Helping Criminals ?

Cesare Beccaria, a Milanese seventeenth century jurist, economist, and criminologist, published his principal work, On Crimes and Punishments [1764].  He criticised the legal sanction against the mere possession and carrying of firearms that was to become the cornerstone of Second Amendment.  Beccaria’s commentary regarding gun-control laws so elegantly states:

False is the idea of utility that sacrifices a thousand real advantages for one imaginary or trifling inconvenience; that would take fire from men because it burns, and water because for evils, except destruction. The laws that forbid the carrying of arms are laws of such a nature. They disarm those only who are neither inclined nor determined to commit crimes. . .Such laws make things worse for the assaulted and better for the assailants; they serve rather to encourage than to prevent homicides, for an unarmed man may be attacked with greater confidence than an armed man. They ought to be designated as laws not preventive but fearful of crimes, produced by the tumultuous impression of a few isolated facts, and not by thoughtful consideration of the inconveniences and advantages of a universal decree. [1]

Even today, Beccaria’s statement is still valid.

The Department of Justice [DOJ], the Congressional Research Service, the Library of Congress, the National Academy of Science [NAS], and the CDC have found no evidence that “gun control” reduces crime.

In 2003, CDC’s indpendent Task Force studied a wide variety of gun control laws, but “found insufficient evidence to determine the effectiveness of any of the firearm laws reviewed for preventing violence.” 1998, Library of Congress study concluded, “it is difficult to find a correlation between the existence of strict firearms regulations and a lower incidence of gun related crimes.”[2]

After the federal Gun Control Act [1968], violent crime increased until 1991. Washington D.C., banned handguns in 1976, by 1991 its murder rate tripled while the national average rose by 12 percent.

A study by an anti-gun researchers, published in the anti-gun Journal of the American Medical Association [2000], found the Brady Act doesn’t have any effect on reducing crimes.[3]

However: In 2001, Project Safe Neighborhoods [PSN]was created by the Bush administration, which targeted criminals who use firearms, by allocating federal law-enforcement resources to enforce federal gun laws. The program resulted in a 60% increase federal gun prosecutions, a 62% increase in numbers of defendants charged on gun crimes, and increased in sentences for those convicted. In 2003, 93% of defendants were sentenced to some prison time, and 72% were sentenced to more than three years.[4]

The number of privately own guns in America is at an all-time high [upwards of 200 million] and rises about 4.5 million per year.

Since 1991, violent crime has declined every year, 39% overall, to a 30-year low. Murder has decreased by 44%, rape 24%, robbery by 50%, and aggravated assault, 39%. Right To Carry [RTC] states have even lower crime rates on average: [total violent crime is lower by 21%, murder by 28%, robbery 43%, and aggravated assaults 13%].[5]

The law-abiding Americans wants enforcement of the excisting firearm laws against criminals, not more anit-gun laws.

 

 

 

 

—————–

1.  Cesare Beccaria, On Crimes and Punishments 87-88 [trans. H. Paolucci, 1963], in Halbrook, That Every Man Be Armed 35.

2.  NRA-ILA, 2006 Firearms Fact Card.

3.  Ibid.

4.  Ibid.

5.  Ibid.

 

The Pulpit Under Attack

The Founding Fathers were well aware of the threats posed by religion/state entanglement; it’s what gave the world kings with “divine right”. The Framers indented that the “Separation of church and state” clause meant, Government will not officially recognized or give support to an religion as an national institution, not that the church [assembly of people] couldn’t intervene in politics.

“Congress should not establish a religion and enforce the legal observation of it by law, nor compel men to worship God in any manner contrary to their conscience, or that one sect might obtain a pre-eminence, or two combine together, and establish a religion to which they would compel others to conform”. [Madison, Annals of Congress, 1789]

“The appropriation of funds of the United States for the use and support of religious societies, [is] contrary to the article of the Constitution which declares that Congress shall make no law respecting a religious establishment.” [James Madison, Veto, 1811]

It’s the duty of the government to defend the freedom of speech within the free practise of religion.  “As to religion, I hold it to be the indispensable duty of government to protect all conscientious protesters thereof, and I know of no other business government has to do therewith.” [Thomas Paine, the Rights of Man]

Yet, the Government [IRS] is investigating All Saints Church due to a politically charged sermon given by Rev. George F. Regas, titled “If Jesus Debated Sen. Kerry and President Bush” in anti-war view point in Iraq.

