The Purpose Of The Bill Of Rights

[DebateChallenge]

can you names a liberal cause that makes sense?

I will give you to right off hand, environmentalism and children's rights.

 

[MrWonka]

The Bill Of Rights does not grant rights rather it re-enforces rights that are granted by God or some higher power

Not really. It guarantees rights that were absolutely essential to the people of the time. It was known that any attempt to revoke those rights would result in an outright rebellion by the people, and there were large subsections of the country who would not have joined the union at all if they weren't guaranteed to always retain them.

That is why, unlike the rest of the Constitution, the Bill Of Rights or any part of it can't be repealed and is scribed in stone.

Yes, it can. It's called an Amendment. They are very difficult to pass, but it can be done. It's highly unlikely that it would ever happen, but it is entirely possible that one could become obsolete over time or at minimum need to be put into a proper context. The obvious example is the 2nd Amendment. The existence of modern arms has required us to re-examine that. That is why we can and have banned fully automatic weapons, surface to air missiles, and nuclear weapons. Not to mention made it considerably difficult to obtain many other powerful explosives that didn't exist that day or time.

At this point, it's not really a question of whether or not we can ban or restrict arms it's really just a question of how deadly does an armament have to be before it's not realistically useful for anything but an offensive assault, and what level of evidence do we need to restrict an individuals access to what.

Even something like Freedom of Speech has its limits. You can't yell fire in a movie theatre for example. Freedom of Religion has limits as well. Honor killings and human sacrifice to a God is clearly criminal behavior regardless of what your religion says.

 

[Terryj]

Is the question whether or not we can pass an amendment that changes the constitution? Really?

The short answer to your question is YES.

We can if we choose, call a Constitutional Convention and abolish the Constitution and rewrite another, this is what happened when a Constitutional Convention was call to deal with the Articles of Confederation. The AoC was scraped and a different set of rules were drawn up. All it would take is 2/3rds of the States to request a Constitutional Convention. The federal government really has no power to stop such an action, and a new federal government could be enacted if the new Constitution required it.

 

[Vadinho]

The short answer to your question is YES.

We can if we choose, call a Constitutional Convention and abolish the Constitution and rewrite another, this is what happened when a Constitutional Convention was call to deal with the Articles of Confederation. The AoC was scraped and a different set of rules were drawn up. All it would take is 2/3rds of the States to request a Constitutional Convention. The federal government really has no power to stop such an action, and a new federal government could be enacted if the new Constitution required it.

I guess my sarcasm did not show up but of course I agree with you. I had read some earlier posts wondering if the constitution prohibited new amendments from violating the constitution. That is why I asked credulously....

 

[DebateChallenge]

Not really. It guarantees rights that were absolutely essential to the people of the time. It was known that any attempt to revoke those rights would result in an outright rebellion by the people, and there were large subsections of the country who would not have joined the union at all if they weren't guaranteed to always retain them.

Such rights still are and always will be essential as long as the USA exists. Revoking them would result in civil war.

Yes, it can. It's called an Amendment. They are very difficult to pass, but it can be done. It's highly unlikely that it would ever happen, but it is entirely possible that one could become obsolete over time or at minimum need to be put into a proper context. The obvious example is the 2nd Amendment. The existence of modern arms has required us to re-examine that. That is why we can and have banned fully automatic weapons, surface to air missiles, and nuclear weapons. Not to mention made it considerably difficult to obtain many other powerful explosives that didn't exist that day or time.

Fully automatic weapons are hard to get but are obtainable. With a class III firearms permit you can get full autos that were manufactured prior to 1986. Surface to air missiles, nuclear weapons, and high grade explosives you obviously can't get, not legally, but such weapons are not used by a single person. And back when the 2nd Amendment was written they did have larger and more powerful weapons such as cannons and black powder bombs.

At this point, it's not really a question of whether or not we can ban or restrict arms it's really just a question of how deadly does an armament have to be before it's not realistically useful for anything but an offensive assault, and what level of evidence do we need to restrict an individuals access to what.

