right.
But the polling above suggests that a significant chunk of the
Democratic electorate would be willing to support a much more
restrictive gun-policy agenda than the party currently supports. The
coming of age of the mass shooting generation may increase that
divide.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2018/03/27/one-in-five-americans-want-the-second-amendment-to-be-repealed-national-survey-finds/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.8772ddb3d921
fit to enjoy the protections of this great country.
One consequence of the success of the National Rifle Association's
expansive gun-rights agenda and its lobbying power in Congress is
that groups favoring more gun control have pared down their ambitions
in recent years.
The Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, for instance, no longer
talks about banning handguns. Advocates have moved away from the term
gun control in favor of more specific language like gun violence
and gun safety. Democratic leaders in Congress have grown timid
about proposing significant new restrictions on gun ownership.
In that context it's a bit of a jolt to read an op-ed published
Tuesday by retired Supreme Court justice John Paul Stevens titled
Repeal the Second Amendment. Stevens is something of an expert on
the issue, having considered the proper scope of the Second Amendment
in the 2008 case District of Columbia v. Heller.
In his op-ed, Stevens praises the work of the March for Our Lives
organizers and urges the group to seek more effective and more
lasting reform via a repeal of the Second Amendment. He calls the
Second Amendment a relic of the 18th century, concerned more with
the balance of power between the states and the federal government
than with individual gun rights.
But public-opinion polling shows that it would take a lot of
persuading to bring the public around to that view. In February, for
instance, the Economist and YouGov asked Americans whether they
supported a repeal of the Second Amendment. Twenty-one percent said
they favored such a proposal, compared with 60 percent in opposition.
The poll does, however, show surprisingly robust support for Second
Amendment repeal (39 percent) among Democrats (by contrast, 8 percent
of Republicans would support a full repeal). Black Americans (30
percent) and Northeasterners (28 percent) also showed relatively high
levels of support.
One caveat is that other polls have shown that many Americans do not
know what the Second Amendment is. In 1999, for instance, a Hearst
Newspapers poll found that 59 percent of respondents said they did not
know the purpose of the Second Amendment. But national conversations
on gun rights since then have probably shrunk that number, and the
Economist/YouGov poll discusses the Second Amendment in the context of
guns.
Beyond that, the poll showed that a plurality of Americans do not see
the Second Amendment as something set in stone. Forty-six percent said
they favored modifying the Second Amendment to allow for stricter
regulations, compared with 39 percent who were opposed. More than
three-quarters of Democrats said they supported modifying the Second
Amendment, as did more than one-quarter of Republicans.
Those numbers are surprising, given that virtually no political
leaders in the country are publicly advocating for a repeal or
modification of the Second Amendment. Democrat Hillary Clinton made
gun control a focal point of her presidential bid but spoke of the
need to balance legitimate Second Amendment-rights concerns with
preventive measures and control measures. In 2016, President Barack
Obama felt compelled to publicly state that I believe in the Second
Amendment as he announced a set of extremely limited executive
actions on guns.
Even Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), who has for years been a
leading proponent of gun control in the Senate, wrote in 2012, let me
be clear: If an individual wants to purchase a weapon for hunting or
self-defense, I support that right.
But the polling above suggests that a significant chunk of the
Democratic electorate would be willing to support a much more
restrictive gun-policy agenda than the party currently supports. The
coming of age of the mass shooting generation may increase that
divide.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2018/03/27/one-in-five-americans-want-the-second-amendment-to-be-repealed-national-survey-finds/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.8772ddb3d921