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SELF CONTROL Not Gun Control
Table of Contents
Introduction: SELF CONTROL Not Gun Control
THE POLITICS OF GUN CONTROL
Poem: Scorched Earth Policy
Okay, Let's License Guns Just Like Cars
Why Do People Fear Guns?
In Defense of the NRA
NRA and the Libertarian Party
Can You Handle Victory?
Putting Republican Feet to the Fire
Political Apologies
Gun Club to Gun Rights Author: No Guns Allowed!
Q&A on Civilian Gun Carrying
Letter to President Reagan on Gun Amnesty
50,000 Watts on Guns
When the Truth is Not in Vogue
More Bogus Science About Guns
Resisting a Carjacker
California Carry
Gun Owner Resistance
The Fallacy of Disarmament
When Should Gun Owners Revolt?
The Second Amendment and Militias
A Clarion Call!
An Open Reply to Representative Charles Schumer
THE POLITICS OF SELF CONTROL
Poem: The Last Mile
Natural Rights and Social Utility
The Social Contract
The Libertarian Insight
Who Would Build the Roads in A Libertarian Society?
Positive Liberty
Compulsory National Service
Ignoring the Framers
Virtual States
American Culture
Censorship and Hate Speech
The Semantics of Hate Speech
Symbolic Speech Versus Speech-as-Action
Taxing Slashers Doesn't Go With Slashing Taxes
The Citizen's Line Item Veto Proposition
A More Bulletproof Bill of Rights
Forcing the Spring
Evolution Versus Revolution
The Tenth Amendment War
How About Some Domestic Tranquility?
A Reply to (Sir Henry?) Clinton
The Dignity of Power
Nixon's Advice to a 1996 Presidential Candidate
No Right to "Just Say No"
The Drug Prohibition Epidemic
During the L.A. Riots
Is This A Case For Perry Mason?
O.J.
An Argument on the Death Penalty
The Aliens Are Among Us
Willie Brown, Terrorist
The General Welfare
RETHINKING FREETHINKING
Poem: 15 to Life
The Meaning of Life
Why I Am Not A Jew And What I Am Instead
Thoughts on Individualism
New Age Thinking
The Philosophy of Neilism
ECONOMIC FREEDOM
Poem: An Economics Lesson
The Convertible Corporation: A Proposal
Economic Scandals
Two Documentary Proposals on Work and Productivity:
That Good Ole American Know How
Time Off The Clock
POWER TOOLS
Poem: Virtual Hope
The New Literacies
Paperless Books
Letter To President Reagan on Space Policy
Deprogram Space
The Coming Golden Age
POWER WRITING
Poem: Chopped Liver Prose
The Biter's Manifesto
Political Parables
A Reader's Rudeness
Novels Versus Movies
Serious Literature: A Letter to The New York Times
Writing Fiction
There Are Two Sides To Every Review
AFTERTHOUGHTS
Poem: A Non-Christian's Prayer to Christ
Afterword: Gunzo Journalism by Brad Linaweaver
About J. Neil Schulman
You are reader number
since March 28, 1998.
INTRODUCTION
SELF CONTROL Not Gun Control
"Who controls the maze, controls the rat."
-Æsop, Li Quai Quat, Pavlov,
or "the lady who designed the downtown L.A. freeway interchange"
This is not a diet book.
Full disclosure requires that since the title of this book mentions
self-control, I'd better get that idea out of the way right up
front, because if this were a diet book, I'd honestly have
to advise you against buying it.
With diet and exercise, I have successfully lost large amounts
of fat several times in my life and kept it off for
years at a time. But slowly, like some relentless force
of gravity, the fat has managed to migrate back onto my body,
and I am currently fatter than I am happy being.
But I am not fatter than I choose to be.
The word "diet"--if you trace its origin back to the
Greek word diaita--literally means "manner of living."
The profession I have chosen involves writing,
reading, watching movies and TV, listening
to music and talk radio, sitting
in chairs listening to people speak, lecturing, and debating ideas--all
of which exercise my mind a lot more than they exercise my body.
These are not high-fat-burning activities. Therefore, any time
I devote to the physical exercise of my body has to be stolen
from time I'd otherwise be spending on doing the brain-oriented
things I regularly do--not only as my means of producing income,
but as the source of my intellectual passions
and pleasures.
There are two purely physical activities, however, that I like
even more than the intellectual ones I listed
above: eating and sex. But, all other things being equal,
eating good-tasting food makes you fat, and the
ability--and opportunities--for having great sex varies
directly as the ratio between the human body's muscle and fat.
I have consulted with a mathematician friend, Dafydd
ab Hugh, and this can be stated as an equation:
[SIGMA] = F +( [mu] / [phi])
where SIGMA is Sex, F( ) is an increasing function, mu is
muscle, and phi is fat.
This is the equation that rules my desire for the physical pleasures
of life. Medieval theologians would say
I am torn between the competing sins of gluttony and lust. Every
mouthful of delicious food I eat puts me farther away from the
opportunity for great sex with some hard-bodied goddess.
Past a certain point, I find solace in eating more delicious
food than my body can burn, and I get fatter. When I get sexually
anxious enough to overcome my desire for food, I start eating
spinach and trudging up the Stairmaster. I've
been eating a lot of spinach of late.
The Stairmaster is an exercise device, usually
found in health clubs, that allows you to climb stairs without
ever reaching the top. It was invented by a man named John
Harrington. I bet John got the idea by reading the stories of
how King Eurystheus had to come up with twelve impossible tasks
for Hercules to perform. If King Eurystheus had
had a Stairmaster to put Hercules
on, he could have skipped having Hercules clean
out the Augean Stables.
Another common exercise device found in health clubs is a treadmill.
This is a sidewalk that goes nowhere, and takes you forever to
get there.
Then there are weights, and health clubs have various contraptions
for lifting them. One expends great effort lifting things that,
at the end of the efforts, are in exactly the same place they
were when you started.
Have you detected the insanity here yet? Throughout human history,
hard labor was necessary for survival. Nobody liked
it but there it was. Now, a lot of us make our money by using
our brains rather than our backs, so we get soft and
fat, which is bad for us. So we go to places where we
pay good money we earned with our brains
to do hard physical work which produces no goods whatsoever.
Why has no one picked up on this? Instead of paying slave
wages to migrant workers for picking grapes, grape growers should
hire Teri Hatcher--the gorgeous Lois Lane on
Lois & Clark--away from being the spokesmodel for Bally's
Health Clubs. Teri could seduce us brain-workers into
paying the grape-growers for the privilege of picking their
grapes. The grape-growers would hire hard labor at a negative
cost and we'd get hard bodies in return.
So this isn't a diet book.
My previous book, Stopping Power,
was subtitled "Why 70 Million Americans Own Guns."
It examined the ability of privately-owned firearms to produce
individual freedom and individual
security. This current book is going to follow
the format of Stopping Power
in that it's also a book I grew from articles and essays rather
than a book I outlined in advance; but this book will "spray
and pray" ideas full-auto rather than my more directed-fire
last book.
About a third of this book deals directly with firearms-related
topics. But unlike Stopping Power,
this current volume doesn't contain a comprehensive treatment
of the firearms issue.
So if that's what you're looking for, I'll direct your attention
to my last book.
Stopping Power set out to prove that guns
are instruments of power, and the people with guns
are the people with power. If that power
is used more by criminals and tyrants
than by decent ordinary people, then you get a crime-ridden and
tyrannical society. If that power
is, alternatively, treasured and exercised by decent individuals
to defend themselves from gangsters and powermongers, then freedom
from crime and tyranny is the social result.
In contrast, SELF CONTROL Not Gun
Control explores assorted issues which revolve around the
uses and abuses of power. Because firearms
are implements of power, some of the materials in
this book must again deal with firearms; but much of it will
deal instead with how power is exercised--either by
individuals who wish to rule their own lives,
or by other individuals who wish to rule their
lives for them.
For that, in fact, is the primary political question
in any society: if you can not, may not, or do not
exercise the power to control your own life,
someone else must and will.
Not all the explorations in this book are political
or even ideological. Some questions which would naturally arise
in any discussion of power relate to economics; so
I have some articles on that; there are some pieces on how technology
can empower us with new tools and frontiers; I've included some
discussions of literary technique and values, since
that is a kind of power with which I have had direct
experience; and if you think I went out on a limb by telling everyone
in the entertainment and publishing industries that
I approve of guns, I'm going even farther out this
time: I'm going to explain as precisely as I can what I think
about God, religion, and the place
of human beings in the ultimate scheme of things.
My friends who participate in organized religions,
and my friends who are atheists, will both find
reasons to distance themselves from me, as I find myself
in that twilight zone of philosophical theology
which used to be called "free thought."
In other words, while I believe in God, I don't believe
in religion.
