Need a new Militia Act

[Jon_Roland]

Instead of always playing defense against new restrictions of the RKBA, we need to push for replacement of the last Militia Act with one that begins training our citizens from childhood in military, law enforcement, and disaster response skills. While most adults might resist having to report once a month for training without being paid, if we start with children and continue their training into adulthood we could restore the militia system intended by the Founders.

Granted, with anti-RKBA candidates at the top of the ticket of both major parties, this would not seem to be a promising time to advance such legislation (although Obama hinted at something that could be depicted as militia if done right). However, that is all the more reason to take the initiative to frame the issues at a different point, and begin educating the public on the importance of mobilizing the entire population to meet current threats from terrorism, crime, public corruption, and border intrusion.

A key provision would be recognition of elected local committees of safety that would govern militia units independently of other officials who have shown a neglect of their duties to maintain a strong militia system. See http://www.constitution.org/mil/cos/cos_setup.htm

[Stagger Lee]

The 18th Century called. They want their pipe dream back.

There are already ample opportunities for any citizen who wants to do so to get involved in the military, in law enforcement or disaster preparedness. It's called "enlist, apply, volunteer", and there are slots enough for everyone willing and able to serve.

Have YOU done any of these yet? I got a bet down on what your honest answer'll be.

[Brian Pfleuger]

John Kerry thought rich people should pay more taxes too. Yet he lived in a state that allowed for voluntary extra payment and, LO AND BEHOLD, he had never made a single extra payment. Funny how that works.

[Tennessee Gentleman]

Jon,

I recommend you check outthis link. http://www.adl.org/mwd/faq1.asp

Here is a quote from one of the authors regarding the new militia movement:

As they look back to this utopian past, members of the new militia movement draw upon it for justification for what they do. Their actions are legal--indeed, worthy of estimation--because they merely continue this long (perceived) tradition. What they do is true to the spirit of the Founders, unlike the perverted or corrupted actions of government agencies like the FBI or the BATF. They are merely guardians of their own (and our) liberties.

And yet, when the rose-colored glasses are taken off, it appears that their claims to a political/philosophical inheritance are not particularly strong. Service in the historical militia was a burden rather than a right through much of its early history. As Radical Whig Ideology gained adherents in the colonies in the eighteenth century, many colonists became convinced that a strong militia did in fact guarantee liberty. But the strong militia they conceived of was not an anarchic, individually-based collection of arms-bearing volunteers, but rather the community in arms, hierarchical in nature, subservient to authority and to the law.

The Founding Fathers took this virtuous citizen militia and did something revolutionary with it, placing it (partially) in the hands of the federal government, in the hopes that the militia could better guarantee the security of the nation than could a strong standing army. Since then, the history of the militia has been one of federalism; that is, sharing power between the federal and state governments. Individuals composed the militia and owed military service to the community in the form of militia duty, but this was a burden rather than a right.

As the country grew more populous, its security could be guaranteed by forces smaller than the men provided by compulsory militia service; as a result, first the states then finally the federal government released from the burdens of service all those who chose not to participate. Henceforth, the militia would be voluntary, in what would become the National Guard.

What members of the new militia movement desire is the right to form voluntary militia units, but units without the responsibilities, duties, or safeguards by which the National Guard is governed. Though the history of the militia/National Guard in our country has largely been one of subservience to proper authorities, members of the new militia movement seek and/or claim to be answerable to no one but themselves. American society has traditionally looked askance at such groups, particularly when they are heavily armed.

The new militia movement thus has no claim to history, no claim to legality, and no claim to public support. That it is so alienated from the rest of society is both a cause of its radical opinions and a result of them. Perhaps it is enough to say that they have the tools for violence coupled with an ideology in which violence is not only permissable but if used for the right ends, admirable. That both these means and ends are not necessarily the ones desired by the majority of Americans hardly needs to be said; this is why the new militia movement is a fringe movement.

[xrocket]

... heart is in the right place and maybe you could have framed your position a little better, but when I read your proposal, my initial thought was there is a country ninety miles south of us that already practices what you advocate;

Cuba

[Darren007]

training our citizens from childhood in military, law enforcement, and disaster response skills

We do almost, its called the Boy Scouts. (at least until the mormons got a hold of it).

[Brian Pfleuger]

...at least until the mormons got a hold of it...

That made me laugh but I don't know what you are talking about. Explain please. No mormons controlling are local scouts. Are they an off-shoot of the Lumina-tee or what?

[Citizen Carrier]

As it has been pointed out before, plenty of states have organized militias.

Ohio has one. You can see it's headquarters building on the right side of the road when you drive into Camp Perry, about 50 meters past the guard post where they check your ID. Ohio even has a volunteer Naval Militia...but those volunteers mostly patrol the waters behind the Perry backstop and make sure boaters don't wander into "the beaten zone".

