Category Archives: Second Amendment

Tom Campbell| Tar Heel Voices

Maybe you remember the classic 1975 film, Network, where the anchor Howard Beale, throws open a window and shouts, Im mad as hell and Im not going to take it anymore.

Perhaps thats an explanation for the 2020 statistics on violent crime.

The good news-bad revelation is that the overall crime rate in our state declined again in 2020, however violent crime increased by 31 percent year over year. Philip Cook, a professor of public policy at Duke, said it was the largest increase since experts started keeping stats in the early '30s. 2020 became the most violent year of the 21st Century, Cook said. It looks like that is also true for North Carolina.

A crime is considered violent if it involves rape, robbery, aggravated assault or murder. Our state reported 44,452 violent crimes and 852 homicides, ranking us 21st in the nation ahead of New York, Georgia and most southeastern states, with the exception of South Carolina. We experienced 670 gun deaths, up from 2019s 511, and there were 20 mass shootings. Preliminary evidence indicates these numbers will increase again this year.

After years of decline in violent crimes how can we explain last years large increase, especially since most of us were cooped up in our homes for much of last year? Perhaps our pandemic frustrations morphed into anger. The hyper charged political climate could also have spawned violence and hatred. The Southern Poverty Law Center reports that North Carolina has 29 active hate groups within our borders, groups that include white nationalists, neo-confederates, Ku Klux Klans, racist skinheads, Islamic, anti-immigration and Proud Boys.

Complete data from last year isnt yet available, but we know the majority of gun-related deaths involved suicide. In 2019 suicide deaths were 1,358 and since violent crime numbers rose last year it is reasonable to assume suicides did also. There are two responses to this data.

The first involves mental illness. Few can deny that our states mental health reforms, begun in 2003, are a disaster. Our state eliminated 854 psychiatric hospital beds from state facilities and re-directed funding to local communities. These local management entities were neither capable of dealing with the swell in patients nor able to provide adequate staffing and resources for them. Many with mental illness end up in emergency rooms, in county jails or committing suicide. Better options might have prevented some of these problems.

The second issue is gun control and I can already hear the gun lobby getting their dog-whistles ready to resist any restrictions to their second amendment rights. Take another look at what this article in the Bill of Rights says and doesnt say.

"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." In 1791, when the Bill of Rights was added to the Constitution, there was no massive federal Army, no full-time or part-time state militias, police or sheriff departments like we have today. It was essential to have citizen militia groups, and they needed guns to defend themselves and their communities.

We support that right today, but it has been abused to mean anyone can own any weapon they want and carry it anywhere they go. Whenever even the hint of gun control is raised we hear threats that the boogey-man is trying to take all your guns. Not so. It is time for reasonable gun owners to show some backbone and admit there are too many guns too easy to buy and in the wrong hands. Daily we see headlines of drive-by and public shootings. Recently a North Carolina pastor call on his congregation from the pulpit to get gun training. Do we really want someone sitting in the pew next to us coming to church carrying?

Whats it going to take to move away from the anger and hatred evident today? We must lower the boiling point and find workable solutions for reducing both the anger and violent crime. For the time being, the best advice is the old time-honored axiom to count to ten before taking action.

Tom Campbell is a Hall of Fame North Carolina Broadcaster and columnist who has covered North Carolina public policy issues since 1965. He recently retired from writing, producing and moderating the statewide half-hour TV program NC SPIN that aired 22 years. Contact him at tomcamp@carolinabroadcasting.com.

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Tar Heel Voices: Mad as you-know-what and not going to take it - Kinston Free Press

The verdict in the highly politicized Kyle Rittenhouse trial erupted into a free-for-all as racial justice, gun control and gun rights advocates all tried to claim the jury's decision as a way to push their respective causes.

The events leading up to the shooting in Kenosha, Wisconsin, on August 25, 2020when Rittenhouse fatally shot two men and injured a thirdwere heavily intertwined with the Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement, which swept the nation in the wake of George Floyd's death and regained momentum following the police shooting of Jacob Blake.

As racial justice protesters poured into Kenosha to call for police reform after Blake was shot seven times by a white officer, others traveled to the small Wisconsin city to protect local businesses that were set ablaze and looted amid the unrest. Among these so-called vigilantes was the then-17-year-old Rittenhouse.

