Texas Equipment Bill Of Sale: Fill & Download for Free

The one who left a tear gas grenade under a stack of trash so the cleaning person picking up saw “grenade” suddenly and dove out a second story window and we had the bomb squad out.The one who skipped and let his six foot python go in the space unknown to us. Python climbed into the ceiling only to be discovered slithering between the leasing agent’s legs three months later when she went to the back to turn the electrical panel on.The one who was getting divorced and signed over his business to his cousins so the ex wouldn’t get half. Then wanted us to intervene when his cousins wouldn’t give it back to him. Told him we weren’t interested in committing fraud. He was going to sue his cousins, we let him know that his “deal” with them to defraud his ex-wife wasn’t going to hold up in court other than convicting him of fraud against her.The therapists who shared a space and couldn’t get along and came to us to sort it out.The corporation with $20 billion in cash on hand that wanted a rent deferment during the pandemic due to cash flow issues.The folks that bought a restaurant, had a mysterious fire, had remarkably good insurance who upon reopening tried to take the equipment to another city 200 miles away for “cleaning”. When we stopped them from moving the equipment they told their staff they were going on vacation to Costa Rica. Cops called us the next week. They’d double charged 150k on people’s credit cards. Van was left at the airport but they hadn’t boarded their flight. Cops found they instead had bought a boat for cash and sailed to Florida. Got arrested in Arizona. Extradition was late so they bonded out. Missed court date. Got rearrested in Colorado and shipped to Texas. In Texas bonded out. Killed themselves with carbon monoxide in their car. Life lesson: If you are going to steal from a credit card company do it for enough to really escape and live off the grid forever.First guy I ever leased a space to. Very gentle person. Vietnamese nail shop. Wife goes to Vietnam to visit family. Comes back six months later to tell him she is leaving him because he isn’t a man and she has a new guy. She then goes upstairs and goes to sleep. He loses it and stabs her 20 times. Life Lesson: When you break up leave!Tenant who we sold equipment to kept lying to the tax district saying the equipment was ours. We sent them the bill of sale. Weirdly they were taxing him for ten times what we sold it to him for but he never corrected it. Taxes would have been like a hundred bucks a year. When he said he was moving out we went and got his letter to the tax district, made a deal with them to wipe the lien on it for 1/5th of what we’d sold it to him for and kept the equipment. Life Lesson: pay your taxes. (same guy as number 3)The bar that keeps getting sold to a new newly divorced middle aged rich guy who uses it to hit on his waitresses and inevitably marries one who then gets him to sell it to a slightly younger middle aged rich guy and the cycle continues. I started charging a $1000 transfer fee for the lease work on the bar. Feel like I’m running a high end dating service.The guy who had a very profitable business and had a racehorse girlfriend(much younger very hot) who had two kids. Was buying a restaurant for her to have a job for 250k. Knowing how much work they are I asked “Hey why don’t you just give her 50k a year and she can go work out during the day and take care of her kids?”. They didn’t listen. They broke up 2 years later and he sold the restaurant for 25k.All the boutiques where someone is paying for someone else to have a job.The never ending stream of Herbalife prospects. How do they keep finding people?!The guy I’m pretty sure leased an office space from me just so he could try and get me to buy Ambit energy from him(with a couple office buildings I was a good target for those guys but really).The very small office tenant that took any spare baseball season tickets we had. Basically ended up getting how much rent he paid in free baseball tickets. When he retired he had to get his own tickets.The guy who said he couldn’t bring his rent because he was going for chemo in Houston. Hour later posted pictures of himself playing golf five minutes away from our office. Same guy as 3 and 8.Bonus for so many upvotes: 3, 8, 15, 6 and 10 were all the same space. Guy who has it now is fantastic in his uneventfulness!

