[Vision2020] The NRA's Fraud: Fabrication of Second Amendment Rights

[Nicholas Gier]

               The NRA's Fraud: Fabrication of Second Amendment Rights
Posted: 04/17/2013 4:13 pm  Huff Post, Burton Newman, Washington University
School of Law
The article is a long one, so here is the guts of it:
What did the Supreme Court say in the 2008 *Heller* decision? The Court
held that there existed an individual right to bear arms only for
traditional purposes such as self-defense in the home. The Court declared
that the Second Amendment should not be understood as conferring a "right
to keep and carry any weapon whatsoever in any manner whatsoever and for
whatever purpose." The Court gave examples of firearms laws presumed to be
lawful. These included laws prohibiting firearm possession by felons,
mentally ill persons and possession of firearms in sensitive places such as
schools and government buildings. The Court found that conditions on the
commercial sale of firearms were presumptively lawful. The Court said this
list was not exhaustive; and found that the Second Amendment is consistent
with laws banning firearms that are "dangerous and unusual."

The ruling in *Heller* was a departure from the 1939 decision in the *Miller
* case where the court stated that the "obvious purpose" of the Second
Amendment was to ensure effectiveness of the stated Militia. However, even
with this departure the decision in *Heller* is limited in its scope. The
only right specifically mentioned in the Supreme Court's opinion is the
right of an individual to possess a gun for self-defense in the home.

Did this limited decision stop the NRA from its propaganda campaign? Of
course not. On *Meet the Press* on March 24, 2013, Wayne LaPierre declared
to the nation that under the *Heller* decision it would be an "absolute
abridgement" of constitutional rights to regulate assault weapons. That
myth, heard by millions, was intended to again mislead the country into
believing that there are sweeping Second Amendment rights that cannot be
regulated. Nonsense. The very language of the Supreme Court opinion in *
Heller* calls out LaPierre as a liar.

"*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.*" ~
Second Amendment, U.S. Constitution

Following the Sandy Hook massacre, gun rights, gun laws and the Second
Amendment have been the subject of a national dialogue. Any discussion of
these topics is severely tainted by calculated messaging by the NRA to
deceive and mislead our citizens to believe that the Second Amendment
grants far reaching gun rights which have not and do not exist.

The Second Amendment became part of our constitution in 1791. For well over
two centuries the Supreme Court never decided that the Amendment granted a
constitutional right to individuals to bear arms. The widely held notion
that such a right existed was a myth fabricated by the NRA for its own self
interest and for the corporate profits of gun manufacturers. This
fabrication altered the mindset of most Americans to accept fictional
Second Amendment rights that permitted the proliferation of all manner and
kind of dangerous weapons. We became a gun culture run rampant. The gun
manufacturers reaped enormous profits as gun sales soared. In 2011 industry
wide gun sales were $4.3 billion. Misconceptions generated by the NRA
created a warped interpretation of Second Amendment that generated these
sales.

The fraud perpetrated by the NRA is patent. We do not heed the warnings of
prominent citizens such as former attorneys general Nicholas Katzenbach,
Ramsey Clark, Elliot L. Richardson, Edward Levi, Griffin B. Bell and
Benjamin R. Civiletti. The joint statement in the *Washington Post* of
these former attorneys general in 1992 reads as follows:

"For more than 200 years, the federal courts have unanimously determined
that the Second Amendment concerns only the arming of the people in service
to an organized state Militia: it does not guarantee immediate access to
guns for private purposes. The nation can no longer afford to let the gun
lobbies' distortion of the constitution cripple every reasonable attempt to
implement an effective national policy towards guns and crime."

In a PBS *News Hour* interview in 1991, former Supreme Court Chief Justice
Warren Burger referred to the NRA Second Amendment myth as "one of the
greatest pieces of fraud, I repeat the word fraud, on the American people
by any special interest group that I have ever seen in my lifetime."

The opinions of these distinguished legal scholars had no bearing on NRA
propaganda that continued unabated. During the weeks before the 2000
general election, a self-anointed constitution "scholar," Charleton Heston,
ceremonial president of the NRA, flooded the airways to urge voters to
support candidates who would protect and preserve Second Amendment rights.
Little did most Americans realize that such rights did not exist. The NRA's
reading of the Second Amendment was purely fictional and unsupported by the
law of the land.

Candidates for public office both state and federal reaped in political
contributions from the NRA. These elected officials feared the wrath of the
NRA should they stray from the NRA's Second Amendment myth.

A norm evolved offering sanctity to gun owners and manufacturers. Gun
manufacturers and the NRA prospered and profited. As one gun manufacturing
executive states the equation, the NRA "protects our Second Amendment
rights and those rights protect the ability to buy our products." Elected
officials stand idly by while gun deaths and massacres escalate without
lasting public outcry or meaningful legislative efforts.

The statistics are staggering. The depth of lost life is evident by
comparing deaths in foreign wars and firearm deaths of citizens within our
borders. In all foreign wars during our history about 650,000 soldiers
died. In the 45 years since Robert Kennedy and Martin Luther King were
assassinated in 1968, there have been over 1.3 million deaths in our
country caused by firearms. The fraud perpetrated by the NRA as recognized
by former Chief Justice Burger is linked to these deaths. The blood of
thousands upon thousands of Americans permanently stain the hands of NRA
CEO Wayne LaPierre.

