The horrific Newtown school massacre has again raised the question of why effective gun control is beyond the capacity of American politicians. The question is necessary, natural and appropriate. But it also misreads the constitutional character of American politics which, for both good and ill, remain far more ideological than those of all other liberal democracies.
Change and regulation, which in an Australian or western European context, would entail a technocratic debate over their utility, often raise fundamental questions about the relationship between citizen and state in the US .
In Canberra, healthcare is framed by a competition between two parties each claiming they can deliver it better. Deference to “experts” is high on both sides. In Washington, healthcare is a proxy for a centuries-long struggle between proponents and opponents of federal power – deference to experts takes second place. “Obamacare” is a debate about first principles; Australian Medicare is about technocratic delivery.
The US Constitution largely accounts for this difference. Unlike its Australian counterpart, it gives practical form to an idea, first posited in the Declaration of Independence, that some rights are so basic (“unalienable”) they remain beyond the power of government to abrogate. The United States is an experiment, now in its 24th decade, to see whether government can be so constituted that these rights remain secure.
Initially, these were the right to life and liberty and the pursuit of happiness. In the Bill of Rights (the first ten amendments to the US Constitution, passed in 1791) they were further extended to include, among others, the right to freedom of speech and of religion, and to trial by jury. In the 221 years since, constitutional rights have been further extended to include voting rights, the right to privacy and, from that asserted right, the right to reproductive choice.
The constitutional right to bear arms continues to invoke an ideological clash of a similar intensity to the abortion issue. Proponents of each right acknowledge there are consequences to the exercise of it. Reproductive choice campaigners recognise that since Roe v. Wade (1973) there have been more than 50 million abortions in the United States (1.2 million per year or 3000 per day).
Similarly, advocates of gun choice can’t fail to acknowledge that guns, over the same period, have been used to kill almost 400,000 Americans (about 9,000 per year or 25 each day).
In response, pro-gun and pro-abortion lobbies both argue a variation of “so what?” and “who cares?” The holding of the right is more important than the consequences of its holding. If a woman wants an abortion the government cannot second-guess her. If that same woman wants to own a gun, what right has the government to ask her why and how many? The National Rifle Association (NRA) and the National Organization for Women (NOW), whilst they differ on most issues, are nevertheless engaged in the same political strategy: to make their asserted rights secure in the Constitution, sufficient that mainstream politicians will steer clear of the issue – as both Obama and Romney did this year.
Abortion and gun rights campaigns each offer a slippery slope argument: restrict abortion in the third trimester and eventually women will be denied the procedure in their second; ban assault rifles and a precedent for ever more restrictive gun control will be established until all firearms are banned. Give the government an inch and it will take a mile.
In the days ahead, the NRA will campaign in identical fashion to Planned Parenthood when abortion restrictions are mooted. Denying the right to bear arms, the NRA will claim, invites government to regulate the behaviour of citizens in violation of the US Constitution. The freedom to own guns, like the freedom to make decisions about one’s own body, are the province of the individual; they brook no governmental intrusion. Regulation of either would