So why should I alienate friends on both sides of
me?
Call it a form of flashing, if you wish; but I couldn't see putting
together a book about the power of the individual
without treating ultimate issues. Power relates to
what we do. We can't have a comprehensive discussion of that without
also getting into who and what we are.
Returning for the moment to a less lofty discussion of power,
it's notable that proponents of government control over private
guns wish always to bring the subject around to children.
Their rhetoric always focuses on the tragedies that result when
the ignorant or undisciplined among us--and children
certainly are numerous there--misuse firearms. For their political
purposes, advocates of government control over private guns
are exactly right to do so.
But the difference between a child and a grown-up--and
I am speaking personally as the father of a four-year-old girl--lies
not in the child being any less passionate than the
grown-up in the pursuit of her goals, but merely
less practiced in the selection and achievement of them. Kids
are born with an adult-sized willfulness. The job
of growing up involves learning to harness that will to the better
judgments of the brain and heart.
Our society does not handle the transition from childhood
to adulthood well. Biological puberty
makes us physical adults usually between ten and
fifteen years old; our brains need a few years
practice after the onset of physical maturity to be able to control
reproductive impulses with any rationality; our
current society passes out condoms to thirteen-year-olds
but discourages marriage until they're thirty.
But the point is, the psychological difference
between the child and adult is the relative
ability of adults to control their own lives and
negotiate various problems and dangers.
Let's solve the problem of children and guns
right here, since it can be solved easily. Firearms--like
automobiles, like matches, like pharmaceuticals,
like rat poison--are safe and useful when used properly
and dangerous and destructive when used improperly.
Some children can handle responsibility; some adults
can't. The successful ability to make rational
decisions about potential dangers is a function of an individual's
natural gifts, the parenting skills with
which they were raised, and their individual
life experiences.
It's also a function of that ability we have to reinvent ourselves,
which we can conveniently label free will.
Beyond the age of reason when the brain
has completed its growth--which is around the age of seven--the
rates at which individuals master assorted tasks
vary. In emergencies, three-year-old human beings have punched
9-1-1 and called for help. Five-year-old human beings have saved
their parents using CPR which they saw performed on television.
Ten-year-olds have soloed as airplane pilots cross-country.
At seven-years-old, Mozart was composing symphonies,
Sarah Chang was performing violin
concertos, and Bobby Fischer was winning
chess tournaments. Admittedly these are prodigies…but why
should laws be written which hold the gifted among
us to the lowest-common-denominator?
Our society's current practice of imposing uniform
age standards on the transition from childhood to
adulthood--in driving prohibitions, alcohol and tobacco
prohibitions--is collectivist bigotry.
There are some children whom I would trust with a
match or a gun without hesitation; there are some adults
whom I would keep away from anything as dangerous as a can of
hair spray.
In my novel, The Rainbow Cadenza,
I portray a space habitat with a social
contract called, simply, the Lease. The Lease
says nothing more than that signatories agree to answer for any
liabilities for their debts or damages to others. Any adult
may sign it. The test for adulthood is the ability to read and
understand the Lease. No one is required to sign the
Lease--this is a libertarian society
I'm portraying--but anyone who doesn't sign the Lease
must either find someone to act as a legal guardian…or
go somewhere else. In my imagined society, responsible
adulthood is a matter of reason and choice; childhood
ends when you are capable of ending it.
My friend, Dafydd ab Hugh,
puts it more succinctly: if you can't be trusted with a gun, you
need a keeper.
I do not believe this is a utopian goal. As a matter
of fact, I see our current society's problems as
a function of not understanding the differences between childhood
and adulthood in its political decisions.
Statism in all its pathological variants--communism,
fascism, Nazism--treats the government
as a wise parent and its citizens as irresponsible children.
The current term for this is infantalization.
Paternalistic thinking is at the base of even the
more moderate politics of the United States, though
I have often remarked that the United States has two political
parties: the Mommy Party and the Daddy
Party.
The traditional Democratic Party--the "mommy"
party--has wanted the government to take care of all our physical
needs from cradle to grave, with government child
care and education, welfare, social security,
government health care, and government jobs--and plenty of government
oversight for any remaining nominally-private activities.
The traditional Republican Party--the "daddy"
party--expects us to pay our own way, but is more concerned with
our moral upbringing: we must pray, avoid sex
out of marriage, work hard, stay out of trouble--and there's hard
punishment for anyone who disobeys.
Of the two philosophies, the Daddy Party's is
less destructive to society, but both approaches
still miss the point. You don't turn children into
adults by shielding them from either economic or
moral failure: you turn children into
adults by letting them learn from their mistakes
so deep down they know the reason for not doing it
again.
Politicians are the most arrogant, self-important busybodies in
the country. They honestly believe that if they don't solve a
problem, it won't be solved. If there's a scarcity of something
the public wants or needs--child care, Shakespeare
in the Park, literacy, a colony on Mars--the private
entrepreneur sees this as an opportunity to enter the market
and provide it. The political entrepreneur in a
legislature or executive mansion sees it as an opportunity to
create a program--and starts by making it impossible for the private
entrepreneur to compete with the government.
Gun control is at its essence a product of socialist
thinking. It has all the earmarks of virulent statism.
Gun-controllers don't want us to have guns because
we--poor children--are too emotionally unstable and
careless to handle them without shooting ourselves and our friends.
Gun-controllers don't want us to have guns because
in their view we're not supposed to protect ourselves: that's
what the police are there for. Finally, gun
controllers don't want us to have guns because they
have been working hard for the last century to create a cradle-to-grave
socialist utopia--and now that they
have vast bureaucratic mechanisms running our
lives, they're terrified that we might come to our senses
and shoot the bastards who have enslaved us.
They are right to be afraid. That's what the guns are
for.
Not that arrogant tyrants don't deserve being shot
for subverting the American Dream, but it's
a damn sight less messy to overthrow statism in
the voting booth than it is in urban guerrilla warfare.
So Congressman Charles Schumer won't have
the opportunity to accuse me of encouraging armed rebellion:
I advocate working peacefully within the system so long as we
have free speech, free elections, and occasional redress of grievances.
But I'm still going to hold onto my guns in case the
statists get one percent more arrogant and decide
to do away with free speech or free elections, too--for our own
good, of course.
Under those circumstances, Congressman Schumer--the circumstances
of King George III's America, Stalin's
Russia, Hitler's Germany, Castro's Cuba--I would not
hesitate to use my guns to overthrow the government
by force.
We must make a fundamental choice about how we want to live in
this country. We can have a country of self-reliant grown-ups
who are free to succeed or fail--and to pick themselves up after
failure to try again. In practice this means letting us decide
for ourselves what drugs we want to take, what speed
we want to drive and whether or not to strap in, how we want to
educate our children, what weapons we carry for defense.
Or, we can live wearing political swaddling in a
society that makes drugs forbidden fruit,
diverts cops from catching carjackers so they can give out speeding
tickets, convinces children that teachers
are their jailers, and shows by our intolerably high violent crime
rate that only suckers obey gun laws.
The difference between children and grown-ups
is that children are not yet competent to run their
own lives; grow-ups can and must be. We destroy the innocence
and beauty of childhood if it has no
end. We destroy the meaning and pleasures of adulthood
if we do not have the independence to control ourselves.
The Politics of Gun Control
Scorched Earth Policy
It was an ad in the real-estate section.
For sale by owner.
Five bedroom, three bathroom house.
Family and dining rooms, all new appliances.
Three-car garage and large back yard.
Owners motivated to sell.
Fifty thousand pints of blood or best offer.
Well, why not?
Isn't that how we do it?
Dracula must cry
at all the blood ruined by dirt
and because of it.
I can see that some places
might be worth fighting over.
Niagara falls might be worth a few thousand pints.
I might donate a couple of pints myself
for the Grand Canyon.
But why is it
that some deserts
are worth baptizing?
I've seen sand.
When you've seen one dune
you've seen them all.
Cactus isn't that pretty a plant
and I wouldn't take a bus for a camel.
And why is it
that the real-estate they fight over
in Ulster
has the charm of the Bronx?
And Bosnia.
Jesus, Bosnia.
I've seen pictures.
What's left to fight over
isn't worth fighting over.
There is something insane about
variable interest rates
figured in hemoglobin.
So let's play Klaatu.
I'll be Gort.
Solomon would like this, too.
It's a rule from now on.
If you can't play with your toys nicely
You just can't have them.
You fight over land
You spill blood there
You say it's so holy you'll kill for it.
We say:
You have a week.
Get the family pictures
Fill up the pick-up.
Don't forget the dog.
Cause it won't be there after Sunday.
You fight over it,
we'll make it glow in the dark.
You'd better have snapshots
Cause it won't be there Monday.
These things are so simple
if we're serious about ending it.