You're certainly not going to use a nuke or a high grade explosive for anything else but a large scale offensive assault but handguns are perhaps one of the most if not the most effective weapons for self defense, with the proper training. Although handguns lack the ballistic power of larger firearms they're small and portable and much faster and much more maneuverable, yet even with their lower ballistic power, its handguns that are often regulated the most, which is absurd.

Even something like Freedom of Speech has its limits. You can't yell fire in a movie theatre for example. Freedom of Religion has limits as well. Honor killings and human sacrifice to a God is clearly criminal behavior regardless of what your religion says.

I don't think its a good idea to yell fire in a theater, I would never do it unless there really was a fire but I do know of a case of a boy who got in trouble with the law for saying he was going to kill this bully at school. He said the words, "Im gonna kill you," to the bully and got in trouble for that. That was clearly a violation of the First Amendment.

 

[DebateChallenge]

I guess my sarcasm did not show up but of course I agree with you.

Its hard to tell when somebody is being sarcastic when they do it in writing. For somebody to really know you're being sarcastic they have to hear it when you're talking out loud.

 

[MrWonka]

such weapons are not used by a single person.

Why couldn't they be? If you take the literal meaning of the 2nd Amendment as advocated by many NRA nuts it would seem that these arms exist to that the people would have the tools to rise up against a Tyrannical government. How are you going to fight a tyrannical government with access to nuclear weapons if you don't have them yourself?

And back when the 2nd Amendment was written they did have larger and more powerful weapons such as cannons and black powder bombs.

Well, then how can you justify banning them today if they weren't banned back then? Do we need to legalize surface to air missiles? They are after all the cannons of our age.

You're certainly not going to use a nuke or a high grade explosive for anything else but a large scale offensive assault but handguns are perhaps one of the most if not the most effective weapons for self-defense. it's handguns that are often regulated the most, which is absurd.

They are also the most effective weapon for a criminal who is trying to sneak a deadly weapon down the street and into a public place or your home. NRA types seem to think that they need handguns to protect themselves from criminals who will have them. Is it possible that the reason criminals carry them is to protect themselves from you?

 

[DebateChallenge]

Why couldn't they be? If you take the literal meaning of the 2nd Amendment as advocated by many NRA nuts it would seem that these arms exist to that the people would have the tools to rise up against a Tyrannical government. How are you going to fight a tyrannical government with access to nuclear weapons if you don't have them yourself?

It takes a team to launch a nuclear missile. They don't issue nuclear missiles to individual soldiers as their primary weapons, or as any weapons for single soldiers to use. Same thing with other big weapons, tanks, battleships, ect all take multiple people to operate, some take many many people.
As for the government becoming tyrannical and trying to oppress the people, they would not use nuclear weapons in such a case. If there ever was a 2nd civil war the government would not be using nukes as they would be nuking their own soil.

Well, then how can you justify banning them today if they weren't banned back then? Do we need to legalize surface to air missiles? They are after all the cannons of our age.

Im not sure if they are banned today or if they were back then, Im quite certain they were.

They are also the most effective weapon for a criminal who is trying to sneak a deadly weapon down the street and into a public place or your home. NRA types seem to think that they need handguns to protect themselves from criminals who will have them. Is it possible that the reason criminals carry them is to protect themselves from you?

Criminals are not going to stop using handguns just because the public is disarmed if the public is disarmed, much more likely is they will be all the more eager to use handguns to take advantage of the disarmed public.
If criminals carry handguns to protect themselves from the law abiding public than by that logic you could say police shouldn't carry handguns since criminals use them to protect themselves from good people with guns, including police, so of all the good people, including the police, stopped carrying handguns so would the criminals. That of course is absurd.

 

[James972]

I will give you to right off hand, environmentalism and children's rights.

amazing!! so conservatives are opposed to environmentalism and children's rights? In your head you pretend to yourself liberalism means good. Does that embarrass you?

