By David Lettieri
Wednesday, October 11, 2017
There are few more polarizing topics in American
political discourse than guns and abortion. Both have featured prominently in
the news recently, following the tragic Las Vegas shootings and the House’s new
20-week abortion ban. The Left and Right use guns and abortion as either a
cause to rally around, or as a target to destroy. But the Left is often
hypocritical in its theory of rights, where they come from, how they are
enshrined in law, and how they can and should be advocated for or protected in
the political process.
The debate around guns and abortion often revolves around
how they should be regulated on the state level. While my evidence is
anecdotal, I believe that the vast majority of Americans do not understand how
fundamental rights have been enforced throughout American history as they
relate to state action. It’s important to understand this history, and how we
got where we are, when evaluating the differing view of rights across the
political spectrum.
The History of the
Bill of Rights
In 1791, when the Bill of Rights was ratified and
enacted, it was applicable to the federal government but not to the states. For
example: states still had the ability create an established church and fund it
with tax money, and many states did just that well into the 1800s. The First
Amendment was inapplicable. Similarly, states could outlaw firearms if they so
desired and their state constitution allowed it. The Second Amendment was
inapplicable.
In 1868, the Fourteenth Amendment was ratified and this
balance of federalism was altered. The reason for this amendment, of course,
was to combat the grave injustices that states would continue to allow against
former slaves, their descendants, and other minority groups. Through subsequent
Supreme Court cases, the Bill of Rights was applied against the states so that
state governments could not deny freedom of speech, religion, et cetera to any
citizens—regardless of what state constitutions and laws said.
Predictably, proponents of the Second Amendment argue
that if the federal government can’t regulate or forbid gun ownership, neither
can state governments because of the Fourteenth Amendment. Similarly,
proponents of abortion rights argue that abortion is a fundamental right
protected in the Bill of Rights, and states can’t regulate it as their citizens
see fit because of the Fourteenth Amendment.
The Left Holds
Contradictory Views on Guns And Abortion
However, the Left’s philosophy regarding guns and
abortion contains a contradiction that it isn’t willing to confront. Jimmy
Kimmel, in what I believe was a genuinely heartfelt and sincere late-night
response to the Las Vegas shootings, exposed that hypocrisy. “When an American
buys guns then there is nothing we can do about that,” he said sardonically.
“The Second Amendment, I guess, our forefathers wanted us to have AK-47s is the
argument, I assume.”
But have you ever noticed that the Left only makes an
“originalist” argument about the Constitution when it comes to the Second
Amendment? Several of these originalist arguments have surfaced after the Las
Vegas tragedy, and Kimmel alluded to one in his statement. Another common
argument alleges that one must be a member of the militia to have an individual
right to bear arms. Regardless of whether such arguments have any merit, they
seek to understand exactly what the Second Amendment meant at the time of its
enactment, and bring that meaning into the present day.
Contrast these arguments with the Left’s stance on
abortion rights. These rights stem from a general right to privacy most
prominently found in the Fourth Amendment, which protects against unreasonable
searches and seizures without a warrant issued by a judge based on probable
cause.
Justice Douglas, in an opinion for the Supreme Court,
wrote one of the most famous phrases in American jurisprudence: “The foregoing
cases suggest that specific guarantees in the Bill of Rights have penumbras
[the partially shaded outer region of the shadow cast by an opaque object],
formed by emanations [an abstract but perceptible thing that issues or
originates from a source] from those guarantees that help give them life and
substance. Various guarantees create zones of privacy.”
This type of philosophy, often referred to as a “living
and breathing” view of the Constitution, was used to create a Constitutional
right to contraceptives and then to abortion.
On Abortion, The
Left Changes Their Tune
Now imagine a late-night comedian, with all his
holier-than-thou sarcasm, saying, “And when Americans want to abort unborn
babies, there is nothing we can do about that. Because when our forefathers
said the government couldn’t charge into our houses and seize us or our
possessions without a warrant, I guess they also meant that we could terminate
pregnancies.”
Such a scenario will never happen. When it comes to the
sacred right of the Left—the right to abortion—the living and breathing view of
the Constitution is the only one that receives any merit. Yet when it comes to
gun rights, according to the Left, the only right we should retain is the right
to carry a musket. Because that’s what the Second Amendment, in practice,
covered in 1791. The hypocrisy of these simultaneous views is staggering.
Imagine the reaction to a conservative judge writing,
“Americans have the right to own and carry high power weapons, often referred
to as ‘military style or assault weapons,’ because in the shade of the Second
Amendment there is an abstract but perceptible right that we perceive to exist
absent any other historical context of what the amendment was intended to
create.” The reaction from the left would be predictable, but it begs the
question, why is this philosophy good enough for abortion but not good enough
for guns?
The Left Hates The
NRA—But Loves Planned Parenthood
Of course, if a judge did this, a Republican would have
almost certainly nominated that judge to the bench. The reaction from the Left
would be that the NRA’s corrupting influence on the political process led to
that nomination and thereby tainted the purity of the ruling. This leads me to
a second criticism of Jimmy Kimmel’s monologue.
“Senate Majority Leader Mitch
McConnell, Speaker of the House Paul Ryan, and a number of other law makers who
won’t do anything [about gun violence] because the NRA has their balls in a
money clip also sent their thoughts and their prayers . . . which is good
because they should be praying to God to forgive them for letting the gun lobby
run this country.”
Do you ever notice how the only lobby that runs the
country, according to the Left, is the gun lobby (and sometimes the Koch
brothers)? Step back and think about what the NRA is. It’s a group of citizens
spending their own money to exercise
their First Amendment rights to speech, association, and petitioning of the
government to protect their Second Amendment rights.
Contrast this with Planned Parenthood. It’s a group of
citizens spending their own money in combination with a lot of taxpayer-funded money, to do the same thing with their
preferred right. Sure, not all of the money from taxpayers goes to lobbying,
but money is fungible and finite. If an organization has less of it, they have
to make decisions about what areas they are going to cut.
The Left Wants To
Have It Both Ways
Imagine the following hypothetical speech from Paul Ryan:
“We have too many gun related deaths in this country, and many are preventable
accidents. We can significantly reduce accidental gun deaths by promoting gun
safety. Because the NRA is the national leader in providing gun safety courses,
we are going to appropriate $500 million in the next budget to give to NRA
educational and training initiatives in order to save lives.”
The reaction from the Left is easily imaginable. “The
Right is funding the NRA with taxpayer money so that the NRA can turn around
and spend more money on political races and support of Republicans. Its
absolute corruption that should not be tolerated.” Why isn’t this same standard
applied to Planned Parenthood?
You see, the Left is happy to support a right created by
judicial fiat based on a 2017 view of an 1868 amendment that distorts 1791
amendments beyond all recognition. But when the Right says that the Second Amendment
protects our right to bear arms—which the Second Amendment literally says—the
Left is all too happy to constrain that right to muskets.
When those on the Right use their own money to form an
organization, the Left calls the NRA and the politicians it supports corrupt.
And yet—the Left tells the Right that it is violating women’s rights by arguing
that Planned Parenthood, one of the Left’s key political allies, shouldn’t get
public funds. They can’t have it both ways.
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