But if it doesn't happen
Then maybe
just maybe
It isn't about land
But about what we do
for fun?
February 6, 1995
Presented to the 1995 Virtual Gun Rights Conference
as a white paper.
Okay, Let's License Guns Just Like Cars
How many times have you heard gun-control advocates argue that
it's ridiculous just anyone can buy a gun without a license in
most states, considering you need to register your car
and get a driver's license?
Further, the argument goes, guns should be registered
and licensed the way cars are because while it's true
that cars are involved in about 50,000 accidental deaths
a year in the United States and firearms in only around 1,500
accidental deaths, guns are used in around
15,000 homicides a year and another 15,000 or so
suicides.
Of course this comparison leaves out how many automobile
fatalities are actually suicides. Police accident
reports have no good way of knowing how many single-driver
or opposing-traffic crash fatalities are suicides.
An autopsy showing blood alcohol or drugs
won't necessarily tell you it was an accident because wouldn't
you get stoned if you planned to kill yourself in a
car crash?
But the final argument to register guns and license
gun owners is always the same. Unlike cars, we are
repeatedly told, guns have only one purpose--to
kill.
Forget for a moment that the best criminology
shows guns being used two-to-three times more often
in defense against a crime than guns
being used to commit a crime; and forget that the overwhelming
number of these gun defenses occur without the trigger
ever having to be pulled. Let's also forget that 99.6% of the
guns in this country will never shoot anyone.
For the moment, let's just pretend that there is some reason
behind the argument that guns should be licensed and
registered like cars.
If we're going to take that argument seriously, then let's enact
the same standards for owning and operating a firearm in
the United States as are actually in use for owning and operating
a motor vehicle.
Comparing Manufacture, Ownership Registration,
and Enforcement
To begin with, anyone in the United States may own a motor vehicle
without a license. You can be living on death row
in your state's maximum-security prison and still
hold title to a motor vehicle.
But under federal law, no convicted felon,
or dishonorably discharged veteran, or a person addicted to alcohol
or a controlled substance, may own a firearm; and there are
additional restrictions on possession of firearms by persons
under a court restraining order.
If we're going to treat ownership of firearms the way we
treat ownership of motor vehicles, we're going to have to repeal
these firearms laws.
There are no restrictions whatsoever on what sort of motor vehicle
anyone may own. Anyone of any age may buy or own an automobile,
or an eighteen-wheeler, or a motorcycle, without restriction.
You can own a car that looks like a hot dog, if you
feel like it.
But there are both federal and state restrictions
on the ownership of various types of firearms, or even parts
for them. Restrictions include operational capacities,
accessories, or mere appearance. Laws restrict the sale or ownership
of fully-automatic firearms; similar restrictions affect
some magazine-loading but non-automatic firearms. Other laws
restrict rifles with pistol grips or bayonet mounts
or flash suppressers. Federal restrictions forbid
the sale of ammunition magazines that hold more than ten rounds.
There are laws against rifles or shotguns with too short a barrel,
and restrictions on owning firearms which are made to look
like anything else, such as a wallet.
If we treated ownership of firearms the way we treat ownership
of motor vehicles, we'd have to repeal these sorts of laws.
One need not register any motor vehicle unless one operates it
on public roads. In some states, the registration
of a motor vehicle need not be in the actual name of an owner
but may be registered under a fictitious or business name.
One may own and possess an automobile even if
one lives in public housing. There are no laws requiring that
automobiles be kept in locked garages or specifically
penalizing parents if their children gain access to
an unlocked garage and operate the vehicle, causing harm. There
is no restriction on the ownership or possession of motor vehicles
in Washington D.C., Chicago, Detroit, New
York, or other major cities; nor any requirement that motor vehicles
be kept disassembled and locked up or unfueled, unavailable for
immediate use.
In cities such as Washington D.C. and New
York, numerous prohibitions, restrictions, and requirements are
made in the possession of firearms. In Washington
D.C. and elsewhere, if you're allowed to own a firearm at
all, you must keep it locked up, unloaded, and disassembled, even
in your own house. In some public housing projects where the police
are rare, poverty-stricken residents must surrender all rights
to possess firearms for self-protection.
In California and elsewhere, a parent who keeps
a loaded or unlocked firearm for protection,
even if well-hidden, risks special penalties if a child
finds it and causes harm with it.
If we treat ownership of firearms the way we treat ownership
of motor vehicles, we must repeal these firearms laws.
There is no waiting period or background check necessary for the
purchase of any motor vehicle. There is no restriction on the
size, power, or seating capacity of the motor vehicles
one may legally purchase. No one passed laws making it illegal
to lower the noise-making capacity of a motor vehicle; to the
contrary, laws require that motor vehicles not violate noise-pollution
statutes. There are few or no restrictions forbidding automobile
ownership by ex-cons, or convicts on probation, or parolees, or
individuals under court restraining orders, or
even registered sex offenders--not to mention so-called
deadbeat dads. Even persons convicted of vehicular homicide
may usually still legally hold title to an automobile.
But there is a waiting period to purchase a firearm in many
states, ranging from the five days mandated by the federal
Brady Law, to some states or cities where
the background check can take many months to process. Background
checks often block the purchase of a firearm by someone whose
only crime is that she has an unpaid traffic ticket or that
he's behind on his child support, or someone is subject
to a restraining order obtained as a legal maneuver in a divorce.
Often the license allows just one firearm of a type selected
by a police official, and also restricts the times, places,
and purposes for which one may possess that single firearm.
There are laws forbidding the installation of silencers on firearms
which would allow them to be fired quietly during target
practice, with the result that damage to hearing--even with ear
protectors--is common.
If we treat ownership of firearms the way we treat ownership
of motor vehicles, we must repeal these restrictive firearms
laws.
There is no federal license needed to manufacture
a motor vehicle; nor is the possession of parts with which one
can manufacture a motor vehicle subject to federal,
state, or local laws. The federal government does
not raid the homes of its citizens looking for parts that could
be used in the unlicensed manufacture of motor vehicles. Kids
can make or modify motor vehicles in their back yards, driveways,
or in school auto shops with help from their teachers.
In contrast, manufacture of any firearm requires a federal
license requiring fingerprints, an FBI
background check, oaths and warrants, and significant license
fees. Both federal and state authorities
have harassed both licensed dealers and noncommercial
sellers suspected of paperwork or technical violations; and sting
operations have entrapped individuals. Authorities
induced backwoodsman Randy Weaver into sawing
a shotgun barrel shorter than the legal limit, and attempted to
make him miss a court appearance for this violation by changing
his court date without notice; his failure to appear resulted
in a violent confrontation between this previously law-abiding
man and federal authorities. The confrontation
resulted in the death of a federal officer
and of Weaver's wife Vicki, who was shot--standing unarmed while
holding an infant--by an FBI Hostage Rescue Team sharpshooter
only 200 yards away.
At Waco, Texas, an armed assault
by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms
on the Christian Branch Davidians resulted in a firefight
which led to the immediate deaths of seven civilians
and four federal agents, and the later deaths
of over 80 previously law-abiding men, women, and children;
the warrant which authorized this raid was that the
Davidians were suspected of possessing parts which would have
enabled the conversion of a magazine-fed but non-automatic rifle
into a full-auto rifle that--if the federal tax
had been paid--would have been legal to own in the state of Texas,
anyway.
In numerous cases, acting on nothing more than anonymous tips,
federal officers have staged raids on gun-owners'
homes, destroying their property, terrorizing their
families, confiscating valuable gun collections later determined
to be perfectly legal, and even killing their pets.
No compensation has ever been made to victims of
these gestapo-like raids.
If we treat ownership of firearms the way we treat ownership
of motor vehicles, we must repeal these confusing laws and disband
federal police agencies involved in these sorts
of operations.
There is no requirement that a motor vehicle be purchased from
a licensed dealership. There is no federal licensing
of motor vehicle dealers, and no federal bureau
with police powers allowing regular inspection of dealer's sales
records without a warrant.
In some states, including California, all purchases
of firearms must be made from federally-licensed dealers.
All federally licensed firearms dealers must allow the Bureau
of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms
a yearly inspection of their dealer-record-of-sales forms. ATF
agents have been known to use these occasions for general searches
or even theft of any other paperwork they find interesting,
without obtaining a search warrant meeting constitutional requirements.
The Bill of Rights forbids general searches
and requires officers, if they wish a search warrant, to
make sworn affidavits stating with specificity what
they are looking for and what crime it is evidence
of.
If we treat ownership of firearms the way we treat ownership
of motor vehicles, we must repeal these firearms laws, and
forbid such unconstitutional searches.
Anyone can purchase a motor vehicle by mail, or across state lines.
There is no restriction onthe number of motor vehicles one may
own, or any restrictions on the number of motor vehicles one may
buy in a month.