After the night turned deadly, many activists contrasted the treatment of Rittenhouseboth that evening and in the year-and-a-half that followedto Black Americans, like Blake, and BLM protesters, who were being shot and tear gassed by police officers that same summer.

In the months after the Kenosha shootings, Rittenhouse's delayed arrest and pictures of the teen flashing white power signs while on bail became subject to backlash from critics who argued none of these incidents would be permitted if it was a Black teen who traveled across state lines with an AR-15 and shot people dead.

"Kyle Rittenhouse's trial served as a prime example of the tragically disparate treatment between Black and white Americans," NAACP President and CEO Derrick Johnson told Newsweek. "Rittenhouse's decision to go to Kenosha and provoke protestors was unwarranted, dangerous, and some have said rises to domestic terrorism."

When the jury in Rittenhouse's case acquitted him on all charges, racial justice activists saw it as a confirmation that there are "two justice systems at work in America."

"From the outset, this case has pulled back the curtain on the profound cracks in our justice systemfrom the deep bias routinely and unabashedly displayed by the judge, to the apathy of officers who witnessed Rittenhouse's crimes and did nothing," civil rights attorney Ben Crump said in a Friday statement. "If we were talking about a Black man, the conversation and outcome would be starkly different."

Over the course of three-and-a-half-days, as the jury deliberated, BLM protesters and supporters of Rittenhouse returned day after day in anticipation of a verdict that would deliver each group what they believed to be justice.

While some members of opposing sides were seen sharing pizza and remaining peaceful, others were seen clashing loudly outside the courthouse.

Those who attended in support of the defendant were not there to argue against the BLM activists' calls for racial equality, but to defend their constitutional right to bear arms.

And so the not guilty verdict also became a rallying call for both aisles of the gun debate.

Gun rights groups saw it as proof that the nation believes the Second Amendment should prevail, while gun control advocates proclaimed that it sent a "troubling message" to the nation.

Because Rittenhouse contended that he acted in self-defense that night, the right to bear arms emerged as a central talking point in the case.

Friday's verdict implied that the jury unanimously agreed that Rittenhouse had the right to fire his rifle out of fear of death or great bodily harma decision gun rights groups saw as a win to their cause.

"Today, the American justice system worked as designed, and a young man who has been lambasted, defamed, and threatened by the media and anti-gun Left was declared innocent of all the charges against him," the executive director of the National Foundation of Gun Rights (NFGR), Dudley Brown, said in a statement following the verdict.

The NFGR was one of the first organizations to back Rittenhouse, raising over $50,000 last year to help pay for the teen's legal fees.

"Self-defense is a God-given right, and Kyle defended himself in the face of grave danger and bodily harm," Dudley said. "We hope that Kyle will now be allowed to live a free and prosperous life, and that all Americans will understand that the Second Amendment isn't about hunting it's about the right to defend oneself from tyranny and lawless criminal actors."

On the other side, gun control advocates called the verdict "a perversion of justice," "a horrifying reminder" and "a gross miscarriage of justice." They cautioned that allowing Rittenhouse to walk free would permit gun violence across the country to persist.

"There is no right to carry a firearmmuch less an illegally bought assault rifleacross state lines to terrorize and play 'police officer,'" the Brady Campaign's chief counsel, Jonathan Lowy, said in a statement. "And this tragedy shows what happens when civilians feel entitled to bring guns anywhere."

"If the Kenosha Killer had not brought an assault rifle to that protest, no one would have died. Because he did, two people were killed," Lowy continued.

However, racial justice activists argued against the debate entirely, describing it as a distraction from the real issue at hand.

"This was never a case on the right to bear arms, or the right to defend yourself, this was a case on white supremacy," Johnson said. "The fact that Rittenhouse was able to be apprehended safely, made out to be a victim in the media, and ultimately walk away a free man at the decision of a nearly all-white jury paints a grim picture of the state of race relations in this country."

As various groups continue to use the verdict to make political statements about the social climate of America, legal experts have maintained that the jury's decision is one pertaining to a specific criminal case and not a wider generalization on where the nation stands on racism or guns.

