Talk:Right to keep and bear arms/Archive 5

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English Law Contradictions regarding the Bill Of Rights

From the article:

The English Bill of Rights 1689 set out the right of Protestants to have arms suitable for their own defense as allowed by law.[20] This was because of the fear the Protestants had in England of being disarmed that led to the Glorious Revolution and subsequently their guaranteed right to self-defense.

The Bill of Rights of 1689 included the provision that "the subjects which are Protestants may have Arms for their Defence suitable to their Conditions, and as allowed by Law."[23] The words "as allowed by Law" indicate in England this is considered a qualified rather than an absolute right. However this provision, along with many other pieces of ancient law, has been overruled by the doctrine of implied repeal, the Bill of Rights had no special legal protection as a result of parliamentary sovereignty.

These two points use the same source to make different points, and contradict each other quite seriously. One uses it to state that Protestants were given the right to bear arms, while the second uses it to states that a right to bear arms did not exist at that time. The original source (with context added) states that:

And thereupon the said Lords Spiritual and Temporal and Commons, pursuant to their respective Letters and Elections, being now assembled in a full and free Representative of this Nation, taking into their most serious Consideration the best Means for attaining the Ends aforesaid, do in the First Place (as their Ancestors in like Case have usually done), for the vindicating and asserting their ancient Rights and Liberties, Declare,

"That the Subjects which are Protestants may have Arms for their Defence, suitable to their Condition, and as allowed by Law."

I personally feel that the second of the above points from the article is correct. Does anyone else have any thoughts? Faerie Queene (talk) 00:39, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

We have a bad case of original research going on here... The source cited for the second of the above points [23] is a primary source, and the interpretation drawn from it is not cited at all, much less cited to a verifiable secondary source. So, the former statement is the one that should stand, as it has a verifiable secondary source [20]. Unless the editor who added this has a verifiable secondary source to substantiate the latter interpretation, I'm deleting it per WP:NOR. By the way, does anyone know how to search the article history to see who's adding this stuff? Just curious. --tc2011 (talk) 03:26, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

Not really. Actually, both statements are largely correct. Parliamentary sovereignty permitted Parliament to rescind the right, unlike in the United States, where the US Constitution codified the then extant English law into a form that the US Congress cannot rescind, short of the Constitution being amended through a rather lengthy process. The Right to have arms has long ceased to be true in the UK due to parliamentary sovereignty. The English Bill of Rights is considerably different than the US Bill of Rights; Parliament can rescind rights at any time, if they so see fit. We do need to find a source for the second statement, of course. But, it shouldn't be hard to find a source regarding Parliamentary sovereignty relative to this. Yaf (talk) 05:30, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

Huh? The drafters US Constitution chose to put the militia under government control and regulation. SaltyBoatr (talk) 15:36, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

Is there a source that specifically addresses the issue at hand and the interpretation of the phrase "as allowed by law?" It seems that's what we need here to avoid synthesis and original research. --tc2011 (talk) 13:43, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

Read the Joyce Lee Malcolm book, (while a bit of a polemic), it covers the origins of the English Bill of Rights with considerable detail. I think key points she makes are: Prior to 1689, there was no "right" for a militia comprised of the people, but rather a 'duty' for the people to serve the King in the militia. And, that at that time the question was; where does the power reside? (With an army of a Catholic king who didn't trust the Protestant militia) or with the Protestant militia. This tension fomented a revolution. (Plus, the people hated restrictions on their ability to go hunting with guns on royal land.) Bearing Arms (that is: the people make up the militia) and hunting with guns were closely linked. (The same guns were used for both.) That did not mean that "bearing arms" meant hunting. One does not bear arms against a rabbit. SaltyBoatr (talk) 15:36, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

So add the citation. A "quote=" in the footnote would be helpful. Incidentally, other researchers note that one can, indeed, bear arms against rabbits... "[T]he people have a right to bear arms for the...purpose of killing game."[1] But you knew this. --tc2011 (talk) 17:33, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

No, I hadn't read that Sayoko Blodgett-Ford paper before. Have you read her entire paper? I like her conclusion, and agree with her premise that the 'right to bear arms' has changed over time. Still hanging your hat on a snippet from a rejected proposal by a minority at the Pennsylvania ratifying convention is pretty tenuous. I agree that isolated exceptions can be found, but the overwhelming number of 18th Century usages of the term 'bear arms' implied military context. Are you doing your Google search research to prove your point? Have you read[2] Garry Wills or Uviller and Merkel on this topic? SaltyBoatr (talk) 18:26, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

I'm sorry, I really have nothing to say to you that hasn't already been said before.

For the benefit of those chancing by this discussion, please read this talk page and follow these informative links: [3][4][5] --tc2011 (talk) 19:01, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

I notice once again that you attack me with innuendo, and fail to answer my questions. Is that how talk pages are supposed to work? SaltyBoatr (talk) 20:01, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

The text is being tagged for citation needed. --tc2011 (talk) 19:01, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

Seriously, you request a cite that "as allowed by law" is a qualifier? That should be obvious per simple grammar. You didn't answer me earlier, have you read the Joyce Lee Malcolm book? How about this cite in Peter Squire's book? SaltyBoatr (talk) 20:27, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

It is misleading to portray the phrase "as allowed by law" as a limitation on the English right, because English rights were restrictions only on the Crown. The question of the degree to which Parliament might choose to restrict arms is completely orthogonal to the question of the scope of the right to have arms under the 1689 Bill of Rights. If the article goes to the trouble of pointing out that the right to have arms was "qualified rather than absolute," it tends to lead to a misleading conclusion on the part of readers who are unaware of the context, which is that there is no such thing as an absolute right in the English Bill of Rights. PubliusFL (talk) 22:15, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

global?

Regarding this recent addition Provisions for or abridgments of the right also appear in Mexican, medieval, Israeli, Spanish, Cuban, and Chinese cultures. Please provide citation so I can read it in third party reliable sourcing, it appears to be entirely original research. SaltyBoatr (talk) 21:30, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Read the article. --tc2011 (talk) 21:43, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

There are sources. Do you perhaps mean it's a synthesis problem, or is this really a complaint about the title? Cool Hand Luke 00:03, 7 June 2008 (UTC)

The problem still remains that the topic "keep and" bear arms does not seem to pertain to countries with religious law, civil law, roman law, Chinese law etc. SaltyBoatr (talk) 20:42, 17 June 2008 (UTC)

Possession is a global issue. This has been addressed many times already. --tc2011 (talk) 23:26, 17 June 2008 (UTC)

I don't see that this has been addressed previously. Stop the stonewalling please. Please cite that the "keep and bear arms" equates to "possession" globally. It seems plainly obvious that United States term "keep and bear arms" does not have meaning in global religious law, Sharia, civil law, roman law, Chinese law etc. Thanks. SaltyBoatr (talk) 17:54, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

[6][7] --tc2011 (talk) 01:18, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

To illustrate this problem, most of the world does not view this topic as a "individual rights to firearms" issue. See for instance this passage[8] about bearing arms in the Ottoman Empire. SaltyBoatr (talk) 18:09, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

What title would you support? "Right to bear arms" isn't much better, and most terms are not widely used in English-language sources. Cool Hand Luke 23:30, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

As a matter of fact, "right to bear arms" is the English phrase most often used in reference to heraldic rights. At least that's what Google seems to indicate:

• '"right to bear arms" heraldry' yields ~248,000 hits
• '"right to arms" heraldry' yields ~2,430 hits
• '"right of arms" heraldry' yields ~78 hits

Which probably means that Right to bear arms should provide disambiguation, rather than a strict redirect to this article. --tc2011 (talk) 00:50, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

Wow. About 20% of google usage, which is amazing because that meaning is very uncommon in the US, which normally dominates google results. I think you're right to disambiguate it. Had no idea.

So the point stands: what alternative terms exist for this concept? Cool Hand Luke 01:07, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

The article should be moved back to Right to bear arms. The move to Right to keep and bear arms was decidedly a move "changing one controversial name to another" which is strongly discouraged here: Wikipedia:Naming_conventions#Controversial_names. The older, and long standing title, while not perfect, is the most global and common. SaltyBoatr (talk) 18:45, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

Your citation talks of no right--individual, collective, protected, abridged, or whatever. Perhaps Sharia talks about safeguarding or denying dhimmis the possession or use of arms somewhere else, but the citation you provide does not do that. --tc2011 (talk) 01:30, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

Actually, the passage speaks not the use of individual arms, but the societal duty of military service. And, yes, there is a blurry line between a "right" and a "duty" for military service, both in Sharia, but also with the history of bearing arms in the Anglo tradition. Have you had a chance to read Professor Malcolm's book on this topic yet? SaltyBoatr (talk) 18:17, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

The problem remains that the global material is now off topic in this article with the US centric title. Perhaps a compromise is to have the global topic addressed in a split article with the old title Right to bear arms, and the Anglo/US topic addressed in Right to keep and bear arms, two separate articles. Comments? SaltyBoatr (talk) 18:13, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

You've floated this suggestion before, and it's a bad idea. If someone were to do that, we would merge them back together. There's already an article on the U.S. Second Amendment. If you would like to trim the U.S.-centic fat from the article (minutiae about "militias" and the meaning of "bear arms," for example), I would not oppose it.

