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OpEd | False Assertions about Gun Amendment
by REP. THOMAS MASSIE (KY-4)
The original Courier-Journal OpEd can be viewed here.
In defiance of the U.S. Constitution, the Supreme Court and even basic common sense, District of Columbia Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton and now The Courier-Journal (editorial, July 25) continue to attack my effort to restore the right to bear arms in the District of Columbia.
On July 16, the U.S. House of Representatives passed my legislation that would block the District of Columbia from using federal taxpayer dollars to enforce various D.C. laws that infringe upon Second Amendment rights. The amendment passed by a vote of 241-181. Twenty Democrats even voted in favor.
Norton and the Courier-Journal suggest that my amendment somehow “forces big government” upon those who live in the District, and that my efforts to restore basic rights to D.C. residents are inconsistent with my limited government principles. This assertion is false.
First, the U.S. Constitution — the supreme law of the land — states unambiguously in Article I, Section 8, Clause 17 that Congress has the authority to legislate “in all Cases whatsoever” over the District of Columbia. Our founding fathers specifically included this provision because, as James Madison explains in The Federalist No. 43, they believed it was necessary to have a “federal city” accountable solely to Congress. The founders feared that without such a federal city, the individual state that encompassed the nation’s capital would have undue “influence” over the federal government as compared to other States.
In addition, the U.S. Supreme Court has repeatedly acknowledged that the Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution protects an individual right to bear arms that cannot be infringed by the federal government or by state or local governments. In fact, in District of Columbia v. Heller, the court recognized that the Second Amendment simply re-states a pre-existing right to self-defense that is given to us by our creator and not by any government. Then, in McDonald v. Chicago, the court specifically affirmed that state and local governments cannot override their citizens’ Second Amendment rights. And just last weekend, a federal judge ruled in Palmer v. District of Columbia that D.C.’s total ban on carrying guns outside the home is unconstitutional.
Finally, Norton and the Courier-Journal ignore basic principles of common sense in their continuing attacks on my recent legislative victory. Norton even delivered a long floor speech last week in which she declared once again that my amendment is “dangerous,” because D.C. is the “nation’s capital, a prime terrorist target,” and a big city “where gun violence is most likely to occur.” This is precisely why the good people who live in the District should be allowed to own and carry a gun and be free of government attempts to deny them this right. What Norton never acknowledges is that criminals by definition don’t care about laws. They will obtain guns whether or not a particular government decides to outlaw them.
Some may choose to ignore the Constitution, the U.S. Supreme Court, and common sense. Thankfully, the bipartisan majority of the members of the U.S. House of Representatives who voted to pass my gun amendment do not.
Thomas Massie is the Republican representative of Kentucky’s 4th Congressional District.
The original Courier-Journal OpEd can be viewed here.
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