Speaking with reporters outside the courthouse, Rittenhouse's defense attorney, Mark Richards, said that unlike Rittenhouse's prior attorneys, he did not take on the defendant's case to argue a cause.

"I don't represent causes, I represent clients," Richards said.

"If [Rittenhouse] was looking for someone to go off on a crusade, I wasn't his lawyer," he added.

Michael McAuliffe, a former federal prosecutor and former elected state attorney, also emphasized to Newsweek that neither political issue was being presented to the jury.

"The caselegallyis about the shooting deaths of two individuals, the wounding of a third person with a weapon and the reckless endangerment of others. Self-defense is the legal justification for those actions," he said. "The evidence and the jury instructions don't address or refer to race or the Second Amendment. And, as you know, the gun charge was dismissed."

Rittenhouse had also been charged of unlawful possession of a firearm by a minor, but the defense team successfully argued that the charge should be dismissed based on the size of the rifle's barrel.

"The underlying tension in the case may well be about guns and one's use of weapons in a situation that has the backdrop of confusion and chaos," McAuliffe said.

"However, the jury's job is to ignore the larger issues and focus on whether the defendant committed a crime or crimes through his actions that evening," he added. "Criminal juries shouldn't be making larger policy statements when determining the potential criminal culpability of a defendant."

Even the prosecution and President Joe Biden have urged the nation to respect the jury's verdict and trust the system, despite earlier remarks expressing hope there might be some type of guilty verdict.

"While we are disappointed with the verdict, it must be respected," lead prosecutor Thomas Binger said in a Friday statement. "We are grateful to the members of the jury for their diligent and thoughtful deliberations."

Biden echoed those sentiments, saying: "While the verdict in Kenosha will leave many Americans feeling angry and concerned, myself included, we must acknowledge that the jury has spoken."

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Was the Kyle Rittenhouse Trial About Race, the Second Amendment or Neither? - Newsweek

In gratitude

During this season of gratitude, theres a few things I am really grateful for in our community.

To the crews who worked so hard on the Foys Lake interchange, thank you! I travel that road multiple times a day, and over the past several months I was excited and surprised daily at how much work was being done and the fact that it was completed! You deserve a holiday bonus!

To our schools youre doing it! You have risen above the vitriol in our community and are continually providing an excellent education and above and beyond opportunities for our kids to thrive. I see you Kalispell Education Foundation and the creative teachers and administrators who just received over $26,000 in community grants to do more great things. Thank you!

And to our beloved ImagineIF library Ive been watching from the front row how you are graciously navigating every block that is being set in front of you, from the county commissioners to your own board of trustees. You just keep showing up, ensuring free and untethered access to all information, and incredible programs for all. You are wonderful.

Sara Busse, Kalispell

With the U.S. Supreme Court about to render what could be a landmark Second Amendment ruling in the case of New York State Rifle & Pistol Assoc. v. Bruen, the Daily Inter Lake on Nov. 15 published an editorial from the Los Angeles Times in its As Others See It feature on the opinion page. With the potentially profound and far-reaching consequences of the courts decision in this case on state and local laws across the country, it is altogether fitting and proper for the Inter Lake to share views on the subject from other publications around the nation. I only wish they had chosen a different source.

The once great L.A. newspapers summary of the issues at stake and the history of the high courts stance vis--vis Artice II of the Bill of Rights suffers from sloppy scholarship. Journalists are not, of course, legal scholars, nor are they supposed to be. Nor are their readers. But with little effort the arguments of the legal scholars on whom Justice Anton Scalia and the court majority based their decision in District of Columbia at al. v. Heller, particularly those of David E. Young, can be easily grasped by those who write for and read newspapers.

The failure to fully explore and explain these arguments instead implying that Scalia and his colleagues pulled their ruling out of a hat in much the same way that Justices Blackmun, Burger, Douglas, Brennan, Stewart, Marshall and Powell in Roe v. Wade discovered a constitutional right to abortion in the penumbras and emanations of the document smacks of either bias or laziness or both.