The concept of a normative entitlement for private firearm ownership doesn't become suddenly incomprehensible when two words are added. This is a commonly-understood name per WP:NAME.

However, I would like someone to come up with a good source stating that "right to bear arms" is a POV title. I've seen very little evidence for it, and I really don't understand how a term embraced by people like Eugene Volokh is politically incorrect. It baffles me. Cool Hand Luke 02:14, 21 June 2008 (UTC)

Cramer and Olson note that [American gun-control proponents] push an "overly narrow focus on 'bear arms'" in order to assert that the phrase refers "exclusively or at least overwhelmingly to the military carrying of firearms."[9] The POV that is pushed with this wording is clearly seen here (more here) and all over this talk page. --tc2011 (talk) 03:44, 22 June 2008 (UTC)

Taiwan

I don't know too much about Taiwan-China politics... is this edit accurate? --tc2011 (talk) 17:31, 22 November 2008 (UTC)

"unilateral"???

Regarding this revert[10] by TC2021. The word "unilateral" here seems wrong. There are multiple reliable sources which hold the position being rebuked by Cramer/Olson. Indeed, the Cramer/Olson postion seems to be the outlying position. Please explain the revert. Thanks. SaltyBoatr (talk) 19:32, 31 December 2008 (UTC)

The word "unilateral" here is correct, and has nothing to do with the number of people holding a certain position, but with the one-sided selection bias of their research (which Cramer and Olson examine). Please review Cramer/Olson and English vocabulary. --tc2011 (talk) 19:53, 31 December 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the suggestion, I have reworded the sentence to say "one sided selection bias" which is a more clear way to say what you mean. You don't mean "unilateral conclusion", you mean "unilateral selection bias". SaltyBoatr (talk) 22:56, 31 December 2008 (UTC)

Perhaps I did not explain properly... Cramer/Olson are saying that selection bias leads to a unilateral/one-sided conclusion. --tc2011 (talk) 23:46, 31 December 2008 (UTC)

You seem confused. Please mention the passage you are reading. The conclusion was sound, the data was biased. SaltyBoatr (talk) 01:03, 2 January 2009 (UTC)

the selection of data was biased, which led to a one-sided conclusion. if you come to the conclusion that all roses are red because you have only examined red roses, your conclusion is unilateral and thus faulty. Anastrophe (talk) 01:27, 2 January 2009 (UTC)

beowulf

Regarding the deletion of the passage about Beowulf as etymology for the term "bear arms". I cite this to the Oxford English Dictionary based on both the etymological discussion Garry Wills in _To Keep and Bear Arms_, N.Y. REV. BOOKS, Sept. 21, 1995. And, also the OED etymological analysis of David Yassky in the Michigan Law Review 99.3 (Dec 2000) pg 588. SaltyBoatr (talk) 01:23, 2 January 2009 (UTC)

Then add those citations. The current citation is unacceptable, as the current OED lists "to bear arms against" as an idiom distinct from "to bear arms" and does not connect the two. The current inclusion of "to bear arms against" is OR. --tc2011 (talk) 01:39, 2 January 2009 (UTC)

Have removed the OR about "to bear arms against", as it is clearly a different expression than "to bear arms". Yaf (talk) 01:46, 2 January 2009 (UTC)

Did you check the sources? This is well sourced as part of the etymology of the term "bear arms". SaltyBoatr (talk) 02:22, 2 January 2009 (UTC)

Asking again. Did you guys get a chance to check the sources? SaltyBoatr (talk) 17:15, 2 January 2009 (UTC)

I did. Clearly you did not. --tc2011 (talk) 20:59, 2 January 2009 (UTC)

This is astonishing then. The etymology of the term of "bear arms" is covered in great detail in these three sources, especially in the Oxford English Dictionary. Can you explain your problem with this etymology please. Do you have an alternative etymology you are using for the basis of your position? Please be specific. Yaf, you did the most recent revert, would you explain yourself please? Thanks. SaltyBoatr (talk) 21:51, 2 January 2009 (UTC)

I suppose you're looking at page 100? Astonishing. --tc2011 (talk) 22:24, 2 January 2009 (UTC)

I don't understand your point. Please restate yourself specifically. SaltyBoatr (talk) 19:10, 3 January 2009 (UTC)

TC2001, explain yourself please. SaltyBoatr (talk) 20:34, 4 January 2009 (UTC)

perhaps if we were to include all idiomatic phrases it would stand, rather than a claim that it is the only distinctly attached term derived from the root 'bear arms'. Anastrophe (talk) 19:32, 3 January 2009 (UTC)

All idiomatic phrases? Why? I am just in favor of those identified in the reliable sourcing, Wills, Yassky and the Oxford English Dictionary. SaltyBoatr (talk) 20:34, 4 January 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia is not a dictionary, it is an encyclopedia. Only relevant content should be included in Wikipedia. Idiomatic phrases based upon two word combinations with additional words appended (e.g., "bear arms" + whatever random words) are not relevant, and it OR to claim otherwise. Otherwise, we would be making a dictionary of idioms, to include phrasing such as bear arms against, bear arms for the King, bear arms quickly (for describing fast moving individuals hunting with hunting weapons), bear arms that are hairy (for describing the arms of a bear), and "bear arms that are really, really hairy" (for describing Big Foot's arms). This rapidly becomes nonsensical. Lets keep with relevant content only. And forget turning an encyclopedia into an idiom dictionary. Yaf (talk) 05:24, 6 January 2009 (UTC)

global article, Sharia?

For some reason Yaf keeps deleting the stub section about the right to (keep and) bear arms under religious law. Please explain. It seems obvious that there is such a right or not such a right in all legal systems in the world. One third of the world lives under religious legal systems. This seems a very important stub section. SaltyBoatr (talk) 21:03, 16 January 2009 (UTC)

"it seems obvious" isn't a basis for including material in an encyclopedia. unless you have some specific cites in support of codification of the right to keep and bear arms under specific religious law (or evidence that it is not codified), then adding the stub is not appropriate. find citable material first, then add it, not the other way around. Anastrophe (talk) 22:32, 16 January 2009 (UTC)

That is the reason for the "section stub" tag. Feel free to help. It looks like there is plenty of sourcing[11] or [12]. What is needed is some editor to do the work. That is why the "please help" section stub tag is good, someone might volunteer. You perhaps? SaltyBoatr (talk) 23:13, 16 January 2009 (UTC)

See for instance here[13], it says "all men have the right to bear arms", it is truncated on Google Books snippet view, so a trip to the library is needed, but that is a start. Not "keep and...", so the title of the article might need to be generalized to accommodate the global right, or not, lets discuss. SaltyBoatr (talk) 23:28, 16 January 2009 (UTC)

is there something preventing you from doing the work, rather than expecting other editors to do work you task them with? this article is "right to keep and bear arms". perhaps a separate article on the phrase 'bear arms' would be appropriate, since it has a different meaning, rather than attempting to shoehorn two phrases with different meanings into one article. Anastrophe (talk) 23:36, 16 January 2009 (UTC)

Added a cite, just a start, more to come. SaltyBoatr (talk) 23:18, 17 January 2009 (UTC)

Assize of Arms

The inclusion of the Assize of Arms Act appears to be original research, as there is no citation indicating the statute's relevance to the article. I'll remove mention of the statute from the lead, and from the article unless sources are provided. --tc2011 (talk) 00:16, 3 January 2009 (UTC)

There are dozens, if not more, of reliable sources that associate the Assize of Arms with the history of the right to bear arms. Here is but the first[14]. SaltyBoatr (talk) 19:12, 3 January 2009 (UTC)

Good. Add that citation and we're set. --tc2011 (talk) 20:41, 3 January 2009 (UTC)

This is clearly nonsense. The Assize was the grant of arms to certain men in order to maintain the Feudal system then recently introduced into England. Nothing more and nothing less. Its not a special legal document. In the absence of a system of law to prevent it, every person in England was already free to arm themselves for protection. There is no sense in granting a general right to bear arms as there was no one who had previously taken away any right. --Hauskalainen (talk) 18:03, 4 February 2009 (UTC)

Because all men had a right to bear arms at the time of the Assize of Arms in any case under common law, the reference to the Assize of Arms in the context of the Right to Bear and Keep Arms is complete nonsense. I have read the reference above given by SaltyBoatr and also the one given in this article and another given in the WP article on the Assize of Arms. In none of them do I get the sense that any legal scholar has demonstratred any connection to any grant of rights. I propose that we remove the reference to the Assize of Arms as WP:OR unsupported bt WP:RS.--Hauskalainen (talk) 00:57, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

There are dozens of reliable sources[15] that link the Assize of Arms with the origin of the Right to Bear arms.

