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Defenseless On the Bayou
New Orleans Gun Confiscation is Foolish and Illegal
By Dave Kopel , 9/12/2005 12:05:45 AM
In the nearly two weeks since Hurricane Katrina, the government of New Orleans has devolved from its traditional status as an elective kleptocracy into something far more dangerous: an anarcho-tyranny that refuses to protect the public from criminals while preventing people from protecting themselves.
At the orders of New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin, the New Orleans Police, the National Guard, the Oklahoma National Guard, and U.S. Marshals have begun breaking into homes at gunpoint, confiscating their lawfully-owned firearms, and evicting the residents. "No one is allowed to be armed. We're going to take all the guns," says P. Edwin Compass III, the superintendent of police.
"Applying the standard that is well established in our case law, we hold that the Second Amendment right is fully applicable to the States." ~ McDonald v. Chicago
When your only tools are a hammer and sickle, every problem starts to look like too much freedom.
Disaster Can’t Destroy Gun Rights
Monday, September 12, 2005
National Rifle Association leader Wayne LaPierre slammed New Orleans authorities Monday for seizing legal firearms from lawful residents.
"What we’ve seen in Louisiana - the breakdown of law and order in the aftermath of disaster - is exactly the kind of situation where the Second Amendment was intended to allow citizens to protect themselves, " LaPierre said.
"When law enforcement isn’t available, Americans turn to the one right that protects all the others - the right to keep and bear arms," LaPierre said. "This attempt to repeal the Second Amendment should be condemned."
The New York Times reported last Thursday that no civilians in New Orleans will be allowed to have guns, quoting the superintendent of police that "only law enforcement are allowed to have weapons."
A Louisiana state statute allows the chief law enforcement officer to "regulate possession" of firearms during declared emergencies. "But regulate doesn’t mean confiscate," said Chris W. Cox, the NRA’s chief lobbyist.
"Authorities are using that statute to do what the looters and criminals could not: disarm the law-abiding citizens of New Orleans trying to protect their homes and families," Cox said.
"Applying the standard that is well established in our case law, we hold that the Second Amendment right is fully applicable to the States." ~ McDonald v. Chicago
When your only tools are a hammer and sickle, every problem starts to look like too much freedom.
I'd like to say UNBELIEVABLE but unfortunately I can't IF the cotton picker's down there at not brought to task for this ............. The whole things makes me want to utter four letter words till the air turns blue and I can think straight, but someone needs to pay with their hide for this!
Willy P wrote:I'd like to say UNBELIEVABLE but unfortunately I can't IF the cotton picker's down there at not brought to task for this ............. The whole things makes me want to utter four letter words till the air turns blue and I can think straight, but someone needs to pay with their hide for this!
But nobody will. You know that just as sure as I do.
Total repeal of ALL firearms/weapons laws at the local, state and federal levels. Period. Wipe the slate clean.
What gun rights organization out there is going to be willing to bring the Gov, CLEO, and every other LEO who participated in illegal firearms confiscations under indictment?
Bickering and squabling between the members/founders of this organization alone, shows me that we could never garner enough support/team work amongst ourselves to effect any sort of legal accountability.
One stumbling block among gun owners...we are an individualistic lot, and stubborn too! Divide and conquer works well on us
This situation in NO will set a precedence, for which side I wonder?
OK then the ACLU should do something ! Better? I thought we all did pretty well on the Pat Robertson thread and there were some pretty good opinions expressed there. I feel like we are a pretty open minded group, a large percentage of the time. Some win others to one side of an exchange and others are softened on what may have at first been a hard line on a topic. Some days this is all the adult exchange of ideas I get. Heck I'm even looking forward to going back to the "salt mine" at this point.
ampleworks wrote:If the NRA sits on their hands like they have thus far, they won't see another dime from my checkbook.
How has the NRA been sitting on its hands? They have instituted a boycott against Conoco-Philips. They put out the press release about the New Orleans abuse printed above. What more exactly were you hoping for them to do..?
TunnelRat
"Applying the standard that is well established in our case law, we hold that the Second Amendment right is fully applicable to the States." ~ McDonald v. Chicago
When your only tools are a hammer and sickle, every problem starts to look like too much freedom.
I am proud of the NRA in the Conoco stand! That is something that hits home for me as Delphi could do that to us and I can't help but think it is coming at some time. I have voiced my opinion openly at work on the subject to management and will buck like a rodeo horse if they try it here. The release you posted from the NRA Tom is a begining and I for one think they will go farther. Just how far I don't know but I honestly think we will see more out of them on it.
