Quote:
Originally Posted by Bob K
The Bil of Rights confirms that we have that right. What if that confirmation wasn't in there? You're both saying the same thing.
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Actually no, it's not the same thing. "Granting" and "confirming" are NOT the same thing at all. The US Constitution and the Bill of Rights were not written by the government at all. They were written by people endeavoring to CREATE the government and thereby used as a rule book to try to CONTROL the government. The Bill of Rights was written in order to quell complaints that the US Constitution did not go far enough to protect the people from the government they were creating. Not surprisingly, after recently escaping from the control of England, our forefathers did not want to just jump right back into that situation again with our own newly created government. So they tried as best they can to keep that from happening.
Again, Shadow's comment was:
"The constitution (depending on which justice is proffering thier opinion today) does grant us the "right" however
(by government) to "keep and bear arms."
But it's a common mistake for people to believe that those documents detailed the privileges that the government allows us to have, rather than the other way around.
And I do believe that our forefathers knew the difficulty we would have keeping out government within the bounds they set.
Quote:
NUMBER: 1593
AUTHOR: Benjamin Franklin (1706–90)
QUOTATION: “Well, Doctor, what have we got—a Republic or a Monarchy?”
“A Republic, if you can keep it.”
ATTRIBUTION: The response is attributed to BENJAMIN FRANKLIN—at the close of the Constitutional Convention of 1787, when queried as he left Independence Hall on the final day of deliberation—in the notes of Dr. James McHenry, one of Maryland’s delegates to the Convention.
McHenry’s notes were first published in The American Historical Review, vol. 11, 1906, and the anecdote on p. 618 reads: “A lady asked Dr. Franklin Well Doctor what have we got a republic or a monarchy. A republic replied the Doctor if you can keep it.” When McHenry’s notes were included in The Records of the Federal Convention of 1787, ed. Max Farrand, vol. 3, appendix A, p. 85 (1911, reprinted 1934), a footnote stated that the date this anecdote was written is uncertain.
SUBJECTS: Republic
WORKS: Benjamin Franklin Collection
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