It is illegal to purchase a firearm by mail or from a seller
in another state unless one holds a federal dealer's
license or such purchase meets legal purchase requirements in
both states. Some states, such as Virginia, forbid the purchase
of more than one firearm per month.
If we treat ownership of firearms the way we treat ownership
of motor vehicles, we must repeal these laws.
Comparing Licensing
One does not need any license to be in possession of any motor
vehicle anywhere in the United States of America. There are no
requirements that a motor vehicle be kept locked up and in non-operational
condition as a requirement of legally transporting one. There
are no laws requiring cars to be stored in locked garages,
or otherwise made inaccessible to their owners. Students who drive
may drive their cars to school and park
them on school property if such parking
is available.
In many cities and states, it is illegal for a private individual--and
often even a sworn police officer who is off-duty--to be in
personal possession of a firearm in operational
condition--that is, loaded and without a trigger guard--or in possession
of even an unloaded firearm if it is concealed or not deliberately
rendered inaccessible to its owner; or to keep even an unloaded
firearm in the trunk of one's car or concealed
on one's person.
If we treat ownership of firearms the way we treat ownership
of motor vehicles, we must repeal these firearms laws.
There are no restrictions on the operation of motor vehicles on
private property, with the owner's permission,
anywhere in the United States. A child may legally
operate a motor vehicle on private property with
no license required. The only licensing requirements
in any state are in the event that one is going to operate that
motor vehicle on public streets or highways, in which case one
must qualify for and carry an operator's license.
In many states or cities it is impossible for a private individual
to legally possess a firearm on public streets at all; and
the use of a firearm, even in cases of legal self-defense
or protection of the lives of others, often results
in prosecution on firearms charges. Bernhard
Goetz, acquitted by a jury for shooting young punks
on a subway whom he had good reason
to believe were attempting to mug him, was convicted and served
jail time for possessing the firearm he used to defend himself.
There are additional restrictions on the possession of firearms
by minors, even with their parents' permission, under conditions
where such possession would be for a legally-permissible purpose.
In addition to other criminal penalties, students
possessing a firearm, or a toy gun, or even
empty ammunition casings on school property
are suspended or expelled.
If we treat ownership of firearms the way we treat ownership
of motor vehicles, we must repeal these firearms laws against
possession and legitimate use of firearms.
Training for operating a motor vehicle is part of the curriculum
at public high schools. There are also private operator's
schools in every neighborhood, without zoning restrictions.
In many states one may get a learner's permit to operate a motor
vehicle on public roads as young as age 14, and an operator's
license as young as 16. At 18 one can get an unrestricted operator's
license. Additional tests allow one to operate 2-wheeled vehicles
and 18-wheel vehicles. The test for an operator's license measures
one's knowledge and proficiency in the safe operation of
a motor vehicle. You do not have to convince anyone that you have
a need for the license. Once you've demonstrated competency at
a level that almost anyone can satisfy, the state has no discretion
in refusing you an operator's license. Except for convicted violators
allowed restricted driving privileges, any state's license for
operating a motor vehicle is good in all places
throughout the state, at all times, and every state's license
is recognized by every other state. The license is good
for operating all motor vehicles of that class, not just motor
vehicles which one owns.
In those states where it is possible to obtain a license to carry
a gun at all, such licenses are often at police discretion, and
handed out as payoffs to political cronies. The
licensing procedure is often burdensome, invasive
of privacy, time-consuming, and expensive. In some states the
possession of a carry license is a matter of public record which
can be reported in the news. Often licensing is
blatantly discriminatory against women and minorities.
Often the license has severe restrictions as to time and place
that one may carry the firearm, and limits the carrying to
only specified firearms. Usually the license is not
recognized by other states and a person carrying a firearm
under another state's license is prosecuted as if they were not
licensed at all. In Los Angeles, actor Wesley
Snipes was arrested for carrying a gun; Snipes was licensed to
carry in Florida but was charged anyway. Even in
states, such as Florida, which make issuance of
licenses mandatory to qualified applicants, there are numerous
restrictions on the places into which one is permitted to carry
the firearm, resulting in accidental violations of law
and suspensions of licenses. One must be twenty-one to obtain
a license to carry a firearm in most states; and federal
law severely restricts possession of firearms by
individuals under eighteen, even with their parent's
consent. Firearms training in schools
is a rarity, with the result that those minors in possession of
firearms--even if they have legitimate fear for their lives--are
both penalized for carrying them and often left unqualified,
by lack of available training, to possess or operate them in a
safe or disciplined manner.
If we treat ownership of firearms the way we treat ownership
of motor vehicles, we must rewrite these carry laws to remove
these burdens and restrictions, and make training more available.
You may, with your motor vehicle operator's license, rent a motor
vehicle when your motor vehicle is unavailable--such as upon arrival
at an airport in a city one is visiting.
There is certainly no Hertz Rent-a-Gun at every airport.
Now, shall we place exactly the same restrictions on the manufacture,
vending, purchase, ownership, and operation of firearms that
we currently place on automobiles?
The laws regarding motor vehicles in our society,
while not perfect, at least recognize these common devices as
serving the legitimate purposes of large numbers of the population.
Lawmakers have at least tried to see that the laws governing automobile
ownership and operation do little more than serve basic public
requirements, such as revenue and encouraging proper training
and safety awareness. Ordinary motorists, while perhaps overburdened
themselves, at least aren't penalized for thinking they have a
need to keep a working car with them. Punishments
in our society are reserved for those who misuse
motor vehicles, not those who use them as they were intended.
Contrariwise, the laws regarding firearms in our society
always seem to place the burden of proof on any private
person to demonstrate to some public servant a need to own or
possess a firearm. Restrictions disarm the public in places
where there is increased danger of violence-precisely
where one might need to defend oneself.
It is true that, for most of us, guns aren't as useful
on a daily basis as cars. Looked at with a micro perspective,
you could carry a gun for years before finding it needful;
a gun kept for protective purposes is more like a fire extinguisher
than a car. You might never need it; but when you do,
having it can prevent tragedy.
Looked at with a macro view, existing research shows that one
of your neighbors uses a firearm every thirteen seconds or
so preventing just that sort of tragedy, and that using a gun
for defense against an assault or
robbery attempt is twice as likely to keep you unharmed
than either not resisting at all or attempting any other form
of resistance.
Yet, for a person not either engaged in a life of crime
or professionally confronting criminals,
it is the very unlikeliness of needing the gun that fosters our
problems with them. If more ordinary people carried guns
more regularly, more of us would be familiar with them, education
in them would be as common as for cars, and we'd see
more stories on the news about how one of our fellow citizens
was Joanie-on-the-spot with her gun when some psychopath decided
to turn her lunch break into a murder spree.
The protection of your life, property,
family, and community…hunting game…shooting sports…and
training of the young in arms…these are all well-established
in our nation's customs, the Declaration
of Independence, our Bill of Rights, federal
legislation, and various state constitutions and laws. Unlike
laws treating motor vehicles, our firearms laws are a patchwork
quilt of taxes, burdens, regulations, conditions,
invasions of privacy, and outright prohibitions, all expressing
the mentality that only persons of political privilege
may possess means to use deadly force if the need
arises. Gun control advocates demand a "national
gun policy," but their demands are only for increases in
gun restrictions in places that don't currently have them; they
are unwilling to unify laws in such a way that local violations
of firearms rights are preempted by federal
laws.
So, by all means, let's start immediately rewriting the laws in
this country so that the ownership, possession, and use of guns
are as fair and even-handed as laws governing cars.
Maybe more people will then keep guns with them when
they're needed, and criminals with guns
will no longer operate with the guarantee of a disarmed public
to prey upon.
Honest gun-control advocates should be delighted at this prospect.
They just might get precisely what they've asked for.
The Politics of Self Control
A More Bulletproof Bill of Rights
I've heard two good objections to tampering with
the Bill of Rights, even to make it stronger.
The first is that we don't have the likes of James
Madison and George Mason around any more,
so any attempt to do any wholesale revisions on the Constitution
of the United States will be done by people whose basic philosophy
isn't thoroughly grounded in the principles of liberty.
The second good objection I've heard is that the
Constitution of the United States is a minimalist document that
states broad principles--and if you don't have good
enough people to apply those principles in the first place,
rewriting the constitutional protections to make
them less abstract and more explicit won't do any
good anyway.
So I'll agree that perhaps the following exercise in strengthening
the Bill of Rights shouldn't be taken literally.