About the time people started thinking too much about it because they have an agenda and a complete lack of understanding of what was written. Some time ago it was understood that a disarmed population is easy to control. That any event could be manipulated to further the anti-gun agenda by using emotion to drive said agenda.Gun Facts | Second Amendment, Origins and Court RulingsJustification clause: “A well regulated Militia being necessary to the security of a free State,”Rights clause: “the right of the people to keep and bear Arms shall not be infringed.”The justification clause does not modify, restrict, or deny the rights clause. 1For a full discussion of how the Second Amendment was created and revised, see “Origin of the Second Amendment” at the bottom of this page.Myth: The Supreme Court ruled the Second Amendment is not an individual rightFact: In D.C. v Heller the Supreme Court (2008) firmly established the 2nd Amendment is an individual right, as they had in Cruikshank and Dred Scott.Fact: In McDonald v Chicago (2010) the Supreme Court concluded the right is incorporated against the states via the 14th Amendment.Fact: Of 300 decisions of the federal and state courts that have taken a position on the meaning of the Second Amendment or the state analogs to it, only 10 have claimed that the right to keep and bear arms is not an individual right. Many of the other decisions struck down gun control laws because they conflicted with the Second Amendment, such as State v. Nunn (Ga. 1846). 2Myth: The Second Amendment is a collective right, not an individual rightFact: St. George Tucker, any early legal commentator and authority of the original meaning of the constitution wrote in Blackstone’s Commentaries “… nor will the constitution permit any prohibition of arms to the people.” 3Fact: The Second Amendment was listed in a Supreme Court ruling as an individual right. 4Fact: The Supreme Court specifically reaffirmed that the right to keep and bear arms did not belong to the government. 5Fact: In 22 of the 27 instances where the Supreme Court mentions the Second Amendment, they quote the rights clause and not the justification clause.Fact: Courts disagree. “We find that the history of the Second Amendment reinforces the plain meaning of its text, namely that it protects individual Americans in their right to keep and bear arms whether or not they are a member of a select militia or performing active military service or training” and “We reject the collective rights and sophisticated collective rights models for interpreting the Second Amendment” 6Fact: Citizens disagree. 62% believe the 2nd Amendment guarantees an individual right, while a mere 28% believe it protects the power of the states to form militias. 7Fact: There are 23 state constitutions with RKBA clauses adopted between the Revolution and 1845, and 20 of them are explicitly individual in nature, only three have “for the common defense….” or other “collective rights” clauses. 8Fact: James Madison, considered to be the author of the Bill of Rights, wrote that the Bill of Rights was “calculated to secure the personal rights of the people”. He never excluded the Second Amendment from this statement.Fact: Patrick Henry commented on the Swiss militia model (still in use today) noting that they maintain their independence without “a mighty and splendid President” or a standing army. 9Fact: “The congress of the United States possesses no power to regulate, or interfere with the domestic concerns, or police of any state: it belongs not to them to establish any rules respecting the rights of property; nor will the constitution permit any prohibition of arms to the people; or of peaceable assemblies by them, for any purposes whatsoever, and in any number, whenever they may see occasion.” 10Fact: Tench Coxe, in Remarks on the First Part of the Amendments to the Federal Constitution said: “As civil rulers, not having their duty to the people duly before them, may attempt to tyrannize, and as the military forces which must be occasionally raised to defend our country, might pervert their power to the injury of their fellow-citizens, the people are confirmed by the next article in their right to keep and bear their private arms.”Myth: The Heller Decision created new lawFact: In the Dred Scott case of 1856, the Supreme Court listed the protected rights of citizens and explicitly listed the right to keep and bear arms, and gave this right equal weight to the other freedoms enumerated in the constitution.Fact: In United States v. Cruikshank, 92 U.S. 542 (1876), the Supreme Court ruled:An individual right to arms predated the constitution.The Second Amendment was a prohibition against Congress from disarming citizens.Myth: The Second Amendment was established to control slavesFact: The basis of the Second Amendment arose from the British disarming Americans in the time leading up to the revolution. The first state to declare a civilian right to arms (1776) was Pennsylvania, a non-slave state. Vermont (1777) and Massachusetts (1780) did so as well, and all this occurred before the Second Amendment was drafted. When slaves were emancipated, the Freedmen Bureau Act provided emancipated slaves “the constitutional right to bear arms.”Myth: The “militia” clause is to arm the National GuardFact: “Militia” is a Latin abstract noun, meaning “military service”, not an “armed group”, and that is the way the Latin-literate Founders used it. To the Romans, “military service” included law enforcement and disaster response. Today “militia” might be more meaningfully translated as “defense service”, associated with a “defense duty”, which attaches to individuals as much as to groups of them, organized or otherwise. When we are alone, we are all militias of one. In the broadest sense, militia is the exercise of civic virtue. 