Dozens of reliable sources SAYING WHAT precisely? Pray tell me where in the Assize of Arms is there is any mention of a grant of RIGHT to bear arms. Rather than being about the right to bear arms it mererly lays out the DUTIES of certain classes of persons in the then Feudal system operating in England to be armed to defend the realm. It layed down the standard or arming needed. There is no sense however that people did not have a right to carry a weapon before then. This is NOT a grant of a right to keep a weapon because the people had that right anyway. Rather it set out the beginings of a system of local militias. So yes, I would agree that there is a connection to militias and arms but not a RIGHT to bear arms at all, (because every freeman or villein could in theory carry a weapon to defend himself anyway). I cannot get the sense that there is any connection to a general right to bear arms being handed out BECAUSE EVERYONE HAD THOSE RIGHTS ANYWAY. The Assize of Arms main purpose was about forming militias. Not giving any rights to bear arms. Just about obligations to bear arms. If you wish to maintain that there is a link to a new right to bear arms, please give me a proper quote from a legal or historical source where it says that the Assize of Arms GRANTED a new RIGHT to bear arms that did not exist before. It is no good just a list of constitutional history books culled from a Google book search making a mention of the Assize of Arms and the Right to Vear Arms. There will indeed be many. But what they say has to relate to the claim made in this WP article and must relate somehow to the text of the Assize of Arms. Otherwise the source will be highly suspect. I have placed a similar call for proper references to these claims at the Assize of Arms artice also. All I am asking for is more precision. --Hauskalainen (talk) 02:33, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

I gave this to you on January 3rd, see page 232 of the Hannis Tayler book[16]. He identifies "the roots of this Article (2nd Amendment RTKBA) strike down into the past until they reach the Assize of Arms" I am baffled at your failure to understand this. Is it that you do not recognize the meaning of the term "bear arms" meaning to "do military service", as in to serve the King in a militia? See also ISBN 9780253351593, Bodenhamer, page 80[17]. SaltyBoatr (talk) 03:32, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

I am not the one needing tuition in my own language! I know perfectly well that "bear arms" means "carry a weapon and other means of defence". It most definitely does NOT mean "do military service" as you say it does (though doing military service will in the past have involved bearing arms and often still does today). The second amendment refers to an existing right of the states to form militias. The Assize of Arms is not really about the RIGHT to form militias either, because people throughout the ages have clubbed together for their common defence. From what I have read, the drafters of the constitution were most afraid of the new state (the United States) taking away the states' rights to arm themselves. This was the long established interpretation of the second amendment reference to the right to form militias. This is I think also what I read Hannis Tayler as saying. It is not clear WHY Tayler thinks the Assize of Arms is significant, unless we think that the king embodies the state and therefore that fealty to the king is synonomous with fealty to the modern state). Bodenhammer as I read it agrees with that reading. Its about the formation of militias. Not a persons individual right to bear arms. Let's come at this from another direction. If you think that a person DID NOT HAVE A RIGHT to bear arms prior to the Assize of Rights, then there must have been an earlier legal prohibition. Please let us all know what THAT law was!! I am sure you will have fun looking for one. --Hauskalainen (talk) 18:30, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

Per reliable sourcing the term "bear arms" in modern language means something different that it meant 100, 220, 828 years ago. Read the etymology in the Oxford English Dictionary. Joyce Lee Malcolm, ISBN 9780674893061, agrees about the distinction of the duty to bear arms transforming gradually over time in phases into a right to bear arms. Never-the-less, per an overwhelming preponderance of reliable sourcing, the roots of the RTKBA can be traced back to the Assize of Arms. Your personal belief is obviously different than what the reliable sourcing says, but reliable sourcing trumps your personal belief. SaltyBoatr (talk) 19:48, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

Answering your question about the RTKBA law prior to the Assize of Arms, you question is implicitly in context of the English judicial system. I understand that the origin of the English judicial system was the Magna Carta, and prior to that the English judicial system did not exist. SaltyBoatr (talk) 19:52, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

English Bill of Rights

As much as the Assize of Arms was NOT about granting RIGHTS, The English Bill of Rights was mostly about containing the powers of the King and protecting the people from interference by religious powers (hence the writing in of special protections for protestants to arm themselves against Catholics, seen then as a threat to Parliament). It's not really about GRANTING rights- Such rights that were written into the bill were there for reasons very specific to their times. The most important fact tpo bear in mind about English Law is that everything is possible unless the law forbids it. Hence in English Law there are very few laws that talk about rights. The principle of Habeus Corpus is somewhat exceptional but in the context, quite sensible. This is why the Human Rights Act was so controversial. The licensing of firearms in English law is thus a natural progression of the law which tends to curtail individual freedoms for the common good. Licensing is intended to protect the citizen (from the potentially harmful actions of people holding weapons for no good reason). --Hauskalainen (talk) 18:03, 4 February 2009 (UTC)

As you state, "The most important fact to bear in mind about English Law is that everything is possible unless the law forbids it." Exactly! Hence, the reason for the Ninth Amendment to the United States Constitution protecting for all time the so-called unenumerated rights that existed at English Common Law in the late 18th Century due to this quirk in English Law. Along with the rest of the US Bill of Rights, the then extant English Common Law was fixed in time in the US Constitution, to prevent parliamentary supremacy from ever extinguishing these rights. As for the claim, "Licensing is intended to protect the citizen (from the potentially harmful actions of people holding weapons for no good reason).", this is a very debatable point, as there is an alternative view regarding it as victim disarmament, exactly counter to this "intended purpose". The licensing of firearms in English Law is rather an example of parliamentary supremacy in action, to extinguish freedoms that previously existed amongst Englishmen everywhere (including, lest we forget, the Englishmen among the Plantations in America in the Commonwealth of Virginia, etc., who, during Colonial times, largely encapsulated the English Common Law rights then extant into the US Constitution :-) Yaf (talk) 18:55, 4 February 2009 (UTC)

This sounds like WP:POV and WP:OR. Trying to fathom the WP article on the Ninth Amendment is for me an absolute object lesson in how people are left wondering how to interpret words laid down for a different time. I certainly don't have the same opinion about that as you! You are right about Parliamentary supremacy. It is a clear example of how parliament can act to reflect the will of the people and not be hide bound by a written constitution written for different time. I'm absolutely sure that most British people are quite glad that there is no longer any general freedom to keep and bear arms in modern Britain. If the people wanted it any other way they would elect parliamentarians who would change the law.--Hauskalainen (talk) 19:45, 4 February 2009 (UTC)

Globalize title

The title of this global article is USA centric. The "keep and..." prefix comes from the bill of rights of the United States, but the United States constitutes less than 5% of the world's population. The title Right to bear arms is applicable to 100% of the world, not 5%. SaltyBoatr (talk) 16:20, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

perhaps then there should be an article for "right to bear arms" and a separate article for "right to keep and bear arms", rather than an attempt to shoehorn globalizing views inappropriately. the pie chart is obnoxious by the way. just saying. Anastrophe (talk) 16:33, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

The article used to be titled "Right to bear arms". Presently, this article covers the global rights to bear arms. The "Right to keep and bear arms" is a USA centric subset of the global topic, and it makes sense to be a subsection in this article I think. SaltyBoatr (talk) 17:55, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

And, under "Right to bear arms", it was confused with heraldry, specifically The Right to bear arms, resulting in a lengthy discussion among editors that ended up with the article being where it is today, where it generates no confusion. There is still a differentiation page under Right to bear arms just to keep from confusing readers. There is also a POV push with using the "Right to bear arms" title for a title, being this phrasing is commonly used to push the anti-rights message that only select militias have a right to arms, never individuals. (And, the chart is obnoxious.) Being that the concept, too, is largely an Ango-American concept, anyway, with most of the rest of the world having no right to firearms at all, it doesn't appear to be a problem right where it is. Yaf (talk) 18:08, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

I agree that the "right to keep and bear arms" is largely an Anglo-American concept. I disagree that the "right to bear arms" is the same. The "right to bear arms" has a long history in the proto-Islamic and Islamic society for instance, and measured by percentage of world population the Anglo-American definition is dwarfed. SaltyBoatr (talk) 18:19, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

I have no problem with the title as long as the introductory paragraph makes it clear that the right is a term used in the United States to describe a right that exists in the United States under its constitution. One could be forgiven by reading the article that the right is pretty much a global concept which clearly it is not. Most countries that derive their law from English Law long ago stopped giving people the general right to carry arms or use them in self defence. --Hauskalainen (talk) 11:41, 31 January 2009 (UTC)

deletion of William Weir passage by Yaf

Yaf just made this edit[18] with the edit summary given "corrections, smoothing text, adding cite". Yaf's edit summary is misleading in that he fails to note that he deleted the cited and verified passage by William Weir which describes a contrary view about Bliss. Yaf should explain the odd appearance of his edit which shifts the point of view while giving a the misleading edit summary. Adding POV tag during discussion, pending resolution. SaltyBoatr (talk) 16:32, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

"Common Law right to bear arms"