 

[James972]

But it was Paine and his little pamphlet that turned the tide. I am deadly serious here, the guy is very under appreciated for what he did to start the colonists on a path towards revolution. I bought every thing he wrote a year ago. Its pretty amazing stuff. He ended up leaving because the founders started to fear his rhetoric and he went to France to drive the British nuts from Paris. BTW, he was Hitchens favorite founder. There are some really good documentaries about him on youtube. You seem to like history, don't pass him up for Tommy, he was actually better than Tommy in my book.

Well there were a bunch. Jefferson wrote the Declaration and then founded Republican party in 1792 with Madison to keep the Spirit of "76 alive" and when he won presidency he called it the "Second American Revolution". Hard to beat that!

Loyalists vigorously attacked Common Sense; one attack, titled Plain Truth (1776), by Marylander James Chalmers, said Paine was a political quack[33] and warned that without monarchy, the government would "degenerate into democracy".[34] Even some American revolutionaries objected to Common Sense; late in life John Adams called it a "crapulous mass". Adams disagreed with the type of radical democracy promoted by Paine (that men who did not own property should still be allowed to vote and hold public office) and published Thoughts on Government in 1776 to advocate a more conservative approach to republicanism.

 

[DebateChallenge]

Is MrWonka still here? MrWonka has dodged the point I made back in post #480 where saying you're going to kill somebody, such as a child at school who says he's going to kill a bully whose harassing him, is not supposed to get you in trouble and if it does than it is a violation of the First Amendment.

 

[James972]

Is MrWonka still here? MrWonka has dodged the point I made back in post #480 where saying you're going to kill somebody, such as a child at school who says he's going to kill a bully whose harassing him, is not supposed to get you in trouble and if it does than it is a violation of the First Amendment.

Sure, but purpose of Constitution and Bill of Rights is to identify liberal govt as evil and list in very black and white terms what liberal govt cant do so it will be less like to do what liberal govt did throughout human history!

 

[Rich2018]

This is the purpose of the Bill Of Rights. The Bill Of Rights...re-enforces rights that are granted by God...

And where in the Koran does it say that all men have the right to bear arms ?

 

[James972]

And where in the Koran does it say that all men have the right to bear arms ?

how else would men protect their private property?

 

[DebateChallenge]

And where in the Koran does it say that all men have the right to bear arms ?

The Bill Of Rights does not grant rights rather it re-enforces rights that are granted by God or some higher power according to the beliefs of the founders of the USA. When you quote people you shouldn't slice apart what they say and/or take it out of context. It was a belief if the founders, if you disagree you can argue with them.

 

[James972]

NRA types seem to think that they need handguns to protect themselves from criminals who will have them.

mostly they want to protect themselves from liberal govt!

George Washington's address to the second session of the First U.S. Congress:

"Firearms stand next in importance to the Constitution itself. They are the American people's liberty, teeth and keystone under independence. The church, the plow, the prairie wagon and citizens' firearms are indelibly related. From the hour the pilgrims landed to the present day, events, occurrences and tendencies prove that, to ensure peace, security and happiness, the rifle and pistol are equally indispensable. Every corner of this land knows firearms, and more than 99 and 99/100 percent of them by their silence indicate that they are in safe and sane hands. The very atmosphere of firearms anywhere and everywhere restrains evil influence. They deserve a place of honor with all that's good. When firearms go, all goes. We need them every hour."

 

[Tanngrisnir]

mostly they want to protect themselves from liberal govt!

George Washington's address to the second session of the First U.S. Congress:

"Firearms stand next in importance to the Constitution itself. They are the American people's liberty, teeth and keystone under independence. The church, the plow, the prairie wagon and citizens' firearms are indelibly related. From the hour the pilgrims landed to the present day, events, occurrences and tendencies prove that, to ensure peace, security and happiness, the rifle and pistol are equally indispensable. Every corner of this land knows firearms, and more than 99 and 99/100 percent of them by their silence indicate that they are in safe and sane hands. The very atmosphere of firearms anywhere and everywhere restrains evil influence. They deserve a place of honor with all that's good. When firearms go, all goes. We need them every hour."