But I do think that using this as a commentary on the original
purposes of the Bill of Rights, might be
useful to bring to it a couple of centuries practical experience
in how judges and politicians can twist things away
from their original intent. --JNS
Proposed New Preamble
Derived from the Declaration
of Independence and the Virginia Declaration of Rights.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all Individuals
are by nature free and independent, and have certain
inalienable rights, among which are those
of enjoying and defending life and liberty;
acquiring, possessing, and protecting property;
and pursuing and obtaining safety, happiness, and privacy. That
to secure these rights, governments are instituted,
deriving their just powers from the consent of the
governed. That whenever any form of government becomes destructive
of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish
it, and to institute new government, laying its foundation on
such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to
them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness.
Prudence, indeed, will dictate that governments long established
should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly,
all experience has shown that humankind are more disposed to suffer,
while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves
by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when
a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably
the same object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute
despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such
government, and to provide new guards for their future
security.
To avoid another bloody revolution or civil
war, these revised amendments for the Constitution of
the United States are proposed to strengthen the Bill
of Rights adopted in 1792 so that the people will not have to
once again take up arms to fight to regain liberties lost
in the last two centuries.
Accordingly, upon adoption of these articles of amendment, all
Individuals within the United States and its
territories and possessions, and those of its citizens abroad,
are hereby declared to hold the following Rights, and all laws
within the jurisdiction of the United States or the several states
which are repugnant to these Rights are immediately null and void.
Amendment 1
The amendment currently reads:
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.
Article 1 of the Amendments to the Constitution of the United
States would be replaced by the following article:
All Individuals have the right to be free from
laws respecting an establishment of religion
or taxing or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or taxing
or abridging freedom of speech, or of the press,
or of communication public or private; or peaceably to assemble
in the commons, or to petition the Government for a redress of
grievances; or to travel freely domestically or abroad; yet none
of these freedoms shall be taken as an immunity to invade the
private life, liberty, or property
of any individual not holding government office.
These being among the most fundamental human rights
which enable the existence of a free and just society,
any public official who violates these rights
shall be guilty of a felony with a mandatory minimum
sentence of one year and a day in prison with no possibility of
probation or parole.
Amendment 2
The amendment currently reads:
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.
Article 2 of the Amendments to the Constitution of the United
States would be replaced by the following article:
Section 1
The Right of all Individuals to keep, own, and
carry, openly or concealed, any arms conceivably suitable for
defense of themselves, their kin, their loved ones
and friends, their neighbors, the public peace, or
their state, shall not be called into question in any place in
the United States, except for those persons being held to answer
for an infamous crime or those who, having been convicted of an
infamous crime have had restrictions placed on their liberty
as a consequence of their representing a continued danger to the
public, or in places where such persons may be imprisoned. Nor,
other than requirements that may be enacted for training of the
Militia, shall the government place any burdens
on the acquisition, possession, or ownership of arms. Nor shall
privately owned arms be enumerated or registered with any authority
by force of law. Nor shall any taxes,
tariffs, fees, or regulations be placed on the manufacture of
or trade in personal or militia arms.
Nor shall any Individual be held criminally
or civilly liable for any reasonable act in defense
of life, liberty, property,
or the public peace. Nor shall any sworn police or
peace officer have any greater Rights or powers
than those enjoyed by any other law-abiding Individual.
These being among the most fundamental human rights
which enable the existence of a free and just society,
any public official who violates these rights
shall be guilty of a felony with a mandatory minimum
sentence of one year and a day in prison with no possibility of
probation or parole.
Section 2
A large standing Army being repugnant to the people's Liberty
and creating a likelihood of foreign military adventures,
and public liberty and security being
predicated on the ability of Individuals to act
on behalf of their liberties and personal safety, a popular Militia
is the natural defense of a Free Society,
and posse comitatus drawn from such Militia
is the best protector of public order and safety; however, sense
of duty naturally arising from an Individual's
free exercise of his moral conscience,
no Individual who conscientiously
objects to service in the military or organized
Militia shall be required to bear arms.
Amendment 3
Article 3 of the Amendments would remain unchanged and continue
to read:
No soldier shall, in time of peace, be quartered
in any house, without the consent of the Owner;
nor in time of war, but in a manner to be prescribed
by law.
Amendment 4
The amendment currently reads:
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses,
papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures,
shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable
cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly
describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things
to be seized.
Article 4 of the Amendments to the Constitution of the United
States would be replaced by the following article:
Section 1
The right of all Individuals to be secure in
their persons, houses, documents, files, private communications,
and effects shall not be violated, nor any warrants shall issue,
but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation,
by a Grand Jury elected yearly by
the People, and particularly describing the place to be searched
and the Individuals or things to be seized, and
if such Warrant shall have come about by perjury, malice, manufacture
of false evidence, or malfeasance by any Individual,
such Individual shall be held to answer, criminally
and civilly, for such malfeasance, and Individuals
not charged shall be compensated in full from public funds for
any costs or damages resulting from such a search, seizure, charges,
or trial resulting therefrom. These being among the most fundamental
human rights which enable the existence
of a free and just society, any public official
who violates these rights shall be guilty of a felony
with a mandatory minimum sentence of one year and a day in prison
with no possibility of probation or parole.
Section 2
No Individual in the United States may be denied
or have abridged by law, public, or official act,
any Right, privilege, or immunity held by the people as a whole;
and any official, elected, appointed, or otherwise receiving
remuneration from public funds, who violates the least of these
Rights, even to proposing or supporting a law that would
violate the Rights set forth in this Constitution, shall be held
personally liable, criminally or civilly,
for any damage or dishonor against any or all citizens of the
United States or of any state; and upon conviction of criminal
violation of a citizen's rights may as part of punishment
be further barred from holding any office or position of
public trust within the United States thereafter.
Section 3
Any citizen of the United States or of any state may petition
a Grand Jury to bring criminal
charges against any public official he believes has violated
his Rights; and if the person who might be charged sits upon that
Grand Jury, that Grand Juror shall
be recused and the charges considered by the remaining Grand Jurors.
Section 4
Charges against any government official which, if conducted
by a foreign government at war with the United States,
would be regarded as atrocities or war crimes shall
be tried under the dictum of the Nuremberg War
Crimes trials that following orders in the commission of such
a crime is no defense.
Section 5
In any case where the life of any individual
shall be lost as a direct consequence of an operation conducted
by officials of the United States government, or of the several
states or any subdivision thereof, a Grand Jury
shall automatically convene a criminal investigation
of the officials responsible, and no additional tax-derived
funds may be used for the defense of any individual
indicted as a result of such investigation than would
be available to any private individual under
criminal indictment.
Section 6
No law shall exist whose purpose is to
prevent an adult Individual from
causing harm solely to himself or his own property,
nor conversely from seeking to enhance his own health or well-being
by chemical, medical, herbal, physical, or other means; nor shall
the possession of medicinal substances, herbs, or materials used
in growing or preparation of them be prohibited or burdened; nor
shall the practice of medicine, or of the law, or of
any other Profession or livelihood be licensed
or regulated by the United States or any state or subdivisions
thereof; nor shall any private and discreet religious,
economic, or sexual practice solely between or among
consenting adults be a subject of law.
Section 7
No law shall exist in the United States that shall prohibit
the termination of a pregnancy except that the fetus be healthy
and viable apart from its mother's womb and there exists an Individual
capable of and committed to the adoption of the fetus when born
and to assume all costs of support for the mother through the
birth of the child, any costs relating to the birth,
any costs of care for the mother and any of her other dependent
children resulting from the continuation of the pregnancy
to term, and burdens of parenthood for the fetus when born, in
which case an abortion of such a fetus shall be
tried as homicide; but in the event that no qualified
person has committed to all these costs and responsibilities,
then no criminal or civil charges for
the abortion of even a viable and healthy fetus
shall be permitted.
Section 8
No tax shall be levied by the United States or by any
governmental entity within them for the purpose
of penalizing or limiting any legal act or the use of any legal
product or for the purpose of haranguing the people
with respect to their personal habits and private pursuits; nor
shall taxation be used to finance any activity
which is pursuable by private individuals or
private institutions; nor shall any Individual
be taxed to pay for his own future wants or
those of his fellow citizens when private savings, pensions or
insurance exist to serve those ends; nor shall any tax
exist on wages, interest, incomes, profits, or capital gains;
nor shall any tax be levied without the majority
of the people voting in a direct referendum; and
furthermore no tax may be levied except that it is to
be used for a specific public purpose and no
revenue raised for one purpose may be used for another
without the majority of the people voting
in a direct referendum; and no tax may be enacted such
that it requires burdensome accounting or is ambiguous in its
requirements or requires professional assistance
to understand or comply with it; and if any Individual
may show that they paid more than one-fifth of their yearly
income in taxes they shall be forgiven all other tax
demands in that year and any excess payments shall be returned;
nor shall any Individual suffer any criminal
penalty for failure to pay a tax or evasion thereof.