Next time you go to CMP North for an M1 Garand or Carbine, have a look.

[Tennessee Gentleman]

The Ohio Naval Militia is unarmed. In 2006, the Ohio Military Reserve numbered just six hundred members. Its primary purpose was to expand quickly to assist Ohioans in case of natural disasters or enemy attack. The state government now relied primarily upon the Ohio National Guard for the state's defense, as well as to assist in natural disasters and other types of emergencies.

http://www.ohiohistorycentral.org/entry.php?rec=2088

Here is more:

In the late twentieth century, private citizens in the state formed new types of military organizations. These units called themselves "militias" and were formed in a number other states as well as Ohio. These organizations said that they existed to defend individual states and the United States from attack. They also said that they would stand against federal and state government actions that the militia members believed to be unjust. Many militia members refused to abide by federal laws for various reasons. State and federal courts repeatedly ruled against many of the actions of these private militia units and their members

[Jon_Roland]

In 1933 Congress adopted the dual enlistment system for the National Guard, so that every person who joins the National Guard also enlists in the military. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/State_Defense_Forces . As military, they are on temporary duty when called up for state service.

Now any official or military person can function as militia under certain circumstances. If an off-duty soldier intervenes in a convenience store robbery and arrests the robber, he is functioning as a citizen, not as a soldier, and his arrest is civilian. Now if he had been on sentry duty at the time, and left his post, he would be subject to punishment under the UCMJ (although he might get off with a reprimand, depending on the situation).

I reiterate. "Militia" originally means "defense activity", and only secondarily those engaged in it. It is a fundamental mistake to use the term to mean only some kind of organization. Anyone engaged in activity defending the community is engaged in militia, and that activity is properly called just "militia" (not "the" militia or "a" militia). Militia is the duty that comes with the social compact that creates society, and pre-exists government. It exists under the unwritten constitution of society, which is sometimes referred to as "common law", and is not just court precedents. The authority for militia is a threat, either imminent or anticipatable.

For more on this see http://www.constitution.org/cs_defen.htm

[RedneckFur]

Have YOU done any of these yet? I got a bet down on what your honest answer'll be

StaggerLee, you and your personal attacks. Its almost cute. Almost. :barf:

[homefires]

The Boy Scouts have been effectively Disbanded! They are not allowed to do the things that teach the survival skills they teach.

Killing a rabbit is wrong.

Cooking the Rabbit is wronger!

This book is good for the newbee!

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Dangerous-Bo.../dp/0007232748
!

[Jon_Roland]

Although it appears the ADL was originally a righteous organization, it has fallen under the control of people whose agenda has little connection to truth, justice, or fidelity to the Constitution. Largely foreign-directed, it has managed to infiltrate and subvert our legal institutions in ways and to a degree that would have been the envy of the old Soviet Union. They regularly invent or magnify threats from domestic groups to justify their appeals for donations, and have found it convenient to lump together elements of the constitutional militia movement with irresponsible groups as some kind of looming threat to their gullible constituents. They conduct training seminars for federal and state judges to prejudice them against citizens seeking justice against official oppression, and have convinced many of them to treat pro se litigants as some kind of domestic threat in itself. If they had their way, only those under the control of those in power would have firearms or rights to them.

There is a fine line between legitimate advocacy of one's constituent interests, and subversion of constitutional values. Most of us took an oath to "preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign or domestic". The ADL regularly crosses that line, and you need look no further to find a domestic enemy.

[Tennessee Gentleman]

It is a fundamental mistake to use the term to mean only some kind of organization.

I don't think that is what the COTUS says or the dictionary either. The militia IS an organization.

The authority for militia is a threat, either imminent or anticipatable.

The authority for the militia is the COTUS and our elected government. It is not an entity unto itself. That is mob rule and vigilantism.

[Tennessee Gentleman]

There is a fine line between legitimate advocacy of one's constituent interests, and subversion of constitutional values. Most of us took an oath to "preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign or domestic". The ADL regularly crosses that line, and you need look no further to find a domestic enemy.

How are they a domestic enemy? Can you name something they have done to justify that label or is this antisemitism? I think the article brings forth cogent points. I don't think your view of the militia is correct.

[Jon_Roland]

Militia is the term properly used to refer to the duties arising out of the social compact that creates society, before there is a government, much less a SCOTUS or elected officials. The right and duty of militia is recognized in our written Constitution of government, but does not originate with it. The meaning of "defense activity" goes all the way back to the ancient Romans. The Founders were Latin-literate, well aware of the ancient meanings of Latin terms, and generally used them correctly. See http://www.constitution.org/col/mil_inim.htm

The SCOTUS has been in substantial conflict with the Constitution as originally understood since 1819, although their deviation gets worse every year. Stare decisis is like a game of telephone, where errors are propagated from one generation to the next until the original meaning is largely lost. Part of the problem is that lawyers are also largely ignorant of the Constitution, so in choosing among the arguments made, the court often has no constitutional alternatives.

