ATF Rejects TN Firearms Freedom Act -- No to 10th Amendment

[Chut1st]

John,

Just a thought, but since FFL's are licensed by BATFE, that could be construed as an implicit consent to the authority of BATFE in this matter. On the other hand, a non-FFL private citizen or Tennessee-based corporation would have a defense based strictly on the 9th and 10th Amendments without any such implication.

Your opinion?

Rick

[johnharris]

[jpesz]

The BATFE has a long history or ignoring the Constitution and trampling on the rights of citizens, firearms dealers and the states. If there is such a thing as a federal agency to which the term "jack-booted thugs" actually applies it is the BATFE. Their abuses in the past have been so tyrannical that at one time in the eighties Congress actually considered abolishing the agency. Instead they instituted what they considered "major reforms" which the BATFE has totally ignored while continuing to function more like an agency of the old USSR than something that we should have in a constitutional democracy. They appear to be answerable to nobody and could care less about the Consitution, states rights or due process. There is at least some attempt in congress right now to address some of these issues. Tell your representative to get behind these efforts. Make sure that they know that the 2d Amendment is a deal breaker for you at election time and be sure that you check their actual voting record in congress and in the state legislature if they were there first. Many will lie on questionaires sent out by pro-gun organizations. Even Jimmy Naifeh and Kent Coleman at one time were able to con the NRA into endorsing them. The current administration really does want to take your guns but many democratic congressmen from conservative districts do respond to voter pressure. Make sure that they feel lots of it.

[C. Richard Archie]

[jpesz]

[Dan Lee]

We need a new AG then no?

[johnharris]

[Pat McGarrity]

Let's not forget the classic; Burn All Toddlers First. That name was earned in the '90s at Waco by the bean counters with MP5s from the Treasury Dept.


Wont we get a new TN AG, with a new Governor?

In Liberty,

Pat

[RichardAHamblen]

As Joe Sobran famously said "The Constitution poses no threat to our present form of government".
A few points: once someone applies for and accepts an FFL, he agrees to dance to the BATFE's tune, which means accepting their regulations as well as surrendering basic Constitutional rights such as the Fourth Amendment. An FFL is a contract in other words.

The larger question is where do the Feds get the authority to regulate firearms in the first place? US Attorney General Cummings claimed, in hearings on the NFA of 1934 before the House Ways and Means Committee (remember the NFA is a tax statute), authority based on the model of the Harrison Act which started the notably successful and neverending War on Drugs. This act introduced the novel idea of using the Commerce Clause and the taxing power as the controlling authority. Prior to this, it was generally thought that the Constitution had to be amended to grant authority prior to such actions such as Alcohol Prohibition. But drugs, unlike firearms, are not protected by their own constitutional amendment. Read the preamble to the Bill of Rights, (something you were probably never taught in school, on purpose of course):

THE Conventions of a number of the States having at the time of their adopting the Constitution, expressed a desire, in order to prevent misconstruction or abuse of its powers, that further declaratory and restrictive clauses should be added

The Bill of Rights was adopted after the Commerce Clause, so that its language is controlling, which explicitly says that the right to keep and bear arms "shall not be infringed", period. If a poll tax is now, by constitutional amendment, an infringement on the right to vote, then how can a firearms tax not be an infringement on the right to keep and bear arms? By the same logic which is self evident from the language of the Bill of Rights, the 9th and 10th Amendment trump any authority claimed by anything in the body of the original Constitution unless it has been superseded by later amendment (such as Alcohol Prohibition). Since the language is fairly clear, we are reduced to quibbling over the meaning of individual words, words which were apparently clear to enough to everyone prior to the passage of the Volstead Act, but suddenly became clouded by the time of the FDR administration and have been ever since.

As a practical matter, the Federal Government feels itself bound to the Constitution as a matter of convenience only. When the Constitution cuts in the Feds' favor they obey it; when not they ignore it or put some arcane interpretation on it and then make it practically impossible to challenge that interpretation. When things get really at an impasse, they call out the troops, as did Mr. Lincoln. So much for the Tenth Amendment. The last time Tennessee challenged the Federal Government, she was invaded and conquered. Might makes right, at least according to the Feds' practice if not their words.

A constitutional convention? First, you have to have 2/3 of the states to call one. And then what are you going to do to enforce the changes once 3/4 agrees, assuming we don't end up with something worse. Remember, only the deficiencies in the Articles of Confederation were to be remedied by the convention called in 1787. We ended up with a whole new system, written in secret, which broke down in 1861. The States effectively have no power, and no one in office has indicated they are willing to take the necessary steps to enforce the Tenth Amendment. Will the governor instruct federal agents that they are not to operate in Tennessee with out the express approval of him through his AG, and then only if accompanied by a Tennessee official? And will he back it up with force, if necessary? Does the state even have a Militia? (Don't fool yourself about the National Guard. The Supreme Court considers them part of the US Army. See Perpich v. DOD). There are no indications that anyone in the government has thought this out, not even the backers of the Tenth Amendment resolutions. I have asked.

And then there is the question of the loss of federal money. Most federal requirements are riders to appropriations bills, and the state has to comply or lose the funding. We have become wage slaves to the Federal master.

Don't expect the Courts to come to our aid. Roosevelt put the fear of God into them in 1937 and they have been compliant ever since. They know where their career advancement lies.

If you are going to challenge the Feds and the BATFE, do it on the proper authority, the Second Amendment. The Tenth is for other issues and is only secondarily controlling here. This is not an academic exercise. Real planning and organization is required.

[ProguninTN]