I've started deleting references to "common law rights to bear arms" deriving from English law. No such right exists. The common law is that which has evolved from the decision of judges or other original arbiters of law (e.g. the king). English law, as I described in an earlier section, does not grant rights... rather it restricts rights of some to protect the rights of others. To be granted a right implies that the right had previously been restricted. The grant of rights in the Bill of Rights was not really a grant of rights to one group as much as an implied denial of rights to another. The Bill of Rights in English law is simply not the same as Bills of similar name in American law. I deleted one third party quote because they it was simply wrong. Not necessarily that the quote was made, but because it is not factually correct. The quote that said the Bill of Rights was interpreted as allowing catholics the right to bear personal weapons is a good example. The law was a blatant piece of anti catholicism and the simple fact is that is has quietly been forgotten. If we are to have references here about the law, then lets have them from proper legal sources or the original source (as with the reference I added about Blackstone), not from sources which seem to display POV.--Hauskalainen (talk) 09:52, 10 February 2009 (UTC)

It is OR (Original Research) to claim that one reliable and verifiable source is wrong, remove that source and quote, and then to insert YOUR OWN interpretation of a primary source, in this case, Blackstone. That is not how Wikipedia works. Wikipedia is not the place for Original Research based on any one editor's interpretation of primary sources. Yaf (talk) 09:58, 10 February 2009 (UTC)

I put in place a better source for the UK law... i.e. The UK parliament reference, It was not Blackstone in this case. The source I deleted was in place to tell us about the rights set out in the Bill of Rights. The parliamentary source is an excellent commentary abut the act, its precedence and interpretation. The reference I deleted said"The qualifying clauses of the Bill that appear to limit arms ownership were, in fact, interpreted in a way that permitted Catholics to have personal weapons and allowed Protestants, regardless of their social and economic station, to own firearms". Well, Professor Malcolm may have said this, but I think we need to know how he comes to this interpretation. If you have the journal where he is alleged to have said this, please let us know. I do not regard the deletion as expressing OR because all I did was to replace one reference that is not readily accessible to the WP reader with another excellent one that is.--Hauskalainen (talk) 10:19, 10 February 2009 (UTC)

I was right to delete the quote. It is totally out of context. Here, http://www.constitution.org/mil/maltrad.htm (see Note 50) , the learned professor refers catholics being allowed to keep personal weapons for their defense but this relates to a grant of Charles I in 1642 ... pre-dating the Bill of Rights by almost 50 years! Charles I was of course the one who married a catholic and was executed at the end of the English Civil War for trying to stand in the way of Parliament.--Hauskalainen (talk) 12:09, 10 February 2009 (UTC)

The article (http://www.constitution.org/mil/maltrad.htm ) is a rather a good summary of the legal position as it developed, even though I disagree with the title (as there is no common law here, unless he means "common" in the normal way and not the legal way). What is true, however, (and Malcolm only lightly touches upon it) is that the Bill of Rights in English law was a document for its time and is no longer really regarded as relevent in the issue of firearm law in the UK. Even though the English Bill of Rights is still a key part of the English constitution, the fact is that we English (and I am an Englishman) can just forget about certain bits of it (like rights to arms for protestants and over catholics) even though these clauses were never repealed, because they just don't fit the times we live in today. Americans on the other hand tend to regard the words in their constitution as something totally dear to them that are to be dispensed with at their peril - which is why Americans are still arguing about the meaning of a few words written down by men hundreds of years ago for times that have long since changed out of all recognition. But that is just my POV ;) --Hauskalainen (talk) 12:46, 10 February 2009 (UTC)

unclear sentence

The article presently says

"Some federal district courts have allowed local jurisdictions in some states (e.g., New York, Illinois, California, New Jersey) to license and regulate arms for self defense, whereas in other districts/states, little to no regulation of arms for self defense has been permitted by the corresponding similar functioning courts."

I am confused as to what this sentence is saying. When it talks of "local jurisdictions" I assume that this means State Law (and presumably dictricts refers to special districts like DC). If that interpretation is right, why is there reference to Federal district courts? Is it that the Federal district courts have been asked to rule on whether the second amendment gave a protective right to the people which the states or districts cannot take away? (Again I presume that it does, and that the Federal courts have rejected the notion that the second amendment GRANTED a right to the people and they chose to interpret it as just being restrictive on the powers of Congress). But if that interpretation is correct, then the next element of the sentence has no meaning. The ´bit that says "other districts/states, little to no regulation of arms for self defense has been permitted by the corresponding similar functioning courts". This seems to imply that other federal district courts HAVE blocked regulation concerning arms that have been laid down by state legislatures. If that is so can we have a reference for that? I quickly scanned other its of the article and could't see what it might have been referring to. Or if my interpretation is wrong perhaps the sentence needs to be reworded. I'd prefer that we discussed this here before deciding how it should be expressed in the article.--Hauskalainen (talk) 09:51, 11 February 2009 (UTC)

Some federal district courts have blocked regulation for being contrary to the Second Amendment. Other federal district courts have allowed such regulation to stand, irregardless of the wording of the Second Amendment. "District" here does not refer to special districts such as the District of Columbia; rather, it deals with the partitioning of the federal appeal courts, in their districting. I will add some references, for example, on the 5th District court rulings (Emerson, et al.). The root cause of the differences is that for over 70 years, the US Supreme Court (SCOTUS) dodged all Second Amendment cases, causing a vast difference in rulings among the federal appeal courts that exist beneath the SCOTUS. Some districts have widely supported an interpretation that the Second Amendment protects common law rights codified in the Second Amendment; others have interpreted that no such rights exist. It is not a simple subject, unfortunately. Another fine point is that the US Constitution does not confer rights, rather, it only limits the powers of the federal government, while the powers and rights not otherwise identified in the Constitution are retained by the states or by the people, respectively, being codified in the first ten amendments, called the Bill of Rights, of the US Constitution. The Bill of Rights in the US is entirely different than the English Bill of Rights, despite the similarity of names. The US Bill of Rights codify common law rights of the people, at least among some of the federal district courts. Many people have migrated into the parts of the country that best fits their own interpretation of the US Constitution, while largely avoiding having anything to do with, or even traveling through, any of the areas that view the Constitution differently. Such nuances largely go un-noticed by those living outside the US. The concealed carry laws, CCW, are perhaps the most striking difference among the different areas. Some states (2) require no permit to carry a firearm concealed, holding to the original interpretation. Other states regulate the carry of concealed carry weapons, while nonetheless having to issue a permit to anyone qualified. Other states, or portions of such states, permit no one to carry a weapon concealed or, in some cases, even to possess a handgun. There are roughly 20,000 gun laws on the books in the US. Yet, in some states, there are no laws to speak of, while in others, there are thousands of laws. It is a very complex subject. Yaf (talk) 13:44, 11 February 2009 (UTC)

Lots of personal opinion and synthesis. Zero sourcing. Also, 20,000 local gun laws? This is an interesting assertion, as other reliable counts have found closer to 300 state gun laws, (and city/county law is preempted by state law in virtually all cases)[19]. What is especially fascinating it that it appears likely that the origin of the 20,000 rhetoric could be the 1965 Congressional hearings, that I suspect are also the hearings that form the origin of Yaf's notorious and elusive 1967 Bliss 'violative' quote. SaltyBoatr (talk) 20:51, 11 February 2009 (UTC)

20,000 is the count by the NRA of all gun related laws, whether state, city, county, parish, etc., for firearms as well as for the ammunition that goes in them. 300 is the count according to the Brady Campaign in state firearm laws, which make up but a small subset of the total. Only some states preempt all firearms legislation; in other states, local municipalities can and do have their own confusing and different laws, sometimes even depending on the population size and the state's permission for grandfathered municipalities or municipalities of at least a certain size for setting up local ordnances otherwise contrary to state law. Such as seen for waiting periods to take possession of a handgun, which vary widely even within a state, or even a single county, for cases where a large municipality exists within a county with which it has not merged, for some states. I strongly suspect that the actual number is much closer to 20,000 than to 300. (Also, sourcing is not required in comments on talk pages. To suggest otherwise is only silly. As for the rest of the insults, I simply choose WP:DFTT.) Yaf (talk)

The 300 number comes from a research paper[20] of Jon Vernick of Johns Hopkins University and Lisa Hepburn of Harvard University, in a paper published by the Brookings Institution. (Not the Brady Campaign as Yaf asserts.) Also, this is in context of your discussion WP:V justification for the sentence in the article "Some federal district courts have...", so indeed you do have an obligation to have sourcing standards. The NRA is an advocacy organization, and the 20,000 figure appears false and trumped up to serve political purposes. Therefore you are wrong to point to a false number to defend WP:V for the "Some federal district courts have..."sentence. SaltyBoatr (talk) 17:00, 12 February 2009 (UTC)

20,000 is the NRA-ILA number, shown here. The Brady Campaign also quotes the 300 number from Vernick and Hepburn. I note that SaltyBoatr has deleted the pro-rights viewpoint, while adding a {{fact}} tagline to the false claim that the US Constitution is overarching. His anti-US bias never changes. Neither does his attempt to push an anti-rights POV incessantly into this article. Yaf (talk) 18:56, 12 February 2009 (UTC)

My particular issue was " ..this seems to imply that other federal district courts HAVE blocked regulation concerning arms that have been laid down by state legislatures." Emerson is not an example of this because, if I have read it correctly, it was about the USC (federal law) regulating on a matter which the second amendment clearly states that the federal government cannot regulate. We really need an en example supporting the claim that "little to no regulation of arms for self defense has been permitted by the corresponding similar functioning courts". Otherwise the text will have to be deleted from the article.--Hauskalainen (talk) 20:36, 11 February 2009 (UTC)

Will add same. Just have to do some formatting for the cites. Yaf (talk) 23:39, 11 February 2009 (UTC)

Am still doing the copy editing and formatting of cites, despite SaltyBoor having completely removed the entire sentence without showing good faith and adding a {{fact}} tagline. He has been around long enough to know about assuming good faith on Wikipedia, but chooses not to assume any. Yaf (talk) 18:56, 12 February 2009 (UTC)

Common Law and Common Law Rights - POV in parts of the the article

This article is littered with incorrect usage of the terms "Common Law" and "Common Law Rights".