11Fact: The Dick Act of 1903 designated the National Guard as the “organized militia” and that all other citizens were the “unorganized militia” – thus the National Guard is only part of the militia, and the whole militia is composed of the population at large. Before 1903, the National Guard had no federal definition as part of the militia at all.Fact: The first half of the Second Amendment is called the “justification clause”. Justification clauses appear in many state constitutions, and cover liberties including right to trial, freedom of the press, free speech, and more. Denying gun rights based on the justification clause means we would have to deny free speech rights on the same basis. 12Fact: The origin of the phrase “a well regulated militia” comes from a 1698 treatise “A Discourse of Government with Relation to Militias” by Andrew Fletcher, in which the term “well regulated” was equated with “well-behaved” or “disciplined”. 13Fact: “We have found no historical evidence that the Second Amendment was intended to convey militia power to the states, limit the federal government’s power to maintain a standing army, or applies only to members of a select militia while on active duty. All of the evidence indicates that the Second Amendment, like other parts of the Bill of Rights, applies to and protects individual Americans.” 14Fact: “The plain meaning of the right of the people to keep arms is that it is an individual, rather than a collective, right and is not limited to keeping arms while engaged in active military service or as a member of a select militia such as the National Guard …” 15Fact: Most of the 13 original states (and many colonies/territories that became states after ratification of the Constitution and before or shortly after ratification of the Bill of Rights) had their own constitutions, and it is from these that the original Bill of Rights was distilled. The state constitutions of that time had many “right to keep and bear arms” clauses that clearly guaranteed an individual right. Some examples include:Connecticut: Every citizen has a right to bear arms in defense of himself and the state.Kentucky: … the right of the citizens to bear arms in defense of themselves and the State shall not be questioned.Pennsylvania: That the people have a right to bear arms for the defense of themselves and the state; … The right of the citizens to bear arms in defense of themselves and the State shall not be questioned.Rhode Island: The right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.Vermont: … the people have a right to bear arms for the defense of themselves and the State.Myth: The Second Amendment allows Congress to regulate ownership of guns for militia purposesFact: The phrase “well regulated” was common in the constitutional era, and described things that were in proper order or function. It was not a writ of authority. Borrowing from the Oxford English Dictionary, these examples, both before and after composition of the Second Amendment, show the usage:1709: “If a liberal Education has formed in us well-regulated Appetites and worthy Inclinations.”1714: “The practice of all well-regulated courts of justice in the world.”1812: “The equation of time … is the adjustment of the difference of time as shown by a well-regulated clock and a true sun dial.”1848: “A remissness for which I am sure every well-regulated person will blame the Mayor.”1862: “It appeared to her well-regulated mind, like a clandestine proceeding.”1894: “The newspaper, a never wanting adjunct to every well-regulated American embryo city.”Myth: U.S. v. Cruikshank denied an individual right to bear armsFact: The court ruled that both the 2nd Amendment right to bear arms and the 1st Amendment right to assembly were “preexisting rights”, and that it was incumbent upon the states to enforce that right. Specifically, the court ruled:The right was not created by the amendment; neither was its continuance guaranteed, except as against congressional interference. For their protection in its enjoyment, therefore, the people must look to the States. …Myth: U.S. v. Miller said that the Second Amendment is not an individual rightFact: The Miller case specifically held that specific types of guns might be protected by the Second Amendment. It depended on whether a gun had militia use, and the court wanted evidence presented confirming that citizens have a right to military style weapons. Since no evidence was taken at the trial level in lower courts, they remanded the case for a new trial. Specifically, the court said:“The signification attributed to the term Militia appears from the debates in the Convention, the history and legislation of Colonies and States, and the writings of approved commentators. These show plainly enough that the Militia comprised all males physically capable of acting in concert for the common defense. “A body of citizens enrolled for military discipline.” And further, that ordinarily when called for service these men were expected to appear bearing arms supplied by themselves and of the kind in common use at the time.”