From this morning's Investors Business Daily (IBD for home gamers):
It is clear that Katrina Week was exactly the Worst Possible Time for the Local Police to confiscate legal firearms from citizens. The issue ultimately becomes one of Charelton Heston's favorite sayings: They will only take my firearm from my cold dead hands.
The issue, of course, is whether it is justified homicide to shoot a LEO who tries to enforce such an unconstitutional order. Giving up the firearm and fighting in Court later is not an option since Death by Goon ends the possible plaintiff's case. How committed does one need to be? Hmmmmmm
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<<"Issues & Insights
Goon Control
Posted 9/14/2005
Justice: The breakdown of law and order in the aftermath of Katrina shows the wisdom of letting citizens protect themselves when government cannot. What Katrina could not destroy, predators tried to take.
After Katrina, armed gangs roamed the streets of the Big Easy. While many New Orleans police personnel served honorably and to the point of exhaustion under the worst possible circumstances, hundreds fled the city or were nowhere to be found.
Some literally threw their badges out the window as they sped away.
There were no phones, no communications, no way to dial 911. If you could have reached someone to report a break-in or attempted assault, it is unlikely anyone would have been available.
What law enforcement was available was tied up with rescue efforts, not crime fighting.
One group raided a nursing home whose director said had a 10-day supply of food. As Peggy Hoffman, the home's director, told The Associated Press at the time, "Now we'll have to equip our department heads with guns and teach them how to shoot."
At Tulane University Hospital & Clinic, a group described as "armed thugs" gathered in the parking lot and entered the facility, probably in search of drugs, according to John Matessino, head of the Louisiana Hospital Association.
Senior National Guard official Lt. Gen. Steven Blum said at a Pentagon briefing after returning from New Orleans, "We waited until we had enough force in place" to avoid a firefight with armed criminals and looters that would endanger civilians. "No one anticipated the disintegration or the erosion of the civilian police force in New Orleans."
East Baton Rouge Parish officials agreed to send 20 buses to help evacuate New Orleans residents, but only if a state trooper was also placed on each bus.
The plan was dropped, with Walter Monsour, the chief administrative officer of the parish, explaining, "I told them I don't mind committing drivers and vehicles, but I wasn't going to put our people in harm's way."
In harm's way in the aftermath were people like New Orleans resident Charlie Hackett, who said: "It was pandemonium for a couple of nights. We just felt that when they got done with the stores, they'd come to the homes."
So Hackett, as The New York Times reported, sat with his neighbor, John Carolan, and stood guard over their homes waiting for the looters and thugs to come their way.
And they did. Carolan was sitting on his porch when a group of three or four young thugs, one armed with a machete and another with a knife, demanded that he give them his portable generator.
"I fired a couple of shots over their heads with a .357 Magnum," Carolan recounted. "They scattered." Presumably to search for another victim.
But now the authorities want to take the gun he used to defend himself away. New Orleans Police Superintendent Edwin Compass ordered the confiscation of such legally owned firearms from law-abiding citizens under a Louisiana state statute that allows law enforcement officers to "regulate possession" of firearms in declared emergencies.
But regulation is not confiscation, and it is not clear just how a Category 4 hurricane repeals the constitutional right to keep and bear arms.
Nobody really knows how many times people like John Carolan successfully defend their property and their lives with a legal firearm, but the Justice Department's National Institute of Justice study puts the number at 1.5 million annually.
Guns save lives as well as take them. When we control our goons, we don't need to control our guns.">>
Roy from Westerville
Safer Sidewalks with CCW. Do you have your Ohio CHL? "Remember New Orleans!" ..... NRA September 2005
ampleworks wrote:If the NRA sits on their hands like they have thus far, they won't see another dime from my checkbook.
How has the NRA been sitting on its hands? They have instituted a boycott against Conoco-Philips. They put out the press release about the New Orleans abuse printed above. What more exactly were you hoping for them to do..?
One thing they could have done in addition would be to either file, or support (through attorneys/legal fee funding) someone filing a request for an injunction prohibiting further confisication activities with an appropirate state or federal court.
Even if it didn't got anywhere or was shot down, it would have gotten the attention of the media and possibly any public officials that might contemplate such action in the future.
Randy, NRA Life member, OFCC Member
911: When seconds count, the police are only minutes away.