From: "Perry E. Metzger" <pmetzger@lehman.com>
Date: Fri, 28 Jan 94 11:58:00 PST
To: Phil Karn <karn@qualcomm.com>
Subject: Re: 4th ammendment and Cryptography
In-Reply-To: <199401281924.LAA10905@servo.qualcomm.com>
Message-ID: <199401281954.OAA03871@snark>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain



Phil Karn says:
> >With all due respect, I find it difficult to reconcile Ms. Kennedys
> >assertion that "the people" refers collectively to state organized
> >militia in the second amendment, without carrying this inference elsewhere.
> 
> I re-read the chapter on the 2nd amendment. I can't find *anything*
> that qualifies as a statement of personal opinion. The closest is a
> statement that "...the courts have not supported this interpretation",
> referring to the claim by "the gun lobby and certain scholars" that
> "citizens have a constitutional right to pack a gun". This is a
> statement of fact about what the courts have said, not a statement of
> the authors' personal opinions. 

It is a statement of fact, but it is also an incorrect statement of
fact. One would go so far as to say deliberate lie or rewriting of
history, but I have no evidence for that. The courts HAVE supported
the interpretation of the "gun lobby", and repeatedly. The problem is
that no case has come before the court since U.S. vs. Miller in
1939. Indeed, it appears that the court is deliberately avoiding the
issue, much as they deliberately refused flag burning cases for over
25 years. In the Miller case, the court specifically held that the
second amendment applied to individual ownership of military weapons,
and found against Miller only on the narrow grounds that no evidence
had been provided to the court demonstrating whether a shotgun was a
military weapon. (Miller's attorneys did not appear before the court,
and thus their side did not present evidence.)

Perry