Section 9
In all tax cases or other civil cases in
which the government shall be a plaintiff against a private individual
or private property, all protections
accorded to a defendant in a criminal proceeding
shall be afforded to the defendant or property
owner; neither shall there be any civil forfeiture
of private property to the government except after
judgment in a jury trial.
Section 10
The government may neither operate any enterprise in competition
with a private enterprise; nor by grant of monopoly, subsidy,
or other advantage to a private enterprise discourage free competition
in any service or product offered to the public; nor prohibit
or burden any private enterprise which would provide a service
or product previously offered by a unit of government or enjoying
an advantage due to government privilege.
Section 11
No law shall prohibit any Individual
from using as a medium of exchange any legal commodity, nor require
any Individual to accept any note as legal tender,
nor shall the United States or any state issue any currency not
backed by a commodity in its treasury, nor shall the United States,
any state or any of its subdivisions contract a bond or debt
mortgaged upon the government's ability to collect future
revenues except in time of war or public disaster.
Amendment 5
The amendment currently reads:
No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise
infamous, crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand
Jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval
forces, or in the Militia, when in actual service,
in Time of War or public danger; nor shall any person
be subject for the same offence, to be twice put in jeopardy of
life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal
case, to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life,
liberty, or property, without due
process of law; nor shall private property
be taken for public use, without just compensation.
Article 5 of the Amendments to the Constitution of the United
States would be replaced by the following article:
Section 1
No Individual shall be held to answer for a capital
or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment
of a Grand Jury elected yearly by
the People, except in cases arising in the military
or the Militia when in actual service in time of
war or public danger. Nor shall any act be a crime in
which it can not be proved that one or more actual Individuals
was caused harm or could likely have been caused harm. Nor shall
any Individual be held to answer as an adult
for a capital or otherwise infamous crime who has not enjoyed
the full rights, privileges, and immunities of an
adult. Nor shall any Individual be
subject to charges arising from the same act or set of facts to
be twice put in jeopardy of life, limb, or loss of
property after an acquittal or failure of a Jury
in a criminal trial to reach a conviction, and
a different name to the charges, or a different court, shall not
be used to circumvent this prohibition. Nor
shall anyone be compelled in any criminal case
to be a witness against himself or supply evidence
against himself to the prosecution, but this prohibition
shall not apply, following criminal conviction,
from a civil case arising from the same set of facts.
Nor shall any Individual be deprived of life,
liberty, or property without due
process of law. Nor shall any witness compelled to testify
in a criminal case be forced to suffer dangers,
loss of privacy, or public indignities as a consequence of their
compelled appearance in open court.
Section 2
No private property shall be taken for public use
without full and just compensation, upon a vote of two-thirds
of those voting in a popular referendum and for no
other purpose than a clear and present danger to
the people of the United States or equally grave public purpose.
Neither the United States nor any state or its subdivisions may
have title to real property, nor may the government
demand public use of private property, with the
exception of rights of way necessary to the public's
right to travel and engage in free commerce and recreation,
national cemeteries, embassies and consular offices. The
devolution of public property into private ownership
shall balance the public interest with the conservative advantages
of private stewardship.
Amendment 6
The amendment currently reads:
In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall
enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial
jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall
have been committed, which district shall have been previously
ascertained by law; and to be informed of the nature
and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses
against him; to have compulsory process for obtaining
Witnesses in his favor, and to have the assistance of counsel
for his defence.
Article 6 of the Amendments to the Constitution of the United
States would be replaced by the following article:
Section 1
In all criminal prosecutions the accused shall
enjoy the Right to a speedy and public trial by an impartial jury
of the district wherein the crime shall have been committed, which
district shall have been previously ascertained by law;
and to be informed of the nature and cause of the
accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses against him; to
have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses
in his favor, and to have the assistance of competent and energetic
Counsel for his defense.
Section 2
The standard for conviction in all criminal trials
shall be proof beyond a reasonable doubt. If a jury
shall conclude after its deliberations that the prosecution has
failed this burden, they may enter a verdict of "Not proven"
and the Defendant shall go free. But if a jury is further
convinced that the innocence of a Defendant has been proved, they
may return a verdict of "Innocent." A Defendant judged
innocent shall, in addition to freedom, be entitled
to have the costs of his legal defense paid for
by public funds; shall be entitled to damages due to loss of liberty
and livelihood; damages from any person presenting or conspiring
to present perjured testimony or maliciously presenting or conspiring
to contrive false evidence; and a Defendant judged
innocent may further seek damages for libel or slander against
any public official, journalist, broadcaster,
or media outlet who damaged or continues to damage
his good name with unproved accusations, whether
malice was present or not.
Section 3
In all criminal prosecutions and civil
matters each jury shall be selected from a pool of
rational citizens, excluding anyone who has been
within the last seven years a public official or government
employee or who has within seven years practiced
law as a profession, who have demonstrated
in their lives common sense, courage, a knowledge
of the law in general and of the issues of the specific
crimes being charged or issues being litigated, and shall be of
a sufficient moral stature to overcome any preconceptions
or prejudices that may have arisen in their minds from public
discussion of the case prior to the commencement of trial. Each
jury shall have the power to rule both
upon the facts of the case and to nullify any charge or law
for that case they consider to be unjust, and shall not be bound
to the precedents established in any prior case. The judge for
each trial shall be elected by the jury and no fact
or issue of law shall be considered except in open court
with the full jury present. No jury shall
be sequestered except by a majority vote of its
members. A jury shall adopt its own rules for deliberations
and jurors may inquire directly of attorneys and witnesses, call
their own witnesses, and consult scholars, in order to inform
themselves of the true facts and apply the law equitably.
Jurors shall be compensated from public funds in a sufficient
amount to compensate them for the loss of time from their regular
livelihoods. The judge in the trial may declare a mistrial upon
discovery of misconduct by any juror, and any juror engaging in
misconduct may be held both civilly and criminally
liable.
Section 4
No magistrate may impose a punishment upon any
Individual for Contempt of Court except by presentment
or indictment by a Grand Jury and
conviction on the charge in a criminal trial by
Jury.
Amendment 7
The amendment currently reads:
In Suits at common law, where the value
in controversy shall exceed twenty dollars, the right of trial
by jury shall be preserved, and no fact tried by a
jury, shall be otherwise reexamined in any Court of
the United States, than according to the rules of the common Law.
Article 7 of the Amendments to the Constitution of the United
States would be replaced by the following article:
Section 1
In suits at common law, where the value
in controversy shall exceed five troy ounces of .999 fine
gold, the Right of trial by jury shall be preserved,
and no fact tried by a jury shall be otherwise reexamined
in any Court of the United States, than according to the rules
of the common law.
Section 2
A prevailing Plaintiff in any civil suit shall be
entitled, in addition to any damages received, to require the
Defendant to pay court costs, attorney's fees, and other costs
associated with pursuing equity. A prevailing Defendant in any
civil suit shall be entitled to require the Defendant
to pay court costs, attorney's fees, and other costs associated
with defending the suit, and if prosecution was malicious, equitable
punitive damages.
Section 3
No person or company selling a consumer product shall be held
criminally or civilly liable for damages
caused by use of that product where either it was criminal
misuse or an unwise or unintended use of the product which was
responsible for the damages; and vicarious liability of a producer
or seller of a consumer product shall be allowed only in those
cases where a producer or seller was aware of a possible danger
from the intended use of that product and failed to make a reasonable
attempt to warn consumers of that danger.
Section 4
No law, treaty or contract shall exist in the United
States unless written in plain language understandable to an Individual
of average intelligence and literacy;
and all laws and treaties under consideration in any deliberative
governmental body shall be made available free for examination
to all citizens of the United States; nor shall any law
or treaty be enacted that is of such excessive length, or which
has been so recently drafted, that the public has not had time
to contemplate its effects.
Amendment 8
The amendment currently reads:
Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines
imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted.
Article 8 of the Amendments to the Constitution of the United
States would be replaced by the following article:
Section 1
Excessive bail shall not be required, but if an individual
charged with a crime shall be judged from evidence
and testimony presented to obtain indictment to represent a pretrial
threat to the safety of any other person such that complete liberty
would be imprudently granted, then bail may be denied. If a non-convicted
defendant shall be denied bail or is not able to raise bail, then
only those specific restrictions on the comfort, privacy,
and liberty of such a non-convicted defendant which
are necessary to public safety shall be permitted. If any lesser
form of restricted liberty other than pretrial jailing
may bind a defendant for trial without endangering the safety
of others, it shall be used instead.
Section 2
Neither excessive fines shall be imposed nor cruel and unusual
punishments inflicted, nor shall retaliation
be the primary purpose of criminal
law except that it seeks redress on behalf of victims
for harms caused by a criminal act and acts to
bar dangerous individuals from inflicting further
harms on the innocent.