The SCOTUS may well dodge the foundational issues in their ruling on New York State Rifle & Pistol Assoc. v. Bruen, but if their ruling, to use the L.A. Times editors term, upends long-prevailing presumptions regarding the right to keep and bear arms, it would be pleasant to discover that at least some mainstream journalists had made more than a cursory effort to familiarize themselves with Second Amendment scholarship instead of excusing themselves by employing the (fundamentally false) bromide that the amendments wording is ambiguous because it is NOT ambiguous when viewed in the proper historical and linguistic context.

Lee W. Smith, Somers

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Letters to the editor Nov. 21 | Daily Inter Lake - Daily Inter Lake

The Student Government Association (SGA) is proposing two amendments to their Constitution, requiring 1/3 of the student body to vote on them in order to pass.

The first amendment aims to allow members of the Cabinet to hold or retain officer positions in any other formally constituted campus organization, meaning that students would be able to simultaneously hold an e-board position in a student organization while also serving as an SGA Cabinet member.

Reasons for this change include a lot of the best candidates for the SGA Cabinet are students who are very involved on campus and know a lot about how Stevens student organizations run and since our terms align with the calendar year and most other organizations align with the academic year, this often creates an issue that there are students who would like to join the SGA Cabinet, but in order to do that would need to resign from their e-boards in the middle of their term.

The second amendment aims to change the quorum requirement for referendums of proposed amendments to the SGA Constitution from one-third of the Student Body to five percent of the Student Body. Currently, 1/3 of the student body at a population of 3,791 is 1,263 students. At 5%, only 190 students would be needed to pass amendments.

In an email to undergraduate students, the SGA stated that with the current quorum, it is nearly impossible to make any changes. By decreasing the quorum we are hoping to allow future SGA officers to be able to make necessary and appropriate changes. Five percent of the undergraduate student body is the current number of nominations a presidential ticket needs to receive in order to move to the voting stage of elections. We feel as though it is an appropriate number of votes for constitutional changes as well.

In January 2021, the SGA went through a similar process of seeking 1/3 of the student body to vote on a completely new Constitution, which failed to pass after lack of student participation in the voting process. With the current voting portal only being open until November 22, it is unclear if the amendments will be passed.

Students can vote for the constitutional amendments at this link.

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Student government seeking 1/3 student body vote for Constitution amendments The Stute - The Stute

GOP elected officials like Rep. Matt Gaetz (L) and Madison Cawthorn (R) celebrated the acquittal of Kyle Rittenhouse (C) of all charges. (Photos:Paul Hennessy,Sean Krajacic-Pool/Getty Images, Republican National Committee)

Within minutes of the news breaking that Kyle Rittenhouse, a teenager who shot and killed two people last summer in Wisconsin, had been found not guilty, Republicans were flocking to the internet to celebrate.

Kyle Rittenhouse is not guilty, my friends! You have a right to defend yourself, a grinning Rep. Madison Cawthorn, a North Carolina Republican, cheered on an Instagram Story. Be armed, be dangerous, and be moral.

Kyle, if you want an internship, reach out to me, Cawthorn added in a caption at the bottom.

A Rittenhouse internship might turn out to be a hot commodity among the Capitol Hill GOP. Before the verdict was reached, Florida Rep. Matt Gaetz suggested that Rittenhouse could become his intern. On Friday, Arizona Rep. Paul Gosarthe guy whose staff made an anime that depicted him killing New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Corteztweeted, I will arm wrestle @mattgaetz to get dibs for Kyle as an intern.

Justice was served for #KyleRittenhouse and he is fully exonerated, Gosar added. As I said last year, obviously self-defense.

Gaetz also reaffirmed his support for Rittenhouse on Friday, in a tweet from his official Twitter account. Kyle Rittenhouse committed no crimes, he wrote, before adding the nonsensical suggestion, Now do BLM

Rittenhouse had faced charges of first-degree reckless homicide, two counts of first-degree intentional homicide, and two counts of reckless endangerment of safety. In August 2020, he killed two men and maimed another during protests against police brutality in Kenosha, Wisconsin.

In the months since, Rittenhouse has become a cause clbre among conservatives, who have portrayed him as a hero, who did what was necessary to protect himself, and as a potential martyr for gun rights. During the protests, Rittenhouse was trying to protect a car dealership.

Georgia Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, meanwhile, saluted Rittenhouse as one of the good guys.