The common law represent all law that has not been laid down in legislatures AND where decisions in law have had to have been made by judges. It is not synonomous with rights but rather the restriction of rights.

As I pointed out earlier, law is mostly about the restriction of rights of some to protect the rights of others. Many restrictions are laid down today by legislatures. But there have been many restrictions that have become to be accepted because judges have had to interpret the various rights of some peoples over others without having reference to law laid down by legislatures or have had to interpet the intentions of legislators. This forms laws of precedent or the common law. Again, these are restrictions on rights.

Common Law Rights are by definition all rights that have not yet been restricted either by a judge in common law or by a legislature. There is a presumption that any such right can be restricted by the later exercise of common law processes (the decision of judges) or directly by legislatures, which have primacy over common law rights. In this context, the common law right to bear arms is no more significant than the right to pick one's own nose or the right (as it once existed) to buy and sell slaves.

When the U.S. came into being, the founding fathers declared some things to be inalienable rights, thus enshrining some rights into its very founding documents thus creating an over-arching set of rights. These are not common law rights but constitutional rights. The big argument about the second amendment is whether it was granting a constitutional right to bear arms or merely restricting the federal government's powers over the states in regard to this matter.

The problem with the article is that holds up common law rights to be somehow very noble (which intrinsically they are not) and in places does not reflect the real controversy over the interpretation of the consititutional wording. For example the article says

Through being codified in the United States Constitution, the common law right was continued and guaranteed for the People, and statutory law enacted subsequently by Congress cannot extinguish the pre-existing common law right to keep and bear arms.[32]

The sentence makes it sound like the drafters of the constitution were doing something noble. The use of the word guaranteed here is the key to that. It is highly POV because seems to make it sound as though common law rights are something noble (which they are not) and it does not reflect the other interpretation of the drafters intentions (which is that the drafters were worried not to create a body which could take away from the states the rights to defend theirselves).

A similar piece of subtle POV editing is in this piece.

Some have seen the Second Amendment as derivative of a common law right to keep and bear arms; Thomas B. McAffee & Michael J. Quinlan, writing in the North Carolina Law Review, March 1997, Page 781, have stated "... Madison did not invent the right to keep and bear arms when he drafted the Second Amendment—the right was pre-existing at both common law and in the early state constitutions

Here again the text of the drafter is implying that second amendment's purpose is about the right to bear arms (the wording implying that the second amendment is expressing a derived a right). The fact that Madison did not invent the right is neither here or there. This is POV because many lawyers do not interpret the second amendment as being about the granting of a general right.

And in the following piece, this piece, the "common law rights" are held up to be equivalent to "fundamental rights" and "priviliges and immunities" (which of course they are not).

Akhil Reed Amar similarly notes the basis of Common Law for the first ten amendments of the U.S. Constitution, "following John Randolph Tucker's famous oral argument in the 1887 Chicago anarchist case, Spies v. Illinois":

Though originally the first ten Amendments were adopted as limitations on Federal power, yet insofar as they secure and recognize fundamental rights – common law rights – of the man, they make them privileges and immunities of the man as citizen of the United States...[33]

One must bear in mind that, in legal terms, the common law right to bear arms is no more or less significant than the common law right to pick one's own nose (a right which I think still exists), or the right to drive one's horse and trap on the left hand side of a public dirt track when passing another horse and trap (which I suspect was once legal in the U.S. and no longer is). Common law rights are not necessarily noble rights as this article often seems to imply they are.

Now I am not saying that such quotes should not be in the article, but they should be there in a context which expresses a balancing POV and does not accord common law rights an implied importance which they do not really have.--Hauskalainen (talk) 12:01, 11 February 2009 (UTC)

Except that the common law rights do have an actual importance in many parts of the US, although in other parts of the US, the interpretation is much as you state. Common law rights are extremely noble among a goodly portion of the US population, primarily amongst those who "cling to their God and to their guns", to borrow a certain politician's wording, which is what this article presently includes. The right to keep and bear arms is codified in the US Constitution in the Second Amendment. The right to pick one's nose is also codified in the US Constitution, in the form of the Ninth Amendment. At least in some states :-) Undoubtedly, there are areas that have chosen to ban such behavior as being anti-social, primarily in the 9th District court's jurisdiction :-) Yaf (talk) 13:50, 11 February 2009 (UTC)

How can we know if your personal opinion is "true" based on reliable sourcing? I see in reliable sourcing that "the large majority (in the USA) has consistently supported stronger gun regulations". Presumably, regulation of this "nobel" common law right you speak of. Which is it? SaltyBoatr (talk) 16:58, 11 February 2009 (UTC)

Yaf : Here you go again attaching a value judgement which is POV. "Common law rights are extremely noble".... The issue as I raised it are that they may be noble (the right to buy and sell personal property) or they may be ignoble (the right to buy and sell slaves as personal property) - some may be worth preserving and some are better being lost. There is nothing intrinsically valuable about common law rights. It is for the people to decide via their legislators how common law rights may be restricted. The Heller decision does seem confusing to me. The arguments are lengthy and I don't have time to absorb them all. I am struggling with the idea that it has seems to have ruled that authorities in DC could not take away the man's right to a weapon for self defence and it is not a connected to the militia but stands independent from it. But on the other hand it claims not to be overturning other earlier legal decisions made on the sale and licensing of weapons. If one has a constitutionally guaranteed right to hold a weapon, on what grounds can a third party restrict that right? I suppose in truth I find the US law confusing. It is illegal for a man to a carry a concealed weapon in some states but perfectly legal if he tucks it in his belt for all to see. Personally I'd rather not see it, and I'd rather he didn't have it in the first place - it would make me nervous! Also we Brits quite happily given up our rights to hold hand guns. Hardly any did anyway. I fail to see why gun control gets so many people up-tight in America. I suspect it has something to do with the innate suspicion of governments which goes right back to the early days of the early pioneers who left the old world for the new.--Hauskalainen (talk) 22:26, 11 February 2009 (UTC)

And, here you go again, once more attaching parliamentary supremacy practices and procedures to the United States, where it does not apply. Lets see if I can explain this better. Unlike in the UK, in the United States, the US Constitution codifies and protects the rights of the people, and the powers of the states, while limiting the powers of the federal government. It is not in the powers delegated to Congress, being but one of the 3 branches of the federal government, to remove rights that are protected in the US Constitution, no matter what Congress may want to do. Short of a constitutional convention, popularly known as a "con-con", or through obtaining the approval of the requisite number of states of any proposed amendment, the US Constitution cannot be amended. The rights of the people in the US are inviolate, bar these two possible events, from being usurped by Senators, Congressmen, or, to complete the analogy, by MPs, Lords, a Prime Minister, Kings, Queens, etc.. Parliamentary Supremacy does not exist in the United States. It is extremely POV to assume that the power to usurp the rights of the people is somehow superior to the rights of the people to make these decisions for themselves, collectively, as you seemingly profess. The difference is in the details, despite a common English Common Law basis. The US law is confusing only in that the ultimate authority rests with the people, not with the Government. Government serves at the permission of the citizens of the United States. US Citizens are not subjects, but are collectively the sovereign power. In the UK, and much of the rest of the English Common Law based jurisdictions, it is entirely possible for Parliament to extinguish any rights of the people at will, ceteris paribus. But, this is not possible in the United States of America. Common law rights are extremely noble. The right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness was originally written as the right to life, liberty, and property, but the original phrasing was reworded from "property" to the "pursuit of happiness", as the outcome in a capitalistic society to obtaining property is not guaranteed. It is NOT for the people to decide via their legislators how common law rights may be restricted in the United States, unlike in the UK. Rather, it is for the people to decide for themselves, via a Republican form of government, how laws may be written, and whether or not the Constitution should or should not be amended, to curtail or restrain Common Law rights. Common Law rights enshrined in the US Bill of Rights cannot be removed by simple fiat, upon a word from a Sovereign, or even all of Congress saying so. It is entirely legal in some states (two to be exact) for anyone to carry a handgun concealed, no permit being required. These two states hold to the original interpretation of the Second Amendment to the United States Constitution. In other states, it is entirely legal to carry a handgun concealed, upon filing for a concealed weapons permit and being granted same, while nonetheless remaining illegal for the same person with the same concealed weapons permit to carry a weapon openly. In other states, it is entirely legal to carry a handgun in a holster openly pretty much anywhere in the state except on Federal Property, no permit being required, but it is illegal to carry a handgun concealed without a permit. A multitude of gun laws exist in the United States, varying by state, as well as even by city, county, township, parish, and a whole host of other divisions, at least in some states. In other states, the state has declared pre-emption of all firearms laws in the state, thereby precluding any local municipality from imposing any restriction on the right to keep and bear arms. According to the National Rifle Association, there are 20,000+ gun laws in the United States. According to the Brady Campaign, there are only 300 gun laws nationwide. Based on the numbers of city, county, and state ordnances related to gun laws I have personally seen, the number is much closer to 20,000 than to 300. As for the exact number, I doubt that anyone knows. Gun control gets people uptight in the United States for the precise reason that it represents a loss of freedom, and a loss of the God-given right to self-defense, and a loss of a right to oppose governmental tyranny, such as was the case fighting against George III. Yes, the Brits, and the Aussies, too, have given up their gun rights -- rights that had existed as a Common Law right of Englishmen everywhere during the period of time that the US Constitution was written. The same US Constitution that enshrined in the Bill of Rights the protection of a set of Common Law rights that have largely failed to be eroded since. Is this system better or worse than the case in the UK? It really doesn't matter in the writing of this article. But, denigrating the Government of another country is not conducive to achieving NPOV in writing this article. We may have begun with a common set of laws and practices, but only the United States of America has largely stayed fixed with the old set. In the UK, Australia, Canada, and other former holdings of England, Great Britain, the UK, or any of a whole host of related names, depending upon precisely when one takes the measure, in all but the United States, the historical understanding of the God-given rights of every Englishman have changed. This is neither better or worse, only different, with respect to the writing of this article. We must recognize the differences amongst these different modern day countries if we are to be successful in writing this article on what is admittedly a largely Anglo-centric concept, the right to keep and bear arms. Agreed? Yaf (talk) 23:24, 11 February 2009 (UTC)