Section 3
Execution as a penalty shall be imposed in the United States only
for the crime of Capital Murder with the circumstances
of gratuitous cruelty or multiple victims, where
an Individual so convicted was capable of and
is proved to have had the specific and premeditated intent
to cause the death of some innocent victim,
and where in the jury's deliberations none of the jurors expressed
any belief in the Defendant's actual innocence. Upon
petition to the sentencing authority, a kin or designated
heir of the victim may be granted the right to perform
the execution in place of a public official;
but in the absence of such a petition, a convicted murderer
awaiting execution shall be afforded the right,
upon a personal appearance before the sentencing authority
to make such a request, to have the execution
performed immediately or, alternatively, to be afforded the means
to commit painless suicide. Any convicted murderer
sentenced to life imprisonment with no possibility
of parole shall likewise be afforded the right, upon a personal
appearance before the sentencing authority to make
such a request, to be executed in lieu of life imprisonment
or, alternatively, to be afforded the means to commit painless
suicide.
Section 4
All Capital Murder convictions resulting in a sentence
of execution shall be automatically, immediately,
and directly appealed to the Supreme Court
of the United States, which must confirm the conviction,
the sentence, and the date set for execution.
Thereafter, the only basis for a stay of any death
sentence, or a request for a new trial, shall be the revelation
of a previously unavailable witness or exculpatory evidence
or sworn testimony unavailable or concealed at the time of the
trial, which speaks to the actual innocence of the Individual
under sentence of death.
Amendment 9
The amendment currently reads:
The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights,
shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by
the people.
Article 9 of the Amendments to the Constitution of the United
States would be replaced by the following article:
Section 1
The enumeration in this Constitution of certain Rights shall never
be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the People;
notwithstanding, nothing here shall be constructed to prevent
additional limitations on public power to enhance
the protection of the people from tyrannical
abuse for private purposes under the cloak of public
office.
Section 2
All rights, enumerated or not, held by free white
male Protestant property owners in any of the 13
original states at the time of the adoption of the Ninth Article
of Amendment to the Constitution of the United States are hereby
recognized to be fundamental rights retained by all
the people of the United States to this day, and all laws and
regulations of the United States or of the several states which
infringe the least of these rights are declared repugnant
to the intent of the Ninth Amendment and hereafter void.
Section 3
All precedents established by a decision of the Supreme
Court of the United States, or of any lesser federal
court, or of any court in the several states, which either violate
or fail to protect any of the rights in the original
ten articles of amendment to the Constitution of the United States
from violations by either the federal government
or the several states, are hereby nullified to that extent.
Section 4
In all questions relating to the Construction of these Rights,
decisions must be ruled according to the intent that Individual
private powers be nurtured and the private Individual
be protected from the natural tendency of those
in government to expand the sphere of public power.
The protection of these Rights shall be the first
and last duty of all persons holding any office of public
trust, and the interpretation of these Rights shall firstly
and lastly be decided by the Sovereign Individuals
of the United States and the several states, as expressed in their
acts as members of juries and Grand Juries.
Amendment 10
Article 10 of the Amendments would remain unchanged, and continue
to read:
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.
Rethinking Freethinking
The Meaning of Life
Here it is. The Meaning Of Life.
You've been asking all these centuries, and I'm answering it in
226 well-chosen words.
As Dorothy Parker might have said, this
book is cheap at half the price. --JNS
"Meaning" is possible only to beings capable of reflection
and understanding--call it sentience, sapience,
or intellect. Thus, the "meaning
of life" is that which a reflective being understands
about life.
As for the "purpose" of life--that
also requires an intelligent being, for a purpose
implies a consciously chosen value. For example, one
can say that DNA has a purpose of replicating
and continuing certain forms of life--if one believes
that DNA is, or has been programmed by, an intelligent
entity. One could talk about the purposes of "evolution"
only if one believed that evolution is a programmed function of
some intelligent being. But even if one believes
that there is a Grand Purpose to the Universe,
or to All Living Things, or even to The Human Species--it does
not necessarily follow that this is the only purpose
of life--or that individual, intelligent
beings might not have other, even contradictory, purposes.
To sum up: whatever the purposes DNA, Evolution, or
God may have for life--if there are any such
purposes at all--each of us has to choose our own purposes anyway.
"Meaning" and "purpose" function
only within the context of specific Beings
capable of reflecting on and choosing goals, and figuring
out ways to achieve them--and that's you and me as much as anyone
else inside (or outside) the universe.
Economic Freedom
Two Documentary Proposals on Work and Productivity
In late November, 1980, I was given an opportunity to research
and propose ideas for a documentary to be developed by Public
Communications, Inc., on the topic of work and productivity, being
underwritten by Chase Manhattan Bank for public television. The
president of Public Communications, Robert
Chitester, had previously worked with Milton
Friedman to produce the highly-acclaimed public TV series,
Free to Choose.
It was an exciting opportunity for me, particularly since I was
flown around on a six-city tour to meet with university presidents,
business leaders, economics writers, and Nobel-prize laureate
Norman Borlaug, father of the "green
revolution."
At the end of the research, I wrote two documentary proposals…and
never heard what happened to either of them after delivery. All
I know is that they were never produced.
But that sort of thing isn't at all uncommon in the TV
business--even public TV, I guess.
What are fifteen-year-old unproduced proposals for public
TV documentaries worth? In the marketplace,
zero.
But I find I regret they were never made. --JNS
Time Off the Clock
5 December 1980
The Premise
So you want to take a look at productivity in America, today,
with an emphasis on what we're doing right and how we can make
it still better?
We in America today--as I write this, in December, l980--are caught
in a paradox. The past two centuries have lifted us out of the
world's historical poverty and stagnation and even with our current
problems we are still the most prosperous civilization
this world has even seen. Yet, the causes of our prosperity are
not generally understood, and because we have not been able to
make these riches universal, there are those among
us who damn them, and would rather that we all be made equal.
Equally poor, that is.
A second paradox. We measure change in decades, now, rather than
in millennia, yet we forget what the world was like a scant century
ago.
Would a mother in 1880, who could expect to lose at least one
of her children to disease, have believed a world
in which kids are inoculated against polio,
measles, rubella, and chicken pox before entering school--while
diphtheria, rheumatic fever and smallpox are historical curiosities7
(On the other hand, how would a mother of 1880 have dealt with
a world in which the greatest killers of teenagers
are reckless driving, alcoholism, drug
abuse, and suicide?)
One century? Try fifty years. Would a world half a century
ago, in 1930, barely used to airplanes, radio, talking movies,
and medical X-rays have believed in the possibility of robot spaceships
sending back color TV pictures of Saturn,
computers that play games with your kids,
and laser surgery that can make the blind see again?
A third paradox. We live in an age of cynicism--of energy shortages,
pollution, inflation--of "lowered
expectations."
Yet, today, we have in our possession the technological
and industrial capability (just add a teaspoonful
of will) to give the whole world our current standard of living…and
to give us a living standard greater than the richest among us
today.
Energy shortages? Ten satellites orbiting the Earth in the year
2000 could beam down on laser beams enough solar energy
to supply all America's energy needs. Cost per megawatts less
than nuclear, coal, or hydroelectric power. Pollution:
none. Risks: fewer deaths than the coal cycle; no
potential disaster risk comparable to
dam bursts (the highest cost in lives of any power
source), much less nuclear meltdown. Investment needed
to get them into the energy network: about the same as the Alaskan
pipeline.
A greater standard of living than the richest among us today?
Can David Rockefeller, for all his wealth,
expect to spend his retirement in an environment
where reduced gravity could be expected to give his heart twenty
years past his present life expectancy? What are those
twenty years worth? Not too long from now, if we get busy, we
can extend that possibility to large segments of our population…if
they'll move to habitats in space.
Habitats in space? Who'd want to move to outer
space?
A lot of people, probably. Space is limitless--no possibility
of overcrowding because you build as many habitats as you like,
as large as you like. Mine the asteroids and the
moon for materials and use the sun to smelt what you need. To
move things around, you only use energy to accelerate and decelerate…not
to keep going. That makes transportation dirt cheap…even
from the asteroid belt.
Who'd want to live in space? Who'd want to live in an orbiting
city of several million people--less crowded and more comfortable
than Atlanta or Houston--designed to be pollution
free, with factories, farms, and homes within minutes of each
other, but totally separated? Swimming pools and ski slopes within
a ten minute ride on an electric shuttle? Weather
designed to taste? Who'd want zero-gravity
honeymoon hotels, flying on wings strapped to your arms--just like
birds--sunlight on tap 24 hours a day (You'd prefer 26? Okay.)
but shut off by closing the blinds. No traffic jams, mosquitoes,
locusts, roaches, rats, flu season, earthquakes, volcanoes, hurricanes,
blizzards, monsoons, tidal waves, mudslides, or smog?
