Tuesday, January 15, 2013

Another nail in the coffin - New York's civil liberties destroying new gun regulations

One of the bedrock principles of modern liberalism is that civil liberties - things like privacy, free speech, freedom of movement, freedom of assembly - have been and continue to be under assault from a variety of forces.  Liberals fought the most heinous examples of this in the Civil Rights movement of the 1960's, though their successes in that cause continue to be stymied by the economic and social segregation and racism that seems to permeate the United States even today.  Liberals also lost many natural allies in the moderate Right by not equally defending other rights and liberties, most notably the one to keep and bear arms.

In the wake of the school shooting in Newtown, Conn. many liberals at first rushed to discuss mental health issues, breakdowns in community, and myriad of other issues that have allowed our violent, individualistic culture to keep using guns in what the media likes to portray as an ever downward civic spiral.  Some liberals jumped immediately to the bandwagon of another permanent assault weapons ban, in spite of scant to no evidence the last one did anything to dry up the weapons pipeline.

You can, I hope, imagine my disgust then when New York Governor Andrew Cuomo proposed what would become the most restrictive state level gun laws in the nation.  From a civil liberties perspective, the most heinous part is the involuntary seizure of weapons from persons found to be on mental health watchlists or databases.  The seizure would apparently occur as the result of the person's diagnosis and condition, not any sense or history of activity constituting a threat.  The State Assembly is expected to pass the bill today, and the Governor is ready to sign it.

When did Democrats, as the political party supposedly representing liberal politics and ideas - decide it was appropriate to respond to acts of violence by further destroying our Constitutional Rights?  Just as it's important to protect Second Amendment rights - which will be severely (and IMHO inappropriately) restricted under this new legislation; it's also a requirement to protect Fourth Amendment Rights:

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.

 Like it or not, Liberals and their Democratic politicians who support Gov. Cuomo's position and legislation are now in clear and extraordinary violation of this Right. 

What's more, it is the party whose members died in the 1960's so that African Americans could vote which has done this.  Again.

When do Liberals get their Party back?

2 comments:

Mike Dwyer said...

The thing to know about the two major political parties is this: Both will sacrafice civil liberties for their pet causes. Conservatives will do it for national security, liberals will do it for guns. Conservatives will do it for abortion, liberals will do it for regulation of business. We will also do it on a personal level. It's fine if someone else's kids want to smoke a little weed in college, but I don't want my kids to.

Philip H. said...

Mike,
All that you say is true - at least to a point, but also beside the point. I've taken everyone to task on the issue, as you well know. And I'm tired of it.

The kids and weed thing is also a strawman that's somewhat beneath you - as a parent you have certain obligations that, in both fact and truth, trump Constitutional Rights. The framers expected parents to control their kids according to the norms of the day. Ironically, they also expected them to teach them to shoot properly.