Elections are not constitutional amendments, nor is the Constitution or laws whatever corrupt or incompetent judges say they are. The Constitution was written and adopted to be enforced by every person, not just judges, using his own judgment about what it means and requires. That duty is inalienable -- it cannot be relinquished to judges, supervisors, or legal advisers. We are all on our own, and we had better get it right.

I took an oath to preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution, not some ignorant judge's opinion. If he gets it right, fine, but if he doesn't, his opinion is just another opinion, not worthy of respect or obedience. It is null and void, like any official act in conflict with the Constitution.

[Jon_Roland]

Some of this is discussed at the Wikipedia article on it.

As for anti-Semitism, it opposes and is opposed by the Jews for the Preservation of Firearms Ownership (JPFO), of which I am a long-time supporter. For the record, I am technically Jewish myself, although I do not self-identify as such. I accept the label of constitutionalist, and am considered by many scholars as a leading expert on the subject.

A good example of evidence of subversion is a tape of a seminar they conducted for the participants in the Conference for State Chief Justices in 1998, in which they can be seen clearly indoctrinating judges to subvert constitutional rights. What they did is grounds for impeachment and removal of every judge present. I need to see if someone has put the tape online. If not, I suppose I am going to need to dig out my copy and do so.

[copenhagen]

HMM.....

Guard with jealous attention the public liberty. Suspect everyone who approaches that jewel. Unfortunately, nothing will preserve it but downright force. Whenever you give up that force, you are inevitably ruined.
-Patrick Henry

Are we at last brought to such humiliating and debasing degradation, that we cannot be trusted with arms for our defense?
-Patrick Henry

We are not weak if we make a proper use of those means which the God of Nature has placed in our power... the battle, sir, is not to the strong alone it is to the vigilant, the active, the brave.
-Patrick Henry

The great object is that every man be armed.
-Patrick Henry

Is life so dear or peace so sweet as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take, but as for me, give me liberty, or give me death!
-Patrick Henry

Stagger Lee:

The 18th Century called. They want their pipe dream back.

There are already ample opportunities for any citizen who wants to do so to get involved in the military, in law enforcement or disaster preparedness. It's called "enlist, apply, volunteer", and there are slots enough for everyone willing and able to serve.

Have YOU done any of these yet? I got a bet down on what your honest answer'll be.

Of course I have. I've been in the Marine Corps for six years now. It's still a good idea for the citizens to be armed and capable of forming a fighting force to protect their personal liberties from whatever foes may come. Liberty is a flame which must be guarded jealously.

Oh yes, my signature should be part and parcel of this post as well...

Militia act? Do we need one? I don't figure... I figure we just shouldn't be limiting the rights of militias to exist, or to effectively maintain force comparable to the modern Infantry.

[Jon_Roland]

There are already ample opportunities for any citizen who wants to do so to get involved in the military, in law enforcement or disaster preparedness. It's called "enlist, apply, volunteer", and there are slots enough for everyone willing and able to serve.

The problem is that these official activities don't adequately address the threats we face. Consider a few:

1. Public corruption and abuse of power. None of those official activities are anything but complicit in the problem. See A Lawyer's View of the Justice System, Joseph H. Delaney.
2. Terrorist attacks. The threat of suitcase nukes or something similar is real, and there is no way government agencies can defend us without mobilizing the entire population, not as informers, but as enforcers.
3. Border security. The Minutemen Project has already brought this problem to the forefront.
4. Social disintegration. Militia was the traditional glue that held communities together and helped prepare people to be good citizens who didn't try to depend on nanny government for everything. See The Jury and Consensus Government in Mid-Eighteenth-Century America, William E. Nelson.

[Jon_Roland]

Although the report at http://www.ajs.org/prose/pro_sampson.asp would seem to be friendly to pro se litigants, behind the scenes were efforts by the ADL to oppress them. This might be taken as evidence that the ADL does not hold full sway over its intended targets, and that is so, but it an indication that they make such an effort.

[S832]

The ADL is full of allot of crazy people, so is the JPFO but that discussion is for another thread.

Regarding militias -> I think you should be able to play army in the woods, I even think you should be allowed to have "nerfed" APC's and chalk grenade launchers assuming you aren't actively planning an attempted over-throw of the government.

Basically I want people to admit they are part of a "militia" for entertainment, not because they are "righteous" Americans. That does not mean they will never, ever be useful but the odds that they will be are very small.