You wrongly attribute to me many things which I have not said. The article rightly says that the principle of parliamentary democracy does not apply in the U.S. I have not said otherwise. I added a piece to the article that pointed out the US constitution added constitutional rights that are overarching (which you kind of agree with above), but you deleted it from the article on the grounds that the powers rest with the people. The freedoms set out in the constitution rest with the people but the right to amend them rests with their elected representatives under due process. That's pretty much the same everywhere. I still don't accept that what I added in about over-arching constitutional rights was OR. I'd like you to say more about why you think it is.

You say "It is extremely POV to assume that the power to usurp the rights of the people is somehow superior to the rights of the people to make these decisions for themselves, collectively, as you seemingly profess". You are putting words into my mouth. Where do I say this? I don't want to be using Wikipedia to debate with you. All I said was "It is for the people to decide via their legislators how common law rights may be restricted", and in the US that is a due process of law undertaken by the legislatures (congress and the state legislatures jointly)- according to Article 5 of the United States constitution in the case of consitutional rights.

I just want to get to a point where we can agree how the article should be improved. Yet again you have referred to "protection of common law rights". That is adding a value judgement about common law rights. My point is simply that the things you refer to as "common law rights" should more properly be referred to as CONSTITUTIONAL rights. They are not common law rights because common law rights cover things which have not been legislated for and may be good or not so good depending on your point of view.

I would like to think of you as a serious editor but it is hard to do so when you say "The US law is confusing only in that the ultimate authority rests with the people, not with the Government". I don't know any country under the English law tradition where ultimate authority rests with the government. Ultimate authority rests with the people in their democratically elected legisltures. That is the same in the U.S. and the other countries deriving their laws from the English tradition (as well most others that do not). The key difference between English law and American law is that the U.S. system has set up certain rights to be constitutional and therefore have to pass a different hurdle for amendment (the vote ratio has to 75:25 and not 51:49). The long rant you make after your comment (about US law being confusing) is just a total distraction. Lets focus instead on the article. --Hauskalainen (talk) 12:16, 12 February 2009 (UTC)

Correlation between gun ownership and gun deaths

This section does not belong in the article at all. It includes no reliable sourcing that the right to keep and bear arms is even related to gun deaths. This kind of stuff might belong in the gun politics or gun politics in the US articles, but not this one. --Hamitr (talk) 07:05, 15 February 2009 (UTC)

I disagree. The reason for campaigns and legislatures acting to restrict or try to restrict the keeping and bearing of arms is because they believe it will reduce gun related crimes and especially gun related deaths. That alone is sufficient reason to include comparisons. And there is a demonstrated relationship between gun ownership and gun deaths in international comparisons. I gave at least one reference for that. There may be people who dispute a connection between the two but I am sure that many others believe otherwise. WP has to reflect all main views. So we SHOULD have something about this in the article. It is highly relevant to the subject. The fact the a US citizen has about 40 times as much chance of being the victim of a gun homicide than a UK citizen cannot be explained simply by the higher prevalence of homicide in the US beause the rate of homicides in the US is only 4 times greater than in the UK. We should not speculate about the reasons for this, but neither should we hide the basic fact from the reader.--Hauskalainen (talk) 22:00, 15 February 2009 (UTC)

i agree with hamitr. you've provided your personal opinion as to why it's relevant; your duty is to provide third party reliable sources that explain why it's relevant. your one citation makes no reference to the right to keep and bear arms - no relevance is shown. yes, there is a demonstrated relationship between gun ownership and gun deaths - but how does that relationship cleave to the right to keep and bear arms, which is the ostensible subject of this article? i'm not asking for your opinion of how it relates to this article, i'm asking for reliable sources that make that connection. "WP has to reflect all main views" - correct. where is your reliable source that reflects the view that gun homicide statistics are related to the right to keep and bear arms? simply believing there is a relationship is fine for discussion on the talk page; it is not adequate for adding that belief to article space. provide reliable sources making this connection, and you're good to go. soapboxing here why you believe the connection exists is meaningless. Anastrophe (talk) 22:20, 15 February 2009 (UTC)

The citation from the United Nations publication regarding gun death statistics of course makes no reference to the right to keep and bear arms because its subject was the relationship between gun ownership levels and gun homicides and suicides. But the relationship between gun ownership and gun crime IS an argument used by campaigns in the UK and in the US to LIMIT the right to keep and bear arms which IS germain to this topic. So there is a connection which is of direct relevance to the topic. I am surprised that you even seem to want to argue this point. It seems rather POV to me for you both to want to keep it out. There will be plenty of WP:RS for this. As I say, I have no wish to present a one sided argument. There are people such as campaigners, politicians, and the criminologist at the University of Zurich Prof. Dr Martin Killias (who wrote the chapter of the book I cited) who believe thet there IS a link between the level of gun ownership and the level of gun crime. Others no doubt will think they have got it all wrong. The point is that we have to reflect all major views. I hope that I have not expressed personal opinion here. By all means point it out if I have. (I did for example not put back the reference I made to the public shock following the [Dumblane massacre] in spite of there being a very similar reference in the article on the attacks on 9/11. Neither have I made reference to similar public outrage in Finland regarding two school shootings here in the past few years nor to similar outrages in the US such as at Jonesbro. I could get WP:RS references and add them in if you like, but I'll not labor the point). --Hauskalainen (talk) 23:39, 15 February 2009 (UTC)

i'm baffled as to what is unclear here. where in the article are your reliable sources making this connection? there are none. the link between gun ownership and gun crime is not a settled matter internationally, e.g. switzerland has extremely high gun ownership and extremely low gun crime. that advocacy groups claim that X is a reason they want to eliminate Y does not mean that their position of advocacy bears relevance to a neutral discussion of The right to keep and bear arms. Their positions may be relevant to Gun Politics etc, but you've failed to provide an actual citation from a reliable source that shows relevance of homicide statistics to this article. absent reliable sourcing the material does not belong. Anastrophe (talk) 00:17, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

Swizerland's rate of gun homicide is low compared to the US and lower than some European countries that have fewer guns. But although the Swiss have admirable restraint in killing other people with a gun (only four times higher than the UK) their propensity to kill themselves with a gun shows less reserve. Switzerland rather fits into the same category as Wyoming.. a lot of guns located in sparsely populated areas. The following data comes from the reference I gave which I cited and you can read it for yourself at http://www.unicri.it/wwk/publications/books/series/understanding/19_GUN_OWNERSHIP.pdf

See especially the Figure 3 on page 300. That figure does not include the US because it is completely off the scale. I've summarised the data in the table below (the data being from 1992) for the UK (which has very strict gun control and which has been tightened even further since the data was collected) and with the US- I also include Switzerland as you mention it. The relationship between gun ownership and gun homicides and suicides is pretty clear.