Colorado Rep. Lauren Boebert, who loves to show off her own gun collection, called Friday a great day for the Second Amendment and the right to self-defense, adding, Glory to God!

The Twitter account for Republicans on the House Committee on the Judiciary took a simpler tack. After the verdict, it tweeted, Justice.

But Florida state Rep. Anthony Sabatini, whos running for Congress, might have done the most: He proposed turning Nov. 19 into the federal holiday Kyle Rittenhouse Day.

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The GOP Is Just Loving the Kyle Rittenhouse Verdict - VICE

The right to keep and bear arms is a lot like the right to freedom of speech. In each case, the Constitution expressly protects a liberty that needs to be insulated from the ordinary political process. Neither right, however, is absolute. The First Amendment, for example, has never protected perjury, fraud, or countless other crimes that are committed through the use of speech. Similarly, no reasonable person could believe that violent criminals should have unrestricted access to guns, or that any individual should possess a nuclear weapon.

Inevitably, courts must draw lines, allowing government to carry out its duty to preserve an orderly society, without unduly infringing the legitimate interests of individuals in expressing their thoughts and protecting themselves from criminal violence. This is not a precise science or one that will ever be free from controversy.

One judicial approach, however, should be unequivocally rejected. During the nineteenth century, courts routinely refused to invalidate restrictions on free speech that struck the judges as reasonable. This meant that speech got virtually no judicial protection. Government suppression of speech can usually be thought to serve some reasonable purpose, such as reducing social discord or promoting healthy morals. Similarly, most gun control laws can be viewed as efforts to save lives and prevent crime, which are perfectly reasonable goals. If thats enough to justify infringements on individual liberty, neither constitutional guarantee means much of anything.

During the twentieth century, the Supreme Court finally started taking the First Amendment seriously. Today, individual freedom is generally protected unless the government can make a strong case that it has a real need to suppress speech or expressive conduct, and that its regulations are tailored to that need. The legal doctrines have become quite complex, and there is room for disagreement about many of the Courts specific decisions. Taken as a whole, however, this body of case law shows what the Court can do when it appreciates the value of an individual right enshrined in the Constitution.

The Second Amendment also raises issues about which reasonable people can disagree. But if the Supreme Court takes this provision of the Constitution as seriously as it now takes the First Amendment, which it should do, there will be some easy issues as well.

District of Columbia v. Heller (2008) is one example. The right of the people protected by the Second Amendment is an individual right, just like the right[s] of the people protected by the First and Fourth Amendments. The Constitution does not say that the Second Amendment protects a right of the states or a right of the militia, and nobody offered such an interpretation during the Founding era. Abundant historical evidence indicates that the Second Amendment was meant to leave citizens with the ability to defend themselves against unlawful violence. Such threats might come from usurpers of governmental power, but they might also come from criminals whom the government is unwilling or unable to control.

McDonald v. City of Chicago (2010) was also an easy case under the Courts precedents. Most other provisions of the Bill of Rights had already been applied to the states because they are deeply rooted in this Nations history and tradition. The right to keep and bear arms clearly meets this test.

The text of the Constitution expressly guarantees the right to bear arms, not just the right to keep them. The courts should invalidate regulations that prevent law-abiding citizens from carrying weapons in public, where the vast majority of violent crimes occur. First Amendment rights are not confined to the home, and neither are those protected by the Second Amendment.

Nor should the government be allowed to create burdensome bureaucratic obstacles designed to frustrate the exercise of Second Amendment rights. The courts are vigilant in preventing government from evading the First Amendment through regulations that indirectly abridge free speech rights by making them difficult to exercise. Courts should exercise the same vigilance in protecting Second Amendment rights.

Some other regulations that may appear innocuous should be struck down because they are little more than political stunts. Popular bans on so-called assault rifles, for example, define this class of guns in terms of cosmetic features, leaving functionally identical semi-automatic rifles to circulate freely. This is unconstitutional for the same reason that it would violate the First Amendment to ban words that have a French etymology, or to require that French fries be called freedom fries.