“In the absence of any evidence tending to show that possession or use of a ‘shotgun having a barrel of less than 18 inches in length’ at this time has some reasonable relationship to the preservation or efficiency of a well-regulated militia, we cannot say that the Second Amendment guarantees the right to keep and bear such an instrument. Certainly it is not within judicial notice that this weapon is any part of the ordinary military equipment or that its use could contribute to the common defense.”Fact: Even the US government agreed. Here are some sentences from the brief filed by the government in the appeal to the Supreme Court:“The Second Amendment does not grant to the people the right to keep and bear arms, but merely recognizes the prior existence of that right and prohibits its infringement by Congress.”“The ‘arms’ referred to in the Second Amendment are, moreover, those which ordinarily are used for military or public defense purposes …”“The Second Amendment does not confer upon the people the right to keep and bear arms; it is one of the provisions of the Constitution which, recognizing the prior existence of a certain right, declares that it shall not be infringed by Congress. Thus, the right to keep and bear arms is not a right granted by the Constitution and therefore is not dependent upon that instrument for its source.”Fact: The Federal 8th Circuit Court of Appeals holds that the Miller case protects an individual right to keep and bear arms. “Although an individual’s right to bear arms is constitutionally protected, see United States v. Miller …” 16Fact: Federal courts reject the myth. “We conclude that Miller does not support the [government’s] collective rights or sophisticated collective rights approach to the Second Amendment.” 17They continue, “There is no evidence in the text of the Second Amendment, or any other part of the Constitution, that the words ‘we the people’ have a different connotation within the Second Amendment than when employed elsewhere …”.Summary of various court decisions concerning gun rightsDecisions that explicitly recognized that the Second Amendment guarantees an individual right to purchase, possess or carry firearms, and that it limits the authority of both federal and state governments:Parker vs. D.C., Fed (2007), confirmed an individual right to keep arms and overturned a handgun ban (this case later became the Heller case)U.S. vs. Emerson, 5 Fed (1999), confirmed an individual right requiring compelling government interest for regulationNunn v. State, 1 Ga. 243, 250, 251 (1846), struck down a ban on the sale of small, easily concealed handguns as violating the Second AmendmentState v. Chandler, 5 http://La.An. 489, 490, 491 (1850), upheld a ban on concealed carry, but acknowledged that open carry was protected by the Second AmendmentSmith v. State, 11 http://La.An. 633, 634 (1856), upheld a ban on concealed carry, but recognized as protected by Second Amendment – “arms there spoken of are such as are borne by a people in war, or at least carried openly”State v. Jumel, 13 http://La.An. 399, 400 (1858), upheld a ban on concealed carry, but acknowledged a Second Amendment right to carry openly.Cockrum v. State, 24 Tex. 394, 401, 402 (1859), upheld an enhanced penalty for manslaughter with a Bowie knife, but acknowledged that the Second Amendment guaranteed an individual right to possess arms for collective overthrow of the governmentIn Re Brickey, 8 Ida. 597, 70 Pac. 609, 101 http://Am.St.Rep. 215, 216 (1902), struck down a ban on open carry of a revolver in Lewiston, Idaho as violating both Second Amendment and Idaho Constitutional guaranteeState v. Hart, 66 Ida. 217, 157 P.2d 72 (1945), upheld a ban on concealed carry as long as open carry was allowed based on both Second Amendment and Idaho Constitutional guaranteeState v. Nickerson, 126 Mont. 157, 166 (1952), striking down a conviction for assault with a deadly weapon, acknowledging a right to carry based on Second Amendment and Montana Constitutional guaranteeU.S. v. Hutzell, 8 Iowa, 99-3719, (2000) (cite in dictum that “an individual’s right to keep and bear arms is constitutionally protected, see United States v. Miller, 307 U.S. 174, 178-79 (1939).Decisions that recognized the Second Amendment guarantees an individual right to possess or carry firearms, but only limiting the Federal government’s authority:U.S. v. Cruikshank, 92 U.S. 542, 552 (1876) (limiting use of the Enforcement Act of 1870 so that Klansmen could not be punished for mass murder and disarming of freedmen).State v. Workman, 35 http://W.Va. 367, 373 (1891) (upholding a ban on carry of various concealable arms).State v. Kerner, 181 N.C. 574, 107 S.E. 222 (1921) (overturning a ban on open carry of pistols based on North Carolina Const., but acknowledging Second Amendment protected individual right from federal laws).Decisions in which the Second Amendment was argued or raised as a limitation on state laws, and in which the court ruled that it only limited the Federal government, tacitly acknowledging that the right was individual in nature:Andrews v. State, 3 Heisk. (50 