Country	Firearms (% homes with)	Firearm homicides per million	Firearm suicides per million
England & Wales	4.7	0.8	3.8
Scotland	4,7	1.1	6.9
Switzerland	27.2	4.0	57.4
USA	48.0	44.6	72.8

WP does not call for a neutral view. It calls for a balanced view representing all major views. The views of gun lobbyists, the actions of parliaments in the wake of mass murders, and the opinions of professors of criminology writing for a multinational organization such as the U.N. are all major views and must be represented. We should present the data and the arguments and let the reader decide who to believe.--Hauskalainen (talk) 01:49, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

WP most assuredly calls for a neutral point of view, see WP:NPOV. the problem is, you have not provided any reliable source that makes the connection between RKBA and gun homicide/suicide rates. we emphatically do not present raw data without a demonstrated connection to the ostensible subject matter, in the hopes that readers will synthesize an opinion of the subject matter; that's contrary to NPOV. you've shown a correlation between gun ownership rates and homicide/suicide rates, you have not shown a correlation between the subject of the right to keep and bear arms and homicide/suicide rates. the data you presented immediately above is sixteen years out of date, hardly useful, considering US homicide rates are a fraction today of what they were then. also, switzerland is hardly 'sparsley populated', it has a population density for the whole country of 480/sq mile, compared with wyoming with 5.4/sq mile. switzerland's population density is between that of maryland and delaware - the fifth and sixth most densely populated states in the US, respectively! you wrote "The relationship between gun ownership and gun homicides and suicides is pretty clear.". indeed. what is your reliable source showing a relationship between the right to keep and bear arms, and gun homicides and suicides? if you are conflating the one with the other, you're engaging in synthesis, within article space. that's contrary to WP policy. Anastrophe (talk) 02:18, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

What I meant is that we cannot write from a neutral view (as for example the BBC attempts to do when writing news stories), but we do have to reflect all shades of opinion. You are right about the population density of Switzerland - I allowed my memory of the Sound of Music to overcome me ;) Sorry. I am not sure that the date of data collection is very significiant. Where is your evidence that US homicides are now a fraction of what they were then? Is that a fraction of 1/4 or 9/8? We need to be clear. The data does not look much different to the data I presented earlier (from 2006 if memory servs me right). You keep harping on about my not demonstrating a clear link between gun homicides/suicides and RKBA when I have already told you that the link is clear in the demands of groups currently calling for tighter arms controls (as in the U.S. after numerous schoolm and college shootings and currently in Finland after similar shootings for example) and previously in UK (after Dunblane and before that even with the Hungerford massacre. It is not hard to demonstrate that. Those campaigners use the statistics about gun ownership and gun deaths to make their case. I could VERY EASILY get these links but somehow I think that you are clinging to the silly notion that I have to produce a statistic linking gun deaths to a particular "right" which is not an absolute thing and is regulated to various degreees in different countries.--Hauskalainen (talk) 04:08, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

homicide rate, US, 1992: 9.3/100,000 (100K is the standard metric). homicide rate, US, 2007, 5.9. it dipped to 5.5 in 2000 and 2004, levels not seen since the early 1960's, yet there are far more guns in the US now than back then. [21]. but these statistics are not germane to this article. you wrote "You keep harping on about my not demonstrating a clear link between gun homicides/suicides and RKBA when I have already told you that the link is clear in the demands of groups currently calling for tighter arms controls". am i - and wikipedia readers - to take your word for it? are we to turn this article into a forum for advocacy groups? your statistics are relevant, interesting, and germane....to articles such as Gun politics in the United States, not to this article. you continue to synthesize. who - other than you - is making this connection? i see no citation in the article to support the section even existing. it is weasel-worded as it is. no, the whole section needs to go, it is not relevant to this article. Anastrophe (talk) 04:47, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

The section has been removed. If reliable sourcing can be found that demonstrates its relevance to the Right to keep and bear arms, then we can certainly add it back. --Hamitr (talk) 05:14, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

Hauskalainen, if you can "VERY EASILY get the links" that show the relevance of this section, then by all means, find them and add the section back--properly sourced, of course. If you want the content included, then you have the burden of proof. Thanks. --Hamitr (talk) 05:48, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

SaltyBoatr added "cites" that were unrelated to the right to keep and bear arms relative to gun violence. Have removed the section, for lack of reliable sourcing. It appears that this section is intended only to push an anti-right-to-keep-and-bear-arms POV by conflating gun violence with the right, but without any sourcing claiming a connection exists with the right to keep and bear arms. Cites must at least be related to the topic; it is poor synthesis to just add any old cite and claim, "SEE IT IS RELATED" when there is, in fact, no content in the cites that makes the case. Lets stick to what the cites say, OK? Yaf (talk) 06:31, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

I object to the personal attack which is uncivil and false. SaltyBoatr (talk) 16:38, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

The connection is strong, see for instance chapter 5 of Saul Cornells book A WELL-REGULATED MILITIA ISBN 978-0-19-514786-5 for discussion of the evolution of the "individual rights" theory, pointedly including the Kentucky case Bliss v. Commonwealth, which was in response to gun violence legislation. SaltyBoatr (talk) 17:21, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

passive-aggressive warnings on user talk pages

user saltyboatr apparently disliked my reversion of another editor's unsourced prose added to the article. the edit was the only reversion of material by that editor that i've ever performed on this page. in response, sb - rather than discussing the matter here on the article talk page, decided to do a drive-by tag bombing of my user talk page:

You currently appear to be engaged in an edit war according to the reverts you have made on Right to keep and bear arms. Note that the three-revert rule prohibits making more than three reversions on a single page within a 24 hour period. Additionally, users who perform a large number of reversions in content disputes may be blocked for edit warring, even if they do not technically violate the three-revert rule. If you continue, you may be blocked from editing. Please do not repeatedly revert edits, but use the talk page to work towards wording and content that gains a consensus among editors. If necessary, pursue dispute resolution. SaltyBoatr (talk) 20:49, 14 February 2009 (UTC)

this is annoying, hostile, passive-aggressive, and i'm sick of it. this was not an edit war. my ONE EDIT does not by ANY measure of 3RR constitute grounds to warn another editor. yes, i'm quite totally aware that 3RR can apply to a single edit - but the circumstances here do NOT qualify.

cease and desist with the tag bombing. it's passive-aggressive, annoying, and as it stands, your warning is incivil, and does not assume good faith. stop.

now you have an opportunity to explain - here in the proper forum - what the issue is you perceive. please do so. here. not on my talk page. Anastrophe (talk) 06:50, 15 February 2009 (UTC)

Your series of reverts on Feb15 had an appearance of risk of edit war, and a warning seemed fair and prudent. Sorry if you found this warning annoying. An alternative, less disruptive, strategy instead of wholesale reverts is to insert a ((fact}} tag to allow the editor to provide ref sourcing. Also, please review WP:NOOB guidelines. SaltyBoatr (talk) 22:03, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

"your series of reverts". prove it. there was no series of reverts. furthermore, you know that wikipedia doesn't work the way you're suggesting - editors do not have free rein to insert unsourced prose into articles, expecting other editors to hopefully add fact tagging to their then inserted text. not on contentious articles such as this. lastly, please explain who the new wikipedia user is whom i bit. there is none. you're throwing out red-herrings and WP:SOUP left and right here. you had no business tag bombing my user page with a warning. none at all. all you accomplished was pissing off a fellow editor, rather than encouraging collaboration. it was a hostile action. 22:12, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

Again, sorry. SaltyBoatr (talk) 22:31, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

for all editor's edification, here's the timeline:

07:30, 14 February 2009 hauskalainen inserts long prose section going into great detail about how the constitution is amended, many details of which are incorrect and misleading, and including speculation and OR.

10:38, 14 February 2009 i revert it with edit summary "With the exception of a single citation, this is all unsourced prose, and appears to be OR. please identify who you are quoting or referencing before adding again.."

12:48, 14 February 2009 saltyboatr reverts me, and tagbombs my user page warning that i might be blocked for 3RR for my single edit.

that's it. that's the entire timeline. who in their right mind interprets that as a revert war, deserving of slapping a warning on the user's talk page? its absurd, offensive, and hostile, and the rationale you make above is based on falsehoods. Anastrophe (talk) 22:38, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

note that in the interest of moving on, that's the last from me on this matter. i wanted the record to be clear before disengaging however. Anastrophe (talk) 22:41, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

Regarding your 10:38 14Feb edit. It is inappropriate to use the Edit Summary in that way. Avoid using edit summaries to carry on debates or negotiation over the content or to express opinions of the other users involved. This creates an atmosphere where the only way to carry on discussion is to revert other editors! Instead, place such comments, if required, on the talk page. And, this edit war with Hauskalainen appeared to me at the time to involve two editors, Yaf and Anastrophe. I warned both. SaltyBoatr (talk) 23:04, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

more falsehoods. my edit summary did not carry on any debate or negotiation over the content, or express opinions of other users involved. you're throwing out more soup here. my edit summary explained why i removed the material, that's what edit summaries are for. your claim of tag teaming is bad faith. you have no basis to connect yaf and myself. this falls into the realm of paranoia. there was no revert war, and your warning after SINGLE EDITS was inappropriate. again, your actions appear to have been designed not to encourage collaboration, but to hassle other editors needlessly. it seems you would have preferred to have unsourced prose, stating incorrectly how our constitution works, inserted into the article. your preference is noted, but that's not how wikipedia works, and you would have removed the same material under different circumstances. please stop playing these games. tag me again with a warning for potentially violating 3RR after a single edit, and i'll be forced to file for sanctions against you for these disruptive tactics. Anastrophe (talk) 23:28, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

I object to the false accusation of bad faith. This is a direct personal attack. SaltyBoatr (talk) 01:04, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

certainly, it is not. apparently you have not read WP:TAGTEAM. for your benefit, and the benefit of other readers, i quote from the opening paragraph:

"Wikipedia encourages and depends on cooperative editing to improve articles, and most editors who work together are not a tag team. Assume good faith, and keep in mind that in almost all cases it is better to address other editors' reasoning than it is to accuse them of being on a team.