The IRS is stipulating that the church violated federal law because the sermon is “promoting a politial campaign on behalf of an candidate” for public office, in which they could lose its tax-exempt status.

The church hired Mr. Owens, a partner in the Washington firm Caplin and Drysdale who was a director of the IRS division for tax-exempt organizaiton for ten years.  “But I do think it’s evidence that the IRS is undertaking church examinations on far less compelling facts, on far more borderline cases, than it has historically.” Owens said.

Fully story: http://tinyurl.com/ykqvhy

The Internal Revenue Service is doing a side-step dance around the “Freedom of Specch” doctrine -the church had some how violated the federal tax laws in its sermon on the eve of the 2004 election.

Read the Sermon: http://tinyurl.com/yejm8w

 

Armed Citizens

A COUPLE WAS a home with their 15-month-old son when two armed men, one of them a convicted felon with a history of break-ins, kicked in the front door. According to police, the homeowner shot both intruders with his handgun, causing the felon to flee and the other burglar to fall dead inside the house. “I think probably if he ahd not had a gun, he would have been [killed],  as well as the female in the house, and possibly he baby,” said Sgt. Jack Cates of the Durham, N.C., police department.

The New & Observer, Raleigh, N.C., 08/12/06

 

NOTHING SEEMED OUT of the ordinary inside a Kentucky Fried Chicken restaurant when a man approached the counter and placed an order. But then he demanded of the cashier, “Give me the money before I shoot you.” Initially, Paul Sherlock joined the olther customers as they bolted for the door. But then he stopped out of concern for the cashier. He recalled a June 2005 incident in which a carjacker shot at him. That was the day he decided to buy a gun and apply for a carry permit. Police say Sherlock faced the suspect, then pulled out his 9 mm pistol. The suspect put his hands in the air and Sherlock ordered him to lean against a window. Police apprehended the man without incident. The accused’s “gun” turned out to be a srewdriver.

Indianapolis Star, Indianapolis, Ind., 08/19/06

 

DURHAM, N.C., POLICE say an intruder forcefully entered an apartment and told the resident he was looking for a purticular person. When the resident said that person didn’t live there, the intruder refused to leave and attempted to restrain the resident. In the ensuing struggle, the resident shot the intruder twice, sending hm to the hospital. The resident was unharmed.

The New & Observer, Raleigh, N.C., 08/22/06

 

JOSE BERCAIN WALKED out of his bedroom and was alarmed to find a stranger inside his home. Police say Bercain darted back into his room and retrieved a handgun. The intruder pulled out his own gun and shot at Bercian. Bercian returned fire, killing his assailant, then fled to a neighbor’s home to phone police. “The dude that go killed was three or four times [Bercian's] size,” said the neighbor.

Gwinnett Daily Post, Lawrenceville, Ga., 08/16/06

 

POLICE SAY a burglar wa terrified to find that his intended victim was armed. “The suspect rang the victim’s doorbell several times, and when he received no answer, he kicked in the front door and went inside,” said Sgt. Greg Minster of the Lancaster,Calif., Sheriff’s Station. The resident, armed with an handgun, took aim at the suspect and ordered him to leave. The intruder dashed from the house, screaming for his accomplice who was waiting in a car. “[The suspect] appeared to be worried that he was being pursued,” said Minster, Police blocked off streets and apprehended both men.

Antelope Valley Press, Palmdale,Calif., 07/22/06

 

State’s Preemption Law Ignored

Washington state Supreme Court blatant ignored state’s preemption law [RCW 9.41.290], reads in-part, “… Local laws and ordinances that are inconsistent with, more restrictive than, … of state law shall not be enacted and are preempted…”, by upholding a city’s restrictions on a gun show.

Sequim Police Chief Byron Nelson also ignored RCW 9.41.010(10) which states a person is not required to have a federal firearm license if they makes only occasional sales, exchanges, or purchases for the enhancement of a personal collection or for a hobby, or sells all or part of the collection- when he announced the restriction a day before the show-that only licensed dealer could buy from unlicensed individuals and that only dealers could “dispose of” handgun.

Full story: http://tinyurl.com/y776wb