Tenn.) 165, 172, 173 (1871).Fife v. State, 31 Ark. 455, 25 Am.Rep. 556, 557, 558 (1876); State v. Hill, 53 Ga. 472, 473, 474 (1874).Dunne v. People, 94 Ill. 120, 140, 141 (1879); Presser v. Illinois, 116 U.S. 252, 265, 266 (1886) (upholding a ban on armed bodies marching through the streets).People v. Persce, 204 N.Y. 397, 403 (1912); In re Rameriz, 193 Cal. 633, 636, 226 P. 914 (1924) (upholding a ban on resident aliens possessing handguns).Decisions in which the Second Amendment was implied to guarantee an individual right, though unclear as to whether it limited only the Federal government or states as well, because the type of arm in question wasn’t protected:English v. State, 35 Tex. 473, 476, 477 (1872).State v. Duke, 42 Tex. 455, 458, 459 (1875) (upholding a ban on carrying of handguns, Bowie knives, sword-canes, spears, and brass knuckles).People v. Liss, 406 Ill. 419, 94 N.E.2d 320, 322, 323 (1950) (overturning a conviction for carrying a concealed handgun and acknowledging that the right in the Second Amendment was individual).Guida v. Dier, 84 Misc.2d 110, 375 N.Y.S.2d 827, 828 (1975) (denying that “concealable hand weapons” were protected by the Second Amendment, but acknowledging that an individual right protects other firearms).Decisions in which the Second Amendment has been classed with other individual rights, with no indication that it was not an individual right:Robertson v. Baldwin, 165 U.S. 275, 281, 282, 17 S.Ct. 826, 829 (1897); U.S. v. Verdugo-Urquidez, 110 S.Ct. 1056, 1060, 1061 (1990).Decisions that could have been very much shorter if the court had simply denied that the Second Amendment protected AN INDIVIDUAL right:U.S. v. Miller, 307 U.S. 174 (1939) (the Supreme Court upholding the National Firearms Act of 1934, after district judge released defendants on the grounds that it violated Second Amendment).Origin of the Second AmendmentBefore the United States Constitution or Bill of Rights existed, most of the thirteen original states had clauses in their constitutions protecting the right to keep and bear arms. When the time came for Congress to draft the Bill of Rights, states submitted clauses from their constitutions that they thought should be added to the Federal Bill of Rights.Three predominant arms clauses existed at that time (many states had word-for-word copies from other state constitutions and the redundant versions are not mentioned herein).Pennsylvania (1776): That the people have a right to bear arms for the defence of themselves and the state; and as standing armies in the time of peace are dangerous to liberty, they ought not to be kept up; and that the military should be kept under strict subordination, to, and governed by, the civil power. (Simplified in 1790 to read “The right of the citizens to bear arms in defence of themselves and the State shall not be questioned.”)Vermont (1777): That the people have a right to bear arms for the defence of themselves and the State – and as standing armies in time of peace are dangerous to liberty, they ought not to be kept up; and that the military should be kept under strict subordination to and governed by the civil power.Massachusetts (1780): The people have a right to keep and to bear arms for the common defence. And as, in time of peace, armies are dangerous to liberty, they ought not to be maintained without the consent of the legislature; and the military power shall always be held in an exact subordination to the civil authority, and be governed by it.North Carolina (1776): That the people have a right to bear arms, for the defence of the State; and, as standing armies, in time of peace, are dangerous to liberty, they ought not to be kept up; and that the military should be kept under strict subordination to, and governed by, the civil power.We can see in these state constitution clauses the conjoined purposes as viewed by the people at the time that the 2nd Amendment was drafted.Calls for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms from State Ratification ConventionsFive states that ratified the Constitution sent demands for a Bill of Rights to Congress. All of these demands included a right to keep and bear arms. The relevant parts of these written demands are:New Hampshire: Twelfth[:] Congress shall never disarm any Citizen unless such as are or have been in Actual Rebellion.Virginia: … Seventeenth, That the people have a right to keep and bear arms; that a well regulated Militia composed of the body of the people trained to arms is the proper, natural and safe defence of a free State. That standing armies in time of peace are dangerous to liberty, and therefore ought to be avoided, as far as the circumstances and protection of the Community will admit; and that in all cases the military should be under strict subordination to and governed by the Civil power.New York: … That the People have a right to keep and bear Arms; that a well regulated Militia, including the body of the People capable of bearing Arms, is the proper, natural and safe defence of a free State; That the Militia should not be subject to Martial Law except in time