How did the NRA gain such power and influence on our citizenry? For the
first century of its existence beginning in 1871, the NRA primarily devoted
its efforts to gun safety. Following enactment of new restrictive gun laws
requiring gun licensing and taxes, a 1977 coup within the NRA membership
led by militants resulted in a new harder edged and more aggressive NRA.
The truth mattered not. The edifice of the NRA headquarters would now bear
an abbreviated version of the Second Amendment: "The Right of the People to
keep and Bear Arms Shall not be infringed." The NRA amended the
Constitution unilaterally to avoid even a hint that the language pertaining
to a Militia had any meaning. The law of the land spoke otherwise.

In 1939 the Supreme Court issued the *Miller* decision. The justices ruled
that "the Second Amendment must be interpreted and applied with the view of
its purpose of rendering effective Militia." That was the state of Second
Amendment law until the 2008 *Heller* decision. Prior to *Heller*, the
Supreme Court never recognized that individuals had an individual right to
keep and bear arms. It was the NRA propaganda, not the law of the land,
that led the cry for unlimited gun ownership and protection of gun owner
rights. The NRA myths allowed the cycle of expanded gun sales and NRA power
to purchase political influence. Democrats and Republican alike announced
their allegiance to the Second Amendment and the public grew to believe
that the NRA view of the Second Amendment was consistent with
constitutional law. The NRA controlled too many elected officials to allow
for protection of our citizens from gun violence, gun deaths and
unspeakable gun horrors in schools and public places.

The NRA myths were disseminated on other fronts. Articles appeared in NRA
publications and rewrote history by declaring that "Armed citizens [were]
unregulated except by his own ability to buy a gun at whatever price he
could afford." This credo became an NRA rallying cry.

The NRA poured millions upon millions of dollars into congressional and
state legislative campaigns. Gun owners and manufacturers poured more money
into the NRA. The revisionist view of Second Amendment rights gained
momentum in 1982 when a Senate judiciary subcommittee issued a report about
the discovery of "long lost proof" of an individual's constitutional right
to bear arms. The chair of the subcommittee was Utah Senator Orrin Hatch.
The "proof" has never surfaced.

For over three decades the NRA funded legal research, legal seminars and
pushed for law review articles supporting individual rights to bear arms.
This and the NRA persuasion of elected officials led to a dramatic shift in
Second Amendment legal views. In 2003 the NRA established a $1 million
chair at George Mason University law school. The views of NRA supported
professors and legal scholars were relied on in the 2008 Supreme Court
decision finding an individual right to bear arms for the first time.

What did the Supreme Court say in the 2008 *Heller* decision? The Court
held that there existed an individual right to bear arms only for
traditional purposes such as self-defense in the home. The Court declared
that the Second Amendment should not be understood as conferring a "right
to keep and carry any weapon whatsoever in any manner whatsoever and for
whatever purpose." The Court gave examples of firearms laws presumed to be
lawful. These included laws prohibiting firearm possession by felons,
mentally ill persons and possession of firearms in sensitive places such as
schools and government buildings. The Court found that conditions on the
commercial sale of firearms were presumptively lawful. The Court said this
list was not exhaustive; and found that the Second Amendment is consistent
with laws banning firearms that are "dangerous and unusual."

The ruling in *Heller* was a departure from the 1939 decision in the *Miller
* case where the court stated that the "obvious purpose" of the Second
Amendment was to ensure effectiveness of the stated Militia. However, even
with this departure the decision in *Heller* is limited in its scope. The
only right specifically mentioned in the Supreme Court's opinion is the
right of an individual to possess a gun for self-defense in the home.

Did this limited decision stop the NRA from its propaganda campaign? Of
course not. On *Meet the Press* on March 24, 2013, Wayne LaPierre declared
to the nation that under the *Heller* decision it would be an "absolute
abridgement" of constitutional rights to regulate assault weapons. That
myth, heard by millions, was intended to again mislead the country into
believing that there are sweeping Second Amendment rights that cannot be
regulated. Nonsense. The very language of the Supreme Court opinion in *
Heller* calls out LaPierre as a liar.

How can the American people be educated to understand the true meaning of
the Second Amendment consistent with the Supreme Court's interpretation of
that Amendment? Such an education process could lead to sweeping reform of
state and federal regulation of firearms. But how is the mindset of the
American people to be changed? The same way our mindset about drunk driving
and smoking changed over time. Let's take a look at the circumstances
involved in smoking. Smokers 35 years ago would never have believed there
would be no public smoking. When harms caused by drunk drivers and tobacco
users were known in clear terms, the mindset of the public changed. New
reforms, enforcement of laws and demands for a safer society became
reachable goals. The change in that mindset did not take place in a day a
week or a year. Nor will the change in the mindset regarding Second
Amendment rights change overnight. But it is the education of the citizenry
and the education of our lawmakers that is necessary in order for the
calculated messaging of the NRA to be known for what it is: Lies, myths and
fictions that have harmed and killed our citizens and will continue to do
so until an enlightened view of the very limited scope of Second Amendment
rights is known, understood and acted upon.
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