Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor ruled in January 2009 that states do not have to obey the Second Amendment’s commandment that the right to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.
In Maloney v. Cuomo, Sotomayor signed an opinion of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit that said the Second Amendment does not protect individuals from having their right to keep and bear arms restricted by state governments.
The opinion said that the Second Amendment only restricted the federal government from infringing on an individual's right to keep and bear arms. As justification for this position, the opinion cited the 1886 Supreme Court case of Presser v. Illinois.
“It is settled law, however, that the Second Amendment applies only to limitations the federal government seeks to impose on this right,” said the opinion. Quoting Presser, the court said, “it is a limitation only upon the power of Congress and the national government, and not upon that of the state.”
The Maloney v. Cuomo case involved James Maloney, who had been arrested for possessing a pair of nunchuks. New York law prohibits the possession of nunchuks, even though they are often used in martial arts training and demonstrations.
The meaning of the Second Amendment has rarely been addressed by the Supreme Court. But in the 2008 case of Heller v. District of Columbia, the high court said that the right to keep and bear arms was a natural right of all Americans and that the Second Amendment guaranteed that right to everyone.
The Second Amendment, the Supreme Court ruled, “guarantee(s) the right of the individual to possess and carry weapons in case of confrontation. The very text of the Second Amendment implicitly recognizes the pre-existence of the right and declares only that it ‘shall not be infringed.’”
“There seems to us no doubt,” the Supreme Court said, “that the Second Amendment conferred an individual right to keep and bear arms.”
Sotomayor, however, said that even though the Heller decision held that the right to keep and bear arms was a natural right--and therefore could not be justly denied to a law-abiding citizen by any government, federal, state or local--the Second Circuit was still bound by the 1886 case, because Heller only dealt indirectly with the issue before her court.
http://www.cnsnews.com/public/content/article.aspx?RsrcID=48718
Our "Rights" slowly being taken away? What are your thoughts?
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Juanita, LET IT BE WRITTEN! SO LET IT BE DONE! This is the very strategy that Satan employs, "Separate and Divide" to keep Christians in the dark of their true potential power in agreement. WE are a voice that will be heard but who will be the Christian spokesperson in the Political arena that will stand and fight for us? Now that is the question... I totally agree with you!! Blessings
I think we should rethink how we approach these things. We are too prone to simply run to court to set things straight. See the case of local officials hasseling the couple who have had Bible studies in their home...
If community citizens were UNITED and could speak with a single voice, they could deal with things at the local level - making their wishes know - rather than push things into Federal Court.
We should all have a wakeup call here... The current administration may put in many liberal justices, Sotomayor is a case in point. I heard on the news that she is the most liberal justice ever nominated to the Supreme Court. She does not represent the will of the people. Yet, she and others like her will determine how laws are interpreted. We should be aware that going to the Federal government is not the solution to all of our problems. Our constitution and democracy gives us a tremdous opportunity to impact things at the local and state level.
Because we are not united as a Christian people we are not impacting things as we should in fulfilling our responsibility as citizens of a republic such as ours where the people should be 'in charge.' Please note, the homosexual community is small, yet powerful. They speak with one voice & their agenda is moving forward.
It is time we Christians wake up and realize that we cannot continue to 'do church' as we have done in the past. We need to unite... not so that we can push political 'agendas' but so that as one voice we can call this country back to the values and principles we were founded on. In the civic arena, this is our responsibility.
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https://kingdominsight.ning.com/profiles/blogs/stop-holding-bible-st...
If community citizens were UNITED and could speak with a single voice, they could deal with things at the local level - making their wishes know - rather than push things into Federal Court.
We should all have a wakeup call here... The current administration may put in many liberal justices, Sotomayor is a case in point. I heard on the news that she is the most liberal justice ever nominated to the Supreme Court. She does not represent the will of the people. Yet, she and others like her will determine how laws are interpreted. We should be aware that going to the Federal government is not the solution to all of our problems. Our constitution and democracy gives us a tremdous opportunity to impact things at the local and state level.
Because we are not united as a Christian people we are not impacting things as we should in fulfilling our responsibility as citizens of a republic such as ours where the people should be 'in charge.' Please note, the homosexual community is small, yet powerful. They speak with one voice & their agenda is moving forward.
It is time we Christians wake up and realize that we cannot continue to 'do church' as we have done in the past. We need to unite... not so that we can push political 'agendas' but so that as one voice we can call this country back to the values and principles we were founded on. In the civic arena, this is our responsibility.