Koumei at [unixtime wrote:1194102309[/unixtime]]Which one is which, again?
OK, here they are:
The Second Ammendment wrote:A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the People to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.
Basically it says that the United States needs to have armed forces and that people have a right to fight in those armed forces on behalf of the State. So technically it's unconstitutional to kick someone out of the army for being black, or gay, or any other adjective. Heck, it might seriously be unconstitutional to kick people out of the army for being fat or blind. You know, depending on what you mean by "well regulated".
This bill gets kicked in the nuts all the time, since of course unpopular groups get kicked out of the army
all the time. And while I'm opposed to that sort of thing on a strictly strategic level, it's indeed hard for me to care over much. I personally worked in the paramilitary Emergency Medical System rather than the actual military, so my right to join the actual militia is not something which I am ever intending upon exercising.
Of course, the crazy-hat part is that the NRA keeps insisting that they should be allowed to fight on behalf of the nation
on their own time - that is that the 2nd ammendment actually allows them to form their own militias and go out and fight vigilante style. I am unable to follow this line of logic, since the amendment specifies a
well regulated militia that is
defending the state, and not for example a completely unreglated militia that defends whatever they feel like defending.
And that kind of weakening of the amendment I am deeply opposed to. That's straight bullshit and it offends me when people do it.
The Tenth Ammendment wrote:The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.
This one is pretty much completely meaningless. Since the federal government has the ability to speak "for the people", there really isn't any net effect of this ammendment. Sometimes someone in one state or another will try to get all uppity and use this as justification for something or other, but it basically never ever works because of the weasel words put into the original statment. In 1931 the Supreme Court stated this fairly explicitly with the statement that the 10th ammendment "added nothing to the [Constitution] as originally ratified."
So really, if the 10th ammendment were "weakened" or taken away entirely, I wouldn't even notice. It doesn't do anything now, so it's removal from the Constitution would cause me no more pain than the removal of the 18th.
Now, the ones that indeed I am shaken with shame at the weakening of:
The Eighth Amendment wrote:Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted.
Torture. I am opposed to it. Your nation cannot claim the moral high ground if you do it.
The First Amendment wrote:Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.
This one I'm actually a little shaky on, because the way it has been intrepeted (that those with the money to own the press can do whatever they want and the rest of you can stuff it) is actually a method to establish a plutocratic and hereditary fourth estate. I'd like that to not happen.
-Username17