#200: Civil and Uncivil Rights: The Second Amendment

My older brother periodically texts me suggestions for topics for this column.  Since he taught me to do things like reading and riding a bike, I listen to him.  And so in his honor this, my 200th essay in this space, is on a topic not only suggested by him, but near and dear to his heart.  Merci, Richard.

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What, indeed, are "civil rights"?

I have to wonder sometimes as the discussions around gun control keep flying along.  I suppose there is out there, on Al Gore's Amazing Internet, an actual definition of civil rights in the context of something legally definable.  I'll probably not do the research, but I'll assume there is one.

Would not such definition have to include rights that are explicitly guaranteed to Americans by the actual founding document of our republic?  I refer, of course to rights such as to a "trial by a jury of one's peers", and to be "protected from illegal search and seizure", and "free assembly".

And the right to keep and bear arms.

Now, I have a spotty relationship with the old Second Amendment.  I was an NRA member as a child, until around 1970.  Then I rejoined in 2012, some 42 years later.  I have never in my entire life actually owned a firearm myself; my Dad owned many and some were set aside for me to use in my teens, but I didn't actually own them.

The fact that I've never owned a rifle or pistol does not mean I don't know how to use one.  As a matter of fact, at 18 years old I held one of the highest competitive marksmanship rating levels in the NRA, and had shot rifle competitively in several different organizations -- including my high school team.

My sons both own pistols and know how to use them.  And maybe the first time we shot together at a range, I can't tell what surprised them more -- when their Dad (me), who had never owned a pistol, put five shots in a quarter-sized hole at 30 feet; or when their grandfather, my Dad, who was with us at the time, calmly did the same thing.  My father, who as they eventually learned, had been a champion marksman in the Army in the 1940s, was 93 at the time.

So I will share my view that the Second Amendment is a fundamental, constitutional right.  I believe the states have the right to enact reasonable statutes that may involve the management of the possession of firearms, yes.  But in no case should those statutes place an undue burden on law-abiding citizens in obtaining, keeping and bearing arms -- a view that would have, if obeyed by the particular State of New Jersey, likely saved the life of a lady murdered by an ex-boyfriend while she waited, beyond the mandated period, to be granted a permit.

I do not know what the late lady's family plans to do in this case, other than, as reported in the article, to push for fast-track legislation in Trenton to expedite the process more.  But I know what I think they should be thinking about.

The family of the late Carol Bowne should file a civil suit against the Chief of Police of Berlin Township, New Jersey, and the township itself and, conceivably, the State.  They should be charged with conspiring to deprive her of her civil rights as defined in the U.S. Constitution, specifically the right to keep and bear arms as guaranteed by the Second Amendment.  The evidence is in their callous disregard for and denial of her rights, as shown by their failure to issue a permit to own a handgun in the prescribed period of time set by law, even though she was known to have been threatened.

Really -- even Michael Moore, the bizarre and grotesquely obese far-lefty movie maker, seemed to get the message in a recent tweet -- "Next demand: Disarm the police. We have a 1/4 billion 2nd amendment guns in our homes [for] protection. We'll survive til the right cops [are] hired."  Even he gets the right and, these days, the need to be able to be armed.

But it is not the recognition of the need to possess defensive firearms that is at issue.  It is the right not to have the state infringe upon one's acquisition and possession, the right that it is quite clearly in the Constitution itself.

If any claim to any "civil right" exists, there can be none greater, no more evident and unassailable civil right than those explicitly guaranteed by our founding document.  If any injury to any American due to loss of a civil right exists, there can be none greater than loss of one's life.  Clearly defined civil right ... injury ... lawsuit.  Voilà!

The process for obtaining a legal permit to acquire and possess a firearm in the State of New Jersey is explicit, its timing is in the law.  Thirty days for approval.  The township and the State failed to act in accordance with a law that mandated how Miss Bowne's right to bear arms was to be protected and implemented.

Therefore, Berlin Township and the State of New Jersey have violated the civil rights of Carol Bowne by infringing on her right to bear arms, as guaranteed by the Constitution, and by failing to operate in accordance with their own laws.  Their actions cost her her ability to defend herself and, because of that, their actions cost her her life.

This is a lawsuit for deprivation of civil rights waiting to happen.

I hope there are hungry lawyers reading this.

Copyright 2015 by Robert Sutton
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