From: [o--iv--r] at [cs.unc.edu] (Bill Oliver)
Newsgroups: misc.writing
Subject: Polit. Phil. Gun Cont. : Conclusion (was Fun with Guns)
Date: 14 Jun 1995 12:21:22 -0400


One of the things that strikes me about the position of many of those
who support gun control concerns their almost absolute trust
in the government to respect their rights.  The following is
a representative quote from one such debate:

Strand:You TRUST someone with a "near-monopoly of force" to operate with 
Strand:"reasonable fairness"?  I question your sanity on this one, Ed.  
Strand:If it's a "near" monopoly, who's got the "remaining slice"?  The people! 
Strand: The 2nd amendment is the only *guarantee* of liberty in the Constitution.
Strand:It's amazing how "liberal" people start coming up with some awfully 
Strand:"conservative" arguments when it comes to gun ownership.

Nilges:That is what government [is] about according to liberal and conservative
Nilges:theorists (see Nozick) alike...a near monopoly of force.  If guns, not
Nilges:government, is the "equalizer" then only gun owners will get justice.
Nilges:People unjustly classified as "scum" because of their race or religion,
Nilges:people unwilling to take life, and children will not get justice in a
Nilges:society in which government does not enjoy a near monopoly of force.


I think that the theorists which provided the philosophic underpinnings of
the republicanism of the Founding Fathers would have a bit of a problem
with Mr. Nilges view of what they said, as their own words demonstrate in
the first two parts of my article.  In fact, the republican theorists
took just the opposite view, that concentrating force in the hands of the
government was, and is, a dangerous thing.  Certainly, the government is
to see that justice is for all, but who is to see to the government?

The basic disagreement, as I see it, is who we perceive as the greatest
threat.  Mr. Strand and I see the threat of oppressive government, while
gun control enthusiasts are afraid of their fellow citizens.  I was not 
surprised that Mr.  Nilges refers to the "rabble of gun owners,"  and speaks 
of his fear that any "clown" can get a gun, echoing the fears of Bodin and 
Hobbes. That is the basic difference; Mr. Strand and I echo the feelings 
of the republican theorists in that we  feel that that the threat to 
democracy is of greater creater concern than our fear of the "rabble" 
of this nation.

Mr. Nilges challenges us to "describe how gun ownership guarantees
liberty." "Gun ownership as we know it here in the USA does not guarantee
liberty, for to do so invidiual people would have to own nuclear weapons
to meet the force our government possesses."  He states that "there 
is no coherent story that can be told of an
armed rebellion in our society by a rabble of gun owners." Two points can
be made.  Actually, but less importantly, he is wrong outright  -- primarily 
because he sees us in a vacuum.  While a populace armed with only light 
weapons would indeed have trouble overwhelming the military might of 
the US military, he forgets a number of things.  The first is that, were 
there a rebellion, only the beginning of the uprising would be 
performed using the weapons at hand.  Aid would no doubt come, just 
as it came to the Viet Cong, the Afganis, and to the Contras.  The task of
the rebels would not be to win, but to achieve credibility.  Second, 
he assumes that the government will be willing to use its full strength 
against its people (he mentions, for instance, nuclear arms), which 
is by no means necessarily true.  

The Afganis did quite well with Enfield rifles (and did not have to 
deal with nuclear arms).  Indeed, they could not
control the cities, and did not start to win outright until US aid
arrived, but with light arms and little more, they controlled the
countryside against a foreign invader.  I once had a friend who was a
pilot in Viet Nam at the beginning of our involvement there.  He used to
talk about the Viet Cong "rock patrols" -- these were VC who had no arms
at all, but fought by throwing rocks.  There is a museum at Fort Bragg,
NC, which displays some of the jerry-rigged weapons taken from VC
casualties at  the beginning of the US involvement.  Certainly, the VC
were well-armed by 1975, but they maintained their credibility without
heavy weapons.  More recently, the Bosnian Muslims have shown that the
use of light arms can, at least for awhile, help against heavier 
weapons to provide time to seek other avenues of success.  