Accusations of tag teaming are likely to be viewed as uncivil. Care should be made to frame assertions in an appropriate way, and to cite evidence."

you have assumed bad faith, and acted incivily by accusing yaf and myself of being in cahoots, for which you have no evidence (considering i've never exchanged a solitary word with yaf on his talk page or off wikipedia, your claim is laughable). no, the direct personal attack levied was by you. perhaps you might consider not digging your hole any deeper here. Anastrophe (talk) 02:48, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

I did not make an accusation, and your accusation of incivility is not based in fact. I did make an assumption, based on weighing the pattern of appearances. I hear your denial. SaltyBoatr (talk) 02:56, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

so you believe that saying there's an appearance of collusion doesn't constitute an accusation. in other words, it's the letter of the law that matters, not the spirit. ignoring that making the suggestion in and of itself accomplishes the task of publicly calling into question (with other editors) whether collusion occurred, without having to offer any evidence. in that case, i have to say, there's the appearance that you're wikilawyering for uncivil and hostile purposes. Anastrophe (talk) 17:21, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

Once again, I am sorry and I apologize that you perceived this a hostile act. Sorry, that was not my intention. SaltyBoatr (talk) 18:48, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

i wasn't fishing for an apology, but fair enough. onward. Anastrophe (talk) 05:03, 19 February 2009 (UTC)

Definitions section

I am puzzled why this is the first section. The discussion seems to be purely in the context of the meaning in the second amendment of the U.S. constitution. I would suggest we merge this text into the section on the United States. --Hauskalainen (talk) 20:00, 19 February 2009 (UTC)

Neutrality tag in UK section

An editor has placed a neutrality tag on the UK section claiming this neutrality of this section is disputed. Please discuss the reasons for placing this tag in the space below.--Hauskalainen (talk) 23:21, 13 February 2009 (UTC)

Being that this section was about the UK, it was improper to make a false claim of a 41 fold increased risk of murder in the US than in the UK due to guns. Besides, the article is about arms, not guns. With the removal of the false claim, and the removal of the unnecessary biased comparison, I have removed the neutrality tag. In parallel, I have also removed a similar statement comparing the homicide rate in Iraq with Detroit from the subsequent US section. Neutrality Problems seem solved. Have removed tagline. Yaf (talk) 23:35, 13 February 2009 (UTC)

It was not a false claim. It is verifiable. The risk of being killed in a homicide by a gun is about 41 times higher for the average U.S. citizen compared to his counterpart in England & Wales, or indeed Scotland. See my answer to your earlier point above. You should not try to hide the fact from WP readers and the more times you do try to obscure it or hide it, the more blatant your POV pushing becomes. Therefore I added the comparison back. It is perfectly reasonable to determine whether the level of gun availability in a country correlates the gun crime rate. I have added a new section on the subject which uses a wider range of international comparative data. It's less POV than picking on Wyoming, but as I point out above the gun crime homicide rate in Wyoming is likely to be much higher than that in the UK. I am more than happy to extend the comparatives to knives where I am sure the UK and US will be much more closely matched. --Hauskalainen (talk) 06:11, 14 February 2009 (UTC)

what do these statistics have to do with this article? who - other than you - is making the connection between homicide statistics and the right to keep and bear arms? if you can't identify a reliable source that's making this connection, then it means quite simply that you're performing original research in making this connection. Anastrophe (talk) 18:40, 14 February 2009 (UTC)

Who other? Supreme Court Justice Warren Burger[22], for one, makes a connection between homicide and RTKBA. SaltyBoatr (talk) 20:56, 14 February 2009 (UTC)

And it seems that five other Justices of the Supreme court do not. I agree with Anastrophe, why is this comparison important? If the subsection is about the UK, then leave America out of it. I don't know what the facts are, but those about the US are irrelevant to the section on the UK.Prussian725 (talk) 02:12, 15 February 2009 (UTC)

After just reading the section, I find the comparison of homicide rates to be in no way relevant to the section. The section is about the UK, so state the UK's homicide rate, PERIOD. I also find absolutely no relevance in the reference to the personnel visiting with George Bush. Why is that in there???Prussian725 (talk) 02:28, 15 February 2009 (UTC)

Your opinion is just your opinion. Warren Burger is a most reliable and important source, who disagreed with you. He has been dead for nearly 12 years, so which "five other" justices are you thinking of? SaltyBoatr (talk) 04:20, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

The relevance in the Bush visit is that the UK government is prepared to break the law to accommodate one person's needs. That is pretty much exceptional and worthy of comment. As to the comparison data, its relevant because of the extreme difference between the very restrictive gun controls in the UK (relative to the USA at the other extreme) and its very low rate of gun deaths (relative to the USA at the other extreme). But I agree that just giving two countries data is highly selective. We could perhaps add more data along the lines of the table further down and let the reader decide for themselves if there is or is not any relation. That could go into the special section discussing the link or otherwise between gun ownership and gun deaths if you think its too one sided to just compare UK the and US.--Hauskalainen (talk) 21:36, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

warren burger is also a single source, and if we are to maintain NPOV based upon the balance of published opinion, his single opinion - tendered after his retirement from the court, rendering it an opinion carrying no special weight beyond a personal opinion - is not adequate sourcing for the contention. say, got a minute? could you respond to my inquiry below? you know, where you claimed i wasn't editing collaboratively, tag bombed my user page, and since then have remained completely silent (and non-collaborative) on these matters? thanks! Anastrophe (talk) 04:50, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

Patience please, why the rush? The published commentary by Warren Burger solidly meets Wikipedia policy guidelines. What is the question: That homicide and the RTKBA have WP:V association? There are many WP:V sources that this is true. Halbrook discusses it in his book ISBN 9780313265396. And, many many more. SaltyBoatr (talk) 21:27, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

Just answer this simple question: why is it important to compare the UK and US gun ownership/deaths? Why can't the UK section be about the UK and the UK only and leave the US out of it? You may say I am biased, picking a fight, trolling...whatever, but this comparision stinks of anti-US politics because whoever wrote the "UK" section felt the need to compare the UK to the US when the section is about only one of those two nations. I close with a request for an answer to my above question.Prussian725 (talk) 21:03, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

I added the comparison because the US has very high levels of gun ownership and the UK has very low levels of gun ownership. The US has high levels of gun homicides and the UK very low levels. The suicide levels are interesting too. As I say, we can move the data into another section in which we show many countries and do not pick on one country to compare with another. I have seen several tables like this published on the internet. They are not hard to find. Its easy to get valid and consistent international data. We can get quite a large table with reliable sources for data quite easily. I don't think you are picking a fight or trolling. Its a reasonable question. I am not sure what "anti-US politics means". I happened across this file http://www.ippnw.org/Resources/MGS/V7N1Cukier.pdf and saw Figure 2. As you can see, the two countries are pretty much at polar ends. I have not been avoiding your question. In fact I think if you read further back you will see that I already answered you once before. --Hauskalainen (talk) 00:39, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

I do not doubt that the rates are accurate. I just do not think it is appropriate, at least not for this subsection, to compare the two countries when the subsection is specifically about gun policies in the UK. Does anybody else agree?Prussian725 (talk) 13:38, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

It is not appropriate. It simply pushes an anti-US bias into the article. The reason this is obvious is that there is no mention of the legitimate use of guns for self defense in the US, some say 2.5 million uses a year. There is likewise no mention of legitimate self defense in which the criminal is shot and killed, i.e., justifiable homicide. There is likewise no mention that self defense is no longer a valid reason to use a gun in the UK. NPOV is not being followed in the article. Rather, all of this one-sidedness points to an anti-US bias. The inappropriate content should be removed, and the facts should be allowed to speak for themselves. Yaf (talk) 13:50, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

IMO the UK section is for the UK and the US section is for the US. If someone wishes to compare the gun statistics in these two countries, feel free to do so. However, we should not we should not make a newspaper ad out of that comparison. Admiral Norton ^(talk) 14:58, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

Does anyone object to revising the subsection to remove any references to the US?Prussian725 (talk) 20:56, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

Being no objections were noted, I have fixed this problem. Yaf (talk) 19:37, 20 February 2009 (UTC)

It can go into the international comparison section.--Hauskalainen (talk) 00:18, 21 February 2009 (UTC)