In most American states, including many with large urban population centers, responsible adults have easy access to ordinary firearms, and they are permitted to carry them in public. Experience has shown that these policies do not lead to increased levels of violence. Criminals pay no more attention to gun control regulations than they do to laws against murder, rape, and robbery. Armed citizens, however, prevent countless crimes and have saved many lives. Whats more, the most vulnerable peopleincluding women, the elderly, and those who live in high crime neighborhoodsare among the greatest beneficiaries of the Second Amendment. If the courts require the remaining jurisdictions to stop infringing on the constitutional right to keep and bear arms, their citizens will be more free and probably safer as well.

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Interpretation: The Second Amendment | The National ...

The Second Amendment, or Amendment II, of the United States Constitution, is the amendment and the section of the Bill of Rights that says that people have the right to keep and bear arms. The Second Amendment was adopted into the United States Constitution on December 15, 1791, along with the other amendments in the Bill of Rights. The Second Amendment and the Bill of Rights were introduced into the United States Constitution by James Madison.

There are two important versions of the text found in the Second Amendment, but the only differences are due to punctuation and capitalization. The text of the Second Amendment which is found in the United States Constitution and the Bill of Rights is the following:

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.

The Second Amendment is only a sentence long. However, there are some very important phrases that need to be carefully looked at. Here are some explanations for key phrases in the Second Amendment.

Militia: During early American history, all males who were between the ages of sixteen to sixty were required to be a part of the local militia in their towns and communities. Almost everyone during this time used and owned guns. The few men who did not use or own a gun were required by law to pay a small fee instead of participating in the military services of their communities. These militias defended the communities against Indian raids and revolved, acted as a police force when it was needed and was also available to be called upon to defense either the State or of the United States of America if it was needed.

Bear arms: When the Second Amendment was written, arms meant weapons. The word arms did not necessarily only mean guns, but it definitely included guns. The Second Amendment did not specifically explain what categories or types of arms nor did it list what weapons were considered arms. When you bear arms, this means you physically carry weapons. You may have arms in your home as well as on your person.

Shall not be infringed: The Second Amendment does not grant any right to bear arms. Furthermore, the rest of the Bill of Rights does not describe any right to do so. These rights are thought of as natural rights or God-given rights. In the Bill of Rights, the Second Amendment is just a reminder to the government that they should not try to stop people from having this right.

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2ND AMENDMENT (Second Amendment)-Text, Gun Rights to Bear ...

Twenty-second Amendment, amendment (1951) to the Constitution of the United States effectively limiting to two the number of terms a president of the United States may serve. It was one of 273 recommendations to the U.S. Congress by the Hoover Commission, created by Pres. Harry S. Truman, to reorganize and reform the federal government. It was formally proposed by the U.S. Congress on March 24, 1947, and was ratified on Feb. 27, 1951.

The Constitution did not stipulate any limit on presidential termsindeed, as Alexander Hamilton wrote in Federalist 69: That magistrate is to be elected for four years; and is to be re-eligible as often as the people of the United States shall think him worthy of their confidence. (Hamilton also argued, in Federalist 71, in favour of a life term for the president of the United States.) George Washington, the countrys first president, opted to retire after two terms, setting a de facto informal law that was respected by the countrys first 31 presidents that there should be rotation in office after two terms for the office of the presidency.

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There is no clear indication that the decision to pursue the amendment was triggered by any single event or abuse of power. Indeed, throughout U.S. history, few presidents ever expressed the desire to serve more than the traditional two terms. Ulysses S. Grant sought a third term in 1880, but he was denied his partys nomination. Theodore Roosevelt sought a third term in 1912 but lost (it would have been his second elected term).

In the 1930s, however, the national and global context brought forth an interruption to this two-term precedent.

In the midst of the Great Depression, Democrat Franklin D. Roosevelt had won election in 1932 and reelection in 1936. In 1940, as Europe was engulfed in a war that threatened to draw in the United States and without a clear Democratic successor who could consolidate the New Deal, Roosevelt, who had earlier indicated misgivings about a third term, agreed to break Washingtons precedent. A general disinclination to change leadership amid crisis probably weighed heavily on the minds of votersmuch more so than the perceived deep-seated opposition to a third term for a presidentand Roosevelt romped to victory in 1940 and again in 1944.