More important, gun control enthusiasts who dismiss the political
power of an armed citizenry ignore the coercive influence of an armed
populace to use its power to get concessions.  Con control enthusiasts have 
an abiding faith in the good will of the government, but what happens when the
government chooses to use its "monopoly of force" to oppress minorities --
as occurred in the US against Blacks, American Indians, and others?   
The third part of my article shows that just the opposite is true -- 
the militant blacks of the 1960s correctly viewed firearm control as 
an attempt to stop the threat of the black power movement.  The United
States has a long history of using an advantage of arms, either outright
as with the American Indian, or by selective enforcement as with the
American Black to oppress minorities.  

Mr. Nilges accuses "gun fanciers" of always asking "for a Draconian
judicial system, presumably lacking constitutional rights for the accused,
to control the anarchy that would result from increased gun ownership."
The opposite is in fact true.  As I demonstrated, it is the fear of
anarchy in the form of fear of "rabble," which leads to the destruction of
constitutional protections.  Mr. Nilges statements reflect the fears of
Senator Long much more than they reflect those of us who oppose firearms
legislation.

As Raymond Kessler states

	... Individuals and organizations concerned about civil and human
	rights ignore the fact that in addition to political power and
	oppression, political freedom, defense against injustice, and a 
	more just society may also grow out of the barrel of a gun.

	The relative lack of scholarly attention to these issues may 
	reflect not only the anti-gun bias flowing from a cosmopolitan
	life style but also from the fact that academicians are largely
	dependent on (and perhaps members of) the more fortunate segments
	of society who feel some uneasiness not only about street crime
	but also about the "armed masses."  Given the fact that government
	forces (i.e. police, military) are going to have guns for the 
	near future at least, the essentially conservative bias of 
	advocacy of gun control becomes clear.  Many comfortable 
	individuals (including scholars and academicians) are willing
	to barter away the potential for resistance to oppressive
	government and its partisans in return for an uncertain promise
	of less crime.  The exhange may also mean the loss of the means of
	self-defense for unpopular minorities and dissenters and the 
	potential for riot and revolt by those being exploited or 
	oppressed.  The comfortable almost always have more to fear
	from those below them than they do from those above them. 
	It is thus easy for the "haves" to give away freedoms for
	which they see no need.  It is also easy for the "haves" to
	bargain away freedoms the "have nots" may need -- especially
	when those freedoms pose a threat to the class structure.


No, Mr. Nilges.  I do not oppose gun control because of my "knee jerk"
"Thanatos" orientation.  I oppose gun control for the same reason 
Aristotle, Locke, Adams, and Jefferson did -- because the ownership
of arms by the "rabble" is the only true way to maintain liberty.
Mr. Nilges states that the Supreme Court decision upholding the  
"militia" interpretation of the Second Amendment removes the
Constitutional foundations of those of use who oppose firearms legislation. 
The second of part of my article deals with this.  Mr. Nilges would  
deny me the "license" to disagree with a current Supreme Court finding.  
I wonder if he finds Professor Shalhope's article seditious as well.  
Regardless, in it Shalhope points out that the intent of the Founding Fathers 
can be found in their own words.  While there may be arguments that the
Second Amendment is no longer viable, it is foolish to argue that the
Founding Fathers did not intend that individual citizens have the right 
to keep arms.  If Mr. Nilges finds the libertarian republicanism of Mr.
Strand and myself suspect, he would be horrified of John Adams. 

Gun control activists are horrified when the public goes on a gun-buying spree
every time they succeed in further eroding the government recognition
of ownership rights.  They don't understand, for some
reason, that most folk are like me -- they really do care about their
liberty, and they are frightened, not by their fellow citizens, but by
watching their liberties erode before their eyes. Neither that concern,
nor the philosphical basis thereof is as trivial as gun control
activists claim, and it reflects a celebration of the common man 
rather than the fear that conrol enthusiasts imputes to gun owners.  
It is they, not me, who fears their neighbors. 




Bill Oliver