[Alex45ACP]

Instead of always playing defense against new restrictions of the RKBA, we need to push for replacement of the last Militia Act with one that begins training our citizens from childhood in military, law enforcement, and disaster response skills. While most adults might resist having to report once a month for training without being paid, if we start with children and continue their training into adulthood we could restore the militia system intended by the Founders.

Only if we get our foreign policy under control first. The absolute last thing we need to be doing right now is giving our government an unlimited supply of cannon fodder.

[Jon_Roland]

Only if we get our foreign policy under control first. The absolute last thing we need to be doing right now is giving our government an unlimited supply of cannon fodder.

It already has an unlimited supply of cannon fodder. It can revive the draft at any time.

On the other hand, if the local Selective Service Boards were made elective and repurposed to require all citizens, unless exempt for a limited number of good reasons, to meet with their neighbors regularly to prepare for anything that might threaten them, to train in the proper use of their weapons that they would be required to have, and to train in various law enforcement and disaster response skills, then we would build the sense of community that has been lost in a sea of anonymity, people charged with defending the Constitution would be encouraged to get to know it better, and people would be empowered to solve their own problems without always turning to government to do it for them.

Just imagine the effect on support for gun control legislation if everyone who now has no experience with firearms and is afraid of them were required to have at least one and learn how to use it. We would go from a fearful society to a society aware of its rights and responsibilities and prepared to defend them. We would go from a society of victims of crime to a society of crime fighters.

Part of all this would be to organize citizens into a large number of neighborhood grand juries empowered to investigate the operations of government, and to issue bills of indictment to any citizen, not just to a public prosecutor, to conduct a private criminal prosecutions of official wrongdoing. I also envision empowering such grand juries to decide whether an official was acting within his jurisdiction, and if not, authorizing it to remove that official's immunity from civil or criminal prosecution, including jury trials on a writ of quo warranto, preventing an official from engaging in unauthorized acts or from holding office for which he has exceeded its authority.

Suppose that all the kids who are now allowed to form criminal gangs were instead redirected into forming crimefighting militia units, that could drive out the drug dealers from their neighborhoods, reduce crime, and providing a restraint on abuses from the professional police that are now operating like an occupying army in many inner-city neighborhoods.

Imagine that suitcase nukes start taking out our cities, one every few weeks, and we have no defense except to mobilize the entire population to search every square inch of the country to try to find and defuse more of them. Imagine how much more effective that would be if people were already trained and ready, and already knew their neighbors and had begun to vet them as potential threats, or had engaged them into becoming part of the community in ways that might make them less of a threat.

[Tennessee Gentleman]

Some of this is discussed at the Wikipedia article on it.

I didn't see anything in your link which would show the ADL to be a "domestic enemy" as you purport unless you consider those who disagree with you to be such. IN that case I guess I too would be such an enemy.

Elections are not constitutional amendments, nor is the Constitution or laws whatever corrupt or incompetent judges say they are. The Constitution was written and adopted to be enforced by every person, not just judges, using his own judgment about what it means and requires. That duty is inalienable -- it cannot be relinquished to judges, supervisors, or legal advisers. We are all on our own, and we had better get it right.

What you propose here is nothing less than anarchy. each person does what is legal in his/her own eyes? Now you have broken the social compact you mentioned elsewhere and we're back to living short brutish lives. The government we formed in 1789 IS the social contract we live under today. The checks and balances ensure that no one person or group can grab absolute power. However, within that governmental framework the courts, executive branches and legislatures decide what laws are passed and enforced and whether a law infringes upon the rights of an individual. Our duty as citizens is to participate and VOTE. That is where we exercise our power. Not thru a group that is armed and answers to only themselves.

Just imagine the effect on support for gun control legislation if everyone who now has no experience with firearms and is afraid of them were required to have at least one and learn how to use it. We would go from a fearful society to a society aware of its rights and responsibilities and prepared to defend them. We would go from a society of victims of crime to a society of crime fighters.

So, you are going to force people to own and train with firearms against their will and possible their own faith? Isn't that facism?

Jon, I think your ideas are extreme and what you propose might not help but rather harm freedom.

[RDak]

Roland, you're going a little too far here IMHO.

The three branches of government do provide us with freedom for the most part IMHO.

I know there is corruption but we can't do away with all our institutions.

Plus, like TG says, we can't force people to own firearms. I'd be a hypocrite if I required that.

I love firearms and just want those who don't like firearms to respect my 2nd Amendment rights. But if an individual doesn't want to own a firearm - fine by me. Just don't say I can't own one.

As to militias, I have no problem with some sort of well regulated militia like you opine. I just don't think it should be forced on everyone unless there is an emergency.