Following on the heels of the establishment of the Hoover Commission and with Republicans winning a majority in Congress after the 1946 elections, they introduced an amendment to limit the president to two terms. The amendment caps the service of a president at 10 years. If a person succeeds to the office of president without election and serves less than two years, he may run for two full terms; otherwise, a person succeeding to office of president can serve no more than a single elected term. Although there have been some calls for repeal of the amendment, because it disallows voters to democratically elect the president of their choice, it has proved uncontroversial over the years. Nevertheless, presidents who win a second term in office are often referred to as lame ducks, and the race to succeed them often begins even before their inauguration to a second term.

The full text of the Amendment is:

Section 1No person shall be elected to the office of the President more than twice, and no person who has held the office of President, or acted as President, for more than two years of a term to which some other person was elected President shall be elected to the office of the President more than once. But this Article shall not apply to any person holding the office of President when this Article was proposed by the Congress, and shall not prevent any person who may be holding the office of President, or acting as President, during the term within which this Article becomes operative from holding the office of President or acting as President during the remainder of such term.

Section 2This article shall be inoperative unless it shall have been ratified as an amendment to the Constitution by the legislatures of three-fourths of the several States within seven years from the date of its submission to the States by the Congress.

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Twenty-second Amendment | United States Constitution ...

Second Amendment Supporters Must Remember Multiple Things Can Be True, iStock-697763612

United States -(AmmoLand.com)-One of the hardest parts of effectively defending the Second Amendment is figuring out how to straddle a lot of passions. If youre not denouncing the National Rifle Association, youre really in support of Negotiating Rights Away. Anyone who doesnt accept the notion that Wayne LaPierre is running the organization into the ground is seen as a traitor to the Second Amendment. On the flip side, there are those who get infuriated when Gun Owners of America opposes a bill that would represent an improvement (albeit not a total one) in their present situation.

The fact is, life can be far more complicated than many of us want to admit. On Wayne LaPierres watch, the NRA has greatly expanded concealed carry, largely thwarted federal legislation that would have infringed on our Second Amendment rights, and he also secured the election of politicians who put pro-Second Amendment justices on the Supreme Court. On the political and legislative front, a substantial share of the credit for the undeniable improvement in the overall situation over the last 35 years has to go to the NRA and LaPierre.

That being said, LaPierre also has made some serious strategic errors. On his watch, the NRA got lax with Ackerman-McQueen, and while they appear to be winning legal battles with their former PR firm, the entire situation didnt have to happen. Better oversight or better yet, having multiple vendors to create competition would have been better.

LaPierre also failed to anticipate the possibility that Andrew Cuomo and Letitia James would launch politically motivated abuses against the NRA. Cuomo in particular, gave an ominous warning in 2014 that should have prompted a move (and housecleaning) long before James would have had the power to abuse the NRA.

The NRA has also failed to get involved in the cultural arena, and it has left votes on the table by not hiring translators or engaging in outreach which proved crucial for Glenn Youngkin in Virginia. Both of these failures also took place on LaPierres watch. The NRA needs to get started on rectifying those failures yesterday. And by the way, the threat posed to the entire Second Amendment community should James succeed in her politically-motivated hit on the NRA also exists.

But the NRA is not the only part of defending the Second Amendment that gets complicated. We rightly object when anti-Second Amendment extremists try to punish us for crimes and acts of madness some of them horrific that we did not commit. However, that doesnt make the misuse of firearms to commit crimes and acts of madness some of them horrific (Sandy Hook, Parkland, Las Vegas) something to ignore, or worse, brush off.

In 2020, FBI stats noted that 8,209 homicides were carried out with handguns, 455 with rifles, 203 with shotguns, and 4,283 were of firearms, type not stated. In addition, can any Second Amendment supporter deny that anti-Second Amendment extremists use those instances where firearms are misused as fodder for their unjust agenda? How many times have family members who lose loved ones in a tragedy sought to take their grief out against, especially when we are defending ourselves from having our rights infringed?

Second Amendment supporters need to have something to offer on this front. People might not like Project Exile and may have reservations about supporting legislation like the Restoring the Armed Career Criminal Act and the Protecting Communities and Preserving the Second Amendment Act, but the fact remains these bills can hold off much worse.