of War, Rebellion or Insurrection. That Standing Armies in time of Peace are dangerous to Liberty, and ought not to be kept up, except in Cases of necessity; and that at all times, the Military should be under strict Subordination to the civil Power.North Carolina: Almost identical to Virginia’s demand, but with, “the body of the people, trained to arms,” instead of, “the body of the people trained to arms.”Rhode Island: Almost identical to Virginia’s demand, but with, “the body of the people capable of bearing arms,” instead of, “the body of the people trained to arms,” and with a, “militia shall not be subject to martial law,” proviso as in New York’s.Second Amendment drafting, proposals, and editingJames Madison had the duty of drafting the Bill of Rights from proposed amendments submitted by the states, and most coming from state constitutions. The Bill of Rights went through several revisions. The initial version of the 2nd Amendment read as follows:The right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed; a well armed and well regulated militia being the best security of a free country; but no person religiously scrupulous of bearing arms shall be compelled to render military service in person.The second drafting of the 2nd Amendment saw a rearrangement of the justification and rights clauses, but no change in the intents and purposes therein:A well regulated militia, composed of the body of the people, being the best security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed, but no person religiously scrupulous shall be compelled to bear arms.Notice that in the original draft, Madison used the phrase “free country” as the object of what is protected by the militia. In subsequent drafts, the word “state” was substituted. This is important because the concept of “state” and “country” are interchangeable, whereas “states” (plural) and “country” are not. Throughout the rest of the Constitution, when the states and their powers were defined, the plural was always used but in the 2nd Amendment it was not. Clearly, the intent of militia protection defined in the 2nd Amendment was to protect a form of government, not define the power of the several states.Four further revisions removed objectionable concepts (such as the “conscientious objector” clause). On September 9, 1789, a member of the Senate proposed adding “for the common defense” onto the draft of the Second Amendment. In other words, the proposed wording of the amendment would have read:A well regulated militia being the security of a free State, the right of the people to bear arms for the common defense, shall not be infringed.The proposed change was voted down. This is instructive because some believe that the current wording of the amendment exists specifically for collective/common/mutual defense, and has no bearing on individual self defense. However, the Senate considered adding this restriction and rejected it.It is clear from these origins and first drafts, and from contemporary commentaries on the clause, that the original intent was to secure an individual right. The commentaries of St. George Tucker (The American Blackstone) and Supreme Court Justice Joseph Story, both of whom were federal jurists and chronologically close to the authoring of the amendment, bear this out.Arms clauses of states that joined shortly after the Second Amendment was ratifiedAlso worth review are arms clauses in the constitutions of states that joined the Union shortly after ratification of the Bill of Rights. These demonstrate the contemporary understanding of the amendment and the rights of the people:Kentucky (1792): That the right of the citizens to bear arms in defense of themselves and the State shall not be questioned.Tennessee (1796): That the freemen of this State have a right to keep and to bear arms for their common defence.Kentucky (1799): That the rights of the citizens to bear arms in defense of themselves and the State shall not be questioned.Ohio (1802): That the people have a right to bear arms for the defence of themselves and the State; and as standing armies, in time of peace, are dangerous to liberty, they shall not be kept up, and that the military shall be kept under strict subordination to the civil power.Indiana (1816): That the people have a right to bear arms for the defense of themselves and the State, and that the military shall be kept in strict subordination to the civil power.Mississippi (1817): Every citizen has a right to bear arms, in defence of himself and the State.Connecticut (1818): Every citizen has a right to bear arms in defense of himself and the state.Maine (1819): Every citizen has a right to keep and bear arms for the common defence; and this right shall never be questioned.Alabama (1819): That every citizen has a right to bear arms in defence of himself and the state.Missouri (1820): That the people have the right peaceably to assemble for their common good, and to apply to those vested with the powers of government for redress of grievances by petition or remonstrance; and that their right to bear arms in defence of themselves and of the