Their jobs? Mining the moon? Manufacturing foamed metals in zero-gravity?
Pharmaceutical production? Who knows? How
do you say "I'm in software" to our friends
from 1930?
But somebody's going to have to service those solar
power satellites.
As for those who decide to live and work back on Earth, with most
of the dirty jobs moved into space where they can't pollute anything,
the Earth will become a cleaner, safer, less crowded, and more
comfortable place to live, also.
You want to discuss work and productivity in 1980? How can we
discuss problems today when we'll have completely different problems
in a few years?
The worker of 2030 will have a job as incomprehensible to us in
1980 as the explanation "I'm in software"
would be to someone from 1930.
If we wish to get some perspective on work and productivity today,
we need a view based on change. We need to look back, to see where
we came from, and we need to look forward, to see where we're
going.
"Yesterday is gone," says science
fiction author Robert
Anton Wilson, "the Future is now, and
the Present is becoming the Past even as you read this."
One thing's for sure. If Time is Money, then the future
is worth quite a bit…because it's all we have left.
The Future. You'll be living there the rest
of your life.
The Bit
As that great philosopher of metaphysical logic,
Johnny Carson, says, "If you buy the
premise, you buy the bit."
The premise is that we need to use change as the
lens to focus on productivity and work. Looking at the present
doesn't tell us anything meaningful. The bit is what we need to
make the focus come alive…to make it television.
We need a gimmick.
And, we're in luck. We already have an entire field devoted
to using change as a lens to examine ourselves and our problems.
No, not futurism. These people are amateurs,
much too wrapped up in the short-term problems of today to see
tomorrow very well. They suffer from lack of imagination in their
projections, so they're always wrong.
The field I'm talking about can claim the largest box office
movie of all time, Star Wars,
one of the most popular and enduring TV series of all
time, Star Trek, and a formidable part
of publishing industry profits.
Science fiction.
Science fiction isn't about cute robots and laser guns
any more than Hamlet is a story about a ghost. The cute
robots and laser guns are just to get the kids
interested: they have the most flexible minds.
Science fiction is the literature of change--so
defines the dean of science fiction
authors, Robert A. Heinlein.
Heinlein ought to know with 40 science
fiction books to his credit, half-a-dozen million-sellers
among them.
From Mark Twain to H.G. Wells
to Heinlein, science
fiction has just the gimmick we need to examine work and
productivity, today, tomorrow, and yesterday. It's called time
travel.
Twain used it in A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court
to compare medieval England with l9th century America. Wells used
it in The Time Machine to project his
views on class conflicts to a society where workers
are debased troglodytes and the upper class are their cattle.
Heinlein used it in his l950's book The Door
into Summer to compare his future projection
of 1970 with his future projection of 2000--to
prove that progress does make things better.
You want a documentary on work and productivity in America today?
How about making your interviewers three young actors (two guys
and a girl?) portraying future college students,
say, 100 years from now. We start in their class on 20th century
history where they're discussing the economic crisis of America
in the 1980's. To them it's a dusty dry subject--just something
to learn, pass a test, and forget.
Until their professor (played by 1970 Nobel Peace
Prizewinner Dr. Norman Borlaug) springs
a surprise quiz on them for the next day. A quiz they're completely
unprepared for.
"What was it," the Professor asks them, "that got
the Americans through their crisis?"
As the students discuss their problem after class we get a glimpse
of their society. It's solved many of the problems
we face today. There's power to spare, no pollution,
no unemployment or inflation, taxes
are a thing of the past (everything is handled through direct-use
fees, memberships, and insurance premiums), transportation is
quick and efficient. Expensive to portray, you say? Not to
the experts of videotape, with their Magicam miniatures, blue
screen, and computer animation.
How far out do you want to get? How about putting their classroom
in an orbiting space habitat between the Earth and the moon--at
the gravitational balance point between them, nearer the moon?
But they're still stuck with this surprise quiz. That, at least,
hasn't changed in 100 years. And being college kids,
they decide to bend the rules a bit to do some unauthorized
spot research.
They steal a time machine. A space ship, actually,
that can also travel backwards in time.
And, of course, they blow it. They set the controls wrong and
go a century too far back…they end up in the l880's. Which
gives us a look at work and production in that era. When factories
were just becoming popular, lifting civilization out
of agricultural poverty. When pollution problems
were first being dealt with by the courts, and creating--by
their decisions--the pollution problems of the
future…our present. When instead of auto
exhaust the big problem in cities was horse droppings.
But, they get back into their time machine
after a bit and finally make it to our present in the 1980's.
They start traveling around today (once they manage to get some
current clothing) to actual factories, businesses, shopping centers.
They conduct real interviews with real assembly-line workers,
proprietors, and employees.
It also seems logical that the students seek out various experts
of our time who might be able to give them some answers. One of
those people would be Dr. Norman Borlaug,
who would also play his present-day self.
And, we can have some fun. At the end of an interview, say, with
assembly-line workers in the General Motors factory in Detroit
(unknown in advance to the workers, who think the interviews are
for a normal documentary), the students are interrupted by the
black-uniformed Time Police, whose job it is to make sure the
students don't accidentally change the past (our present) thus
ruining their present (our future).
I can see into the future a bit myself. I see
a two-page photo-story in TV Guide asking what
sort of public TV documentary has Nobel-Prizewinner Dr.
Norman Borlaug standing in a futuristic
classroom wearing Buck Rogers tights, and who are these black-uniformed
guys with the funny ray guns chasing three young interviewers
through the General Motors factory?
Tights and plastic ray-guns don't run up the budget
very much.
At the end of their travels through present-day America, our students
are captured by the Time Police and returned to their classroom
where they wrap up a discussion of what they have learned with
their professor (Dr. Borlaug).
One thing's for sure. This wouldn't be just another boring documentary.
References:
The Third Industrial Revolution
by G. Harry Stine
A Step Farther Out by Jerry Pournelle,
Ph.D.
The High Frontier by Gerard K. O'Neill, Ph.D.
Expanded Universe by Robert
A. Heinlein
Power Tools
The Coming Golden Age:
A Proposal for a Nonfiction Book
Early in 1983, I submitted a proposal for a nonfiction book
to Larry Freundlich, the editor who had bought The
Rainbow Cadenza while he was with Simon & Schuster; he
now had his own publishing company, Freundlich Books.
Either Larry was a lot thriftier with his own money than with
Simon & Schuster's, or I should have taken a more traditional
approach to outlining a book proposal: he turned me down.
Now, a dozen years later, you get to second-guess Larry's editorial
judgment and decide whether this is a book I should have written.
--JNS
The following is a transcript, obtained by Tachyon Receiver, of
an interview with J. Neil Schulman, author
of The Coming Golden Age, with David Hartletter on NBS
television's Good Night, Good
Morning, October 16, 1984.
HARTLETTER:…fun we always have on this program. (Audience
laughter.) And we'll have that live report later in the show.
Coming up next is J. Neil Schulman, author
of the new book, The Coming Golden Age. We'll be right
back after these short messages.
(Back from commercial.)
HARTLETTER: (After throwing paper airplane at Fred, his producer,
off camera.) And, we're back. With us now is author
J. Neil Schulman. We first had Neil on this show a year-and-a-half
ago when his novel, The Rainbow Credenza…what, Fred?
Oh, The Rainbow Cadenza…(Slaps
his own face.)…first came out. Now, we've been hearing
a lot this year about Big Brother, and everybody's been talking
about how everything is just going to continue getting worse and
worse…worldwide famines, depressions, nuclear holocaust…you
name it, we're supposed to get it. Well, Neil doesn't think this
is true at all. In fact, he thinks just the opposite, that we're
on the verge of a Coming Golden Age, which--coincidentally enough--is
the title of his new book being published this month.
Will you welcome, then, J. Neil Schulman.
(Schulman walks out as audience applauds, shakes David's hand,
sits down, waits for applause to die down.)
SCHULMAN: I can't wait for that live report.
(Audience laughter.)
HARTLETTER: Yes, what wonderful things they can do with chickens
nowadays. Neil, your first two books were both fiction--novels
set in the future. Your first novel, Alongside
Night, showed us a U.S. economy collapsing from mismanagement,
and your second novel, The Rainbow
Cadenza, projected a future with seven
men for every woman on Earth, and with women either being drafted
into public sexual service or being hunted for rape
at night. Now you come along and tell us in your new book that
you actually think that things are going to be pretty rosy. Well,
have you been lying to us in your first two books? I mean,
what's going on here?
SCHULMAN: Well, David, of course I've been lying. One definition
of fiction has always been a lie convincingly told. And,
of course, both my novels were what's called "cautionary
tales"--stories meant to prevent what they're portraying.
But, you see, that's part of my point right off. Neither of my
novels was meant to predict gloom-and-doom. I end