LOL! No, he never said that.

George Washington on firearms - snopes.com

 

[James972]

How are you going to fight a tyrannical government with access to nuclear weapons if you don't have them yourself?

actually its doubtful that liberals would fight a civil war against conservatives with nukes. Do you understand?

 

[ElChupacabra]

actually its doubtful that liberals would fight a civil war against conservatives with nukes. Do you understand?

Really? I thought all liberals were vicious and intolerant. Surely that means they'll nuke conservatives in a heartbeat. You'll be longing for the days when they were just disturbing the lunches of GOP politicians.

 

[James972]

Really? I thought all liberals were vicious and intolerant. Surely that means they'll nuke conservatives in a heartbeat. You'll be longing for the days when they were just disturbing the lunches of GOP politicians.

How could they nuke conservatives without also nuking liberals at the same time? Yes liberals are violent. Look at their verbal violence here and their street violence every night on the news!! Liberals know they are not suited to democracy, but rather to violence

 

[ElChupacabra]

How could they nuke conservatives without also nuking liberals at the same time? Yes liberals are violent. Look at their verbal violence here and their street violence every night on the news!! Liberals know they are not suited to democracy, but rather to violence

They would nuke them because they are so violent they won't care about nuking liberals along with conservatives. The other day at the free trade coffee shop a liberal almost threw a hot free trade Jamaican coffee latte supremo at me because I ate the last organic Welsh scone. That kind of anger can easily take you to the genocidal level of violence, and that's every single liberal because we all know it's not possible for their to be a wide spectrum of liberals out there. I know for a fact every Trump supporter is a bigot because of what happened in Charlottesville because of that very same logic.

 

[James972]

They would nuke them because they are so violent they won't care about nuking liberals along with conservatives. The other day at the free trade coffee shop a liberal almost threw a hot free trade Jamaican coffee latte supremo at me because I ate the last organic Welsh scone. That kind of anger can easily take you to the genocidal level of violence, and that's every single liberal because we all know it's not possible for their to be a wide spectrum of liberals out there. I know for a fact every Trump supporter is a bigot because of what happened in Charlottesville because of that very same logic.

in any case the Bill of Rights was to protect us against the evils of liberal govt.

 

[ElChupacabra]

in any case the Bill of Rights was to protect us against the evils of liberal govt.

Really? I suspect it was much broader than that, but I don't think your binary logic will allow exploration of that possibility. I'll add this to the list of inane responses. It might be up there with slavery ending when the US was founded; that one still makes me chuckle.

 

[hado117]

This is the purpose of the Bill Of Rights. The Bill Of Rights does not grant rights rather it re-enforces rights that are granted by God or some higher power according to the beliefs of the founders of the USA. Since its a belief I cannot prove that there is a God that grants such rights but that's what the founders believed. Anyway, that being said the purpose of the Bill Of Rights was to prohibit the government from restricting the rights it mentions and if it were to do so than the government would have too much authority. Simply put, the government does not have the authority to infringe on the rights listed in the Bill Of Rights and its not supposed to. That is why, unlike the rest of the Constitution, the Bill Of Rights or any part of it can't be repealed and is scribed in stone. To repeal or change it would give the government too much authority and would thus result in a corrupt government. That is why the Bill Of Rights has to be respected and kept the way it is. For the government to infringe on any of the rights in the Bill Of Rights in doing so the government would be crossing a line it has no right to cross.

there is currently no evidence that the bill of rights was written before 1950

 

[James972]

Really? I suspect it was much broader than that.

why broader when liberal govt was the source of evil in human history and when liberals always want more liberal govt. Note the progression from Hillary to Sanders! 1+1=2