State cannot be questioned.Notes:Eugene Volokh, Prof. Law, UCLAFor the Defense of Themselves and the State: The Original Intent and Judicial Interpretation of the Right to Keep and Bear Arms, Clayton Cramer, Praeger Press, 1994Blackstone’s Commentaries, St. George Tucker, Vol 1. Note D. Part 6. Restraints on Powers of Congress (1803)Dred Scott, Casey v. Planned Parenthood, U.S. v. Cruikshank and othersUnited States v. MillerU.S. v. Emerson, 5th court of Appeals decision, November 2, 2001, No. 99-10331Associated Television News Survey, August 1999, 1,007 likely votersFor the Defense of Themselves and the State: The Original Intent and Judicial Interpretation of the Right to Keep and Bear Arms, Clayton Cramer, Praeger Press, 1994, cited as an authority in USA v. Emerson (N.D. Texas 1999)Where Kids and Guns Do Mix, Stephen P. Halbrook, Wall Street Journal, June 2000Blackstone’s Commentaries, St. George Tucker, Volume 1, Appendix Note D., 1803 – Tucker’s comments provide a number of insights into the consensus for interpretation of the Constitution that prevailed shortly after its ratification, after the debates had settled down and the Constitution was put into practice.Militia, The Constitution SocietyEugene Volokh, Prof. Law, UCLA, Testimony of Eugene Volokh on the Second Amendment, Senate Subcommittee on the Constitution, Sept. 23, 1998.This document was widely published during the colonial and revolutionary periods, and was the basis for state and federal ‘bills of rights’U.S. v. Emerson, 5th court of Appeals decision, November 2, 2001, No. 99-10331U.S. v. Emerson, 5th court of Appeals decision, November 2, 2001, No. 99-10331U.S. v. Hutzel, 8 Iowa, No. 99-3719U.S. v. Emerson, 5th court of Appeals decision, November 2, 2001, No. 99-10331

We often forget that the Bill of Rights, as a whole, were not meant to confer rights. They were meant as a restraint on the power of the newly formed central government. In the First Amendment, it says “CONGRESS SHALL PASS NO LAWS…” It says nothing about what the State legislatures can do. Some of the states still had religious tests of office, and other laws that were out of accord with the Constitution. Some of those laws (mostly local codes) had to do with regulating the use and storage of arms and ammunition (most specifically the storage of bulk gunpowder which to threaten a community.) The States and their militias were seen (through the eyes of the authors of Federalist Papers) as a force that could stop the central government from interfering with the rights of citizens.Following the Civil War, State laws were putting restrictions on newly freed slaves. The 13th and 14th Amendments were formed. Ironically, now the Central government was protecting citizens from State governments. Over time, various portions of the Bill of Rights were “incorporated.” States could not enforce laws which violated various provisions of the Bill of Rights.Interestingly, this was not done as a whole. It was done one amendment at a time. Freedom of speech, freedom of the press, the right to assemble, the right to a jury, the right to be secure in one’s home and papers,… Each right was tied to a specific case.Warren was an interesting case in that it only applied to federal territory (the District of Columbia, specifically). McDonald v. Chicago applied the Warren decision to the States and the Second Amendment was incorporated to the States. Infringing laws were called to require “strict scrutiny” although many courts seem to continue to use a lesser standard.I believe that Scalia was wrong in his written opinion, not in its outcome, but in his methodology. I believe that the SCOTUS should have begun by overturning the 1939 decision in U.S. v Miller. There, a federal district court in Arkansas had overturned the 1934 Federal Firearms Act. The case focused on a Stevens shotgun with cut off barrels. Citing the conclusion of that opinion:“In the absence of any evidence tending to show that possession or use of a "shotgun having a barrel of less than eighteen inches in length" at this time has some reasonable relationship to the preservation or efficiency of a well regulated militia, we cannot say that the Second Amendment guarantees the right to keep and bear such an instrument. Certainly it is not within judicial notice that this weapon is any part of the ordinary military equipment, or that its use could contribute to the common defense.”Note two phrases: “In the absence of any evidence” and “not within judicial notice”. This was a strange case because the Miller side of the case was not represented in any way. There were no briefs filed. Neither Miller or any attorney was in court to present any arguments. The court abiding by its rules only considered what was brought before it. The clear insinuation was if a connection had been made between the weapon in question and its usefulness in providing for the common defense, the opinion would have gone the other way. If the weapon had been a Browning Automatic Rifle or a Thompson Sub Machine Gun (both issued to the U.S. Military at the time) the law would have been overturned.It is from this ruling that the idea of being a member of the Militia played a key roll in the right of the individual to keep and bear arms. On that, I believe they were correct, however, they at that time still believed that the militia was composed of all men (sic) capable of bearing arms in the common defense. In terms of Statute, the Dick Act of 1903 broke the militia into the active militia composed of the National Guard and the inactive militia composed of those not in the military forces of the United States, plus a few other criteria.It also would be helpful to remember that the U.S. government was selling military arms to citizens to promote marksmanship so the citizenry would be better equipped and prepared to defend the nation if called. The government’s posture from before the adoption of the Constitution to recent times is that it is not only the right, but the duty of citizens, to be equipped and prepared to defend the country as/if needed. As stated in Warren and in the dicta of Miller, members of the militia were expected to join together, bringing their weapons, if the nation was threatened.To a large part, militias are creaturesof the States. The definition of the militia in the State of Texas has different age limits than the federal definition. In addition, Texas maintains a Texas State Guard, that is immune from federalization. A portion of that State Guard is armed, however, the State Guard (or elements of it) have been given training for Licenses To Carry a handgun. (I know this because I know some of the people involved.)Remember that no portion of the Bill of Rights grants rights to the People. It recognizes existing rights, some of which are enumerated. Non-enumerated rights are still protected (such as the expectation of privacy!). What the Second Amendment does is FORBID THE CENTRAL GOVERNMENT from infringing on the rights of people (THE PEOPLE) to keep and bear arms. The arms that are protected, according to Miller, are those arms which can be used in common defense as members of the militia. Normally those would be military weapons.There is no way that a 21st Century court would totally negate the Federal Firearms Act (which would allow the ownership of all machine guns, silencers (sic) and short barreled firearms. There’s no way they would negate the Gun Control Act of 1968 (which would allow the ownership of cannon with ammunition and destructive devices of all types). Ironic, isn’t it that in early 1968 you could have a functioning Sherman tank with an operating main gun and a combat load of ammunition sitting in your driveway, or that you could order an M-1 Carbine by mail and have it delivered to your door without any paper trail other than that created by the seller?My hunch is that the 1968 law was passed in part because of race. The Black Panthers and other Black groups were actively patrolling their neighborhoods armed with shotguns. It could have gotten “interesting” quickly if different enclaves all armed themselves against their neighboring communities. While it did not solve all the problems, it created obstacles to bringing in heavy weapons and explosives. We often forget that after the GCA’68 was passed, all ammunition sales had to be recorded. That went on until 1986, although it never helped to solve a crime (according to articles I have read). What it did do was provide a means of finding out who had what caliber of firearms, if someone wanted to find out.No, the Court that decided Warren could not take the right route and negate Miller. If they had tried to do that, Kennedy would never have signed on. In fact, Kennedy would not have signed on if the ruling went any farther than allowing one to keep and bear an operating firearm in one’s own home. It said that future courts would have do decide what other rights were protected by the 2nd Amendment.The decision was correct in that it incorporated the 2nd Amendment, and it recognized an individual right, but disconnecting from the militia limited the right to certain classes of “firearms in common usage” and left that term undefined.The question is “Are we a people of law, or a people of public persuasion?” Remember, that individual RIGHTS are to protect the rights of the individual even if the vast majority disagree with whatever practice is protected. The rights of the pornographer and the person seeking abortion are protected even in the midst of a hostile society.I think that Scalia knew everything that I have written here. I think he drafted the opinion in a way that could get five votes. It was a step.I also want to add that I’m not interested in owning a machine gun or a cannon, and I’d just as soon that my neighbor not own one as well. However, I would rather my neighbor own one than my government slip the reins of Constitutional limitations and do whatever a majority of Congress thinks is right at a specific time. We should have a living Constitution but it should be alive and evolve through the Amendment process, not through a succession of court rulings. As we live in the latter situation, we live in danger because the law is ever in flux.