International Treaty Could Erode 2nd Amendment Rights

urge the U.S. Senate to ratify this treaty, giving the United Nations the right to dictate the terms under which you may own a gun – or not.

Whether you like guns or hate them… it doesn’t matter. That is not the relevant point here. Regardless of any of that, you might want to hold onto your rights. Those rights are not given to you by the constitution, but are instead recognized in the constitution as being unalienable and something we are born with. We have a patten here, this would take a separate article, but watch the press closely. We hear stories of guns and drugs in Mexico… now this. We have the financial crisis and have porkulus thrown at us. We have declared CO2 a pollutant and now face a repressive carbon tax. We have swine flu and who knows where that is going. But don’t lose the pattern… the pattern is quite transparent. First create a crisis, then cram down your agenda before anybody notices. Repeat as necessary. There is more here than guns.

there shouldn’t be an international anything unless all of the participating countries have a free, civilized society. Corrupt governments like Mexico, Irad and Cuba-OUT.

I’m inclined to believe that most of the time laws like this help no one but criminals. And we all know how tough we are on criminals in court and jail.

Great post. Nothing less than the very sovereignty of our nation is at stake.

Easton–if this is passed, do you think some people could buy guns (legally) from, lets say, hundreds of gun shows, distribute them to countries of their choice, and let those foreign governments extradite the gun sellers from the US? Does it also apply to guns sold in the past?

If so, this is way beyond fairness and reason.

Great. The country with the most freedom on the planet will now have to kowtow to South American countries where the cartels have all the weapons and the governments are just fronts for drug money or socialist morons. Next, they’ll be limiting free speech so as not to offend any of the other signatories.

They can shove that treaty and any other that would limit our freedom up their collective arses.

I do not own guns and used to be an anti gun liberal, when young and stupid. Some years back, I changed my mind. I do not want a gun (well, that may change), but I believe it’s a dangerous step for the Government to take away the rights of Americans to have them. period. Do not take away our rights. I really despise our Government right now. They seem to think they can do whatever they want.

We have been exposed to an education lately on International Law and the Rule of Law. Everyone has been following the torture memos and some of us have a quaint understanding of how the U.S. signing the treaty at the Geneva Convention forcibly influenced laws that we were required, by the treaty, to add to our books. That treaty suits us and most of us don’t argue with the fact that we signed and ratified it.
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International law has nothing to do with torture. In 1996, the Republican congress drafted and passed the War Crimes Act of 1996.US Code title 18..2441. War crimes, torture and the penalties are specified by US criminal law and not by some vague crap at the Hague. That is one reason by Pelosi is lying her ass of about what she knew and when she knew it. Under US law she is just as guilty as the person who does the torture. If indicted, tried and convicted she could receive the DEATH sentence. Under US law there is no statute of limitations.

Missouri v. Holland, 252 U.S. 416 (1920)

In case anyone is wondering how all-powerful a treaty is, this is the case that set that status in stone.

In an opinion by Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., the Supreme Court held that the law was in fact constitutional, noting that the treaties clause of the Constitution (Article VI, clause 2), sometimes known as the “supremacy clause,” makes treaties the “supreme law of the land,” co-equal in status to the Constitution itself, a finding that trumps any state concern with regard to the provisions of any treaty, and further implying that treaty provisions were not subject to questioning by the states under the process of judicial review.

Perhaps if Sen Feinstein is indicted for War Crimes, she will have other thing things to worry about than taking away my Mil Spec firearms.

After reading through the Treaty for myself, I don’t see what you NRA propagandists are worried about. The treaty describes ILLICIT (that means “illegal”, for those who don’t have a dictionary or are afraid of learning something new) trafficking and manufacturing. You know–the stuff that THIS country already prohibits.
I am so fucking tired of the NRA and its worrywarts who defend some asinine belief that if they can’t own a military-grade weapon in their own arsenal that the next thing you know they won’t be able to own a standard rifle or handgun. That is bullshit.
YOU DO NOT HAVE A RIGHT TO OWN AN OPERATIONAL UZI OR A WORKING AK-47 OR A FUNCTIONAL M-16.
The treaty’s wording doesn’t prohibit any American or any Venezuelan or any Argentine or any Bahamian from owning LEGAL weapons, as provided by the laws of their home countries. Nor does it, for that matter, prohibit hunters from entering another country with a weapon provided they do so in FULL compliance with the host country’s own weapons laws (most travel guides provide ample basic information on hunting laws for visitors but always recommend that a vacationing hunter check with the country’s consulate or embassy for up-to-date information, especially in regards to LEGAL transport of firearms).
As far as I could tell, the treaty is working to prevent things like the narco-terrorists in Colombia from obtaining weapons with the apparent ease they’ve been doing. And, there is NOTHING that I read to even suggest that the 2nd Amendment would be overruled or overturned. The ONLY context that this treaty considers is the ILLICIT manufacture and trafficking–things that the US government already prohibits, even under the 2nd Amendment.
To put this in terms that some of the more neoconnish here might understand, “If you’re not engaged in illegal firearms manufacture or transport, then why are you worried?” (That’s a paraphrase from the far-right against people who opposed the Bush Administration’s less-than-legal wiretapping and coercion of the telecom industry in the “war on terror”.)
Once upon a time, the NRA dealt strictly with educating people in the safe handling of firearms. Now, it’s its own industry to put M-16s into the hands of anyone able to hold one and decrying any reasonable efforts to make sure that military-grade weapons are only available to the military and law enforcement (instead of street gangs and unstable teenagers).

So, I read the thing and it also says this…

Approximately 90 percent of weapons seized by the Mexican Government from Mexican drug cartels came into the country illegally from the United States.

I also remember seeing that 90% was the traceable guns and not a percentage of all guns. Ours are traceable because we already have serial numbers on guns in this country. We already have laws about removing these marks. Guns are cheap in Eastern Europe, and Korea. What, does nobody think Mexico can’t get cargo directly into their ports from these countries? Of course they do. Do we think Mexico can keep guns from importing through their ports? They have a corrupt system. Criminals have the edge in corrupt governments. This is all just candy coated farce.

Good Article Eastan. Thanks.

This just proves that the United States has no government because those heading the government are not governing by the the Constitution they promised to protect and defend. None of this is legal under our Constitution. The Declaration of Independence gives us a remedy

for a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism …[and] it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new guards for their future security…

Thus, those who do not follow the Constitution and try to write laws that are against our Constitution without following the rules for Amendments are those creating a revolution and We the People, who give our consent to those governing us, also has the Right to alter or to abolish it when it strays from its Constitutional mandate. This government leader, that a political party selected for us, refuses to honor our laws, castigates our Country in enemy countries, and bows to foreign potentate, does not represent the United States of America and has lost the privilege of representing our Constitution and Our People. All that needs to be done is to “provide new guards for our future security.”

A basic legal perspective, for your information:

CIFTA is what’s called, in the parlance of international law, a “non-self-executing” treaty. That means that even if the Senate ratifies it, it does not become domestic law enforceable in courts unless and until Congress passes some separate legislation enacting the treaty’s provisions.

What this means is that you have very little to worry about. To mean anything whatsoever to any of us, Congress would have to pass a law (not just ratify the treaty). Any law running afoul of the 2nd Amd. would be struck down in courts. You can’t do an end run around the Constitution with a treaty like this (or any treaty, really). So, no worries. Hugo Chavez is not coming for your guns.

I know a fair bit about the legal stuff at issue here, FWIW, so I can do my best to answer any questions you might have.

i have never owned a gun but am thinking about purchasing one and learning to use it.

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