Also, think of this: The likely alternative to gun bans in a post-NYSRPA v. Bruen (and other Second Amendment cases) world be a series of other legislative attacks including the Sabika Sheikh Licensing and Registration Act. Do not think that this case, or those percolating from the rulings by Judge Benitez, will be panaceas.

We also must address the fact that much of the threats we now face come not from legislation or politicians, but from private entities. This is another complex fight because the Constitution grants them the same liberties it does for us. At the same time, we cannot allow ourselves to be financially blacklisted.

All Second Amendment supporters seek the restoration of an uninfringed right to keep and bear arms. Reaching that goal will require defeating anti-Second Amendment extremists via the ballot box at the federal, state, and local level. It also means accepting the fact that the defense of our rights will be complicated at times.

About Harold Hutchison

Writer Harold Hutchison has more than a dozen years of experience covering military affairs, international events, U.S. politics and Second Amendment issues. Harold was consulting senior editor at Soldier of Fortune magazine and is the author of the novel Strike Group Reagan. He has also written for the Daily Caller, National Review, Patriot Post, Strategypage.com, and other national websites.

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Second Amendment Supporters Must Remember Multiple Things Can Be True - AmmoLand Shooting Sports News

The Kay County Chapter of the Oklahoma Second Amendment Association met Tuesday, November 9, 2021 at Marys Grill in Tonkawa, Oklahoma. OK2A members and the public were in attendance at the meeting along with guest speaker Sheriff Steve Kelley; Terry Thompson, Kay County OK2A coordinator; Mayor Ken Smith and wife Dianne; Chris Gonthier, representative with U.S. LawShield and Mayes County OK2A coordinator.

The OK2A meeting started with prayer, led by Dr. Glenn Cope and the Pledge of Allegiance, led by Sheriff Kelley. Mayor Ken Smiths birthday was the same day so Happy Birthday was sang by all to Mayor Smith. Thompson reported to the group an update of what has been happening with OK2A.

Thompson introduced Chris Gonthier to give an update about the U.S. Law-Shield organization. Terry Thompson then introduced Sheriff Steve Kelley. Kelley gave the people some background information about his family and that the sheriff is the only elected law enforcement position in our county. He has lived in Kay County all his life, except for four years in the U.S. Navy. In 1998 he started working with the Blackwell Police Department. He was interested in learning more about investigation and went to the sheriff department in 2003. He worked as undersheriff with Everette Van Hoesen, then in 2016 decided to run for the sheriff position to replace retiring Van Hoesen. In 2017 he was elected sheriff. He enjoys being able to serve citizens in Kay County.

Kelley was elected to the North Central Oklahoma Sheriff Association (OSA) as a board member. He represents and has a vote for ten counties in Oklahoma. The OSA has been around a very long time and has a lot of clout with the legislature.

Kelley told the group that Saturday, December 11, 2021 at 9:00 a.m. there will be a gun auction held at 402 N. 13th in Blackwell of lost and found or confiscated guns. There was a lot of consideration and concern that went into having the auction, according to Kelley. New training options for law enforcement recruits will be held at Pioneer Tech in 2022. Kelley spoke to the group about the Sheriffs Citizens Academy and the alumni association. Kelley spoke about the situation in the country concerning mandates, marijuana grow farms, illegals and immigrants and the overreach by the government and current administration. In the question and answer session there was a lot of information shared about concerns of citizens in Kay County. Contact information for the Kay County Sheriff Department is 580-362-3250 and it is located at 1101 W. Dry Road, Newkirk, Oklahoma

The OK2A mini meeting is held at Marys Grill in Tonkawa the second Tuesday of every month at 6:00 p.m. The second meeting is held each month on the fourth Saturday at 12:00 noon at the New Hope Christian Fellowship, 401 South Lincoln in Ponca City. For more information about the Oklahoma Second Amendment Association call Terry Thompson, Kay County Chapter coordinator at 580- 670-0357, email terry.thompsonok2a@gmail.com or go to their website at ok2a.org. You may follow the group on their Facebook page at Oklahoma Second Amendment Association.

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Sheriff Steve Kelley speaks at Oklahoma 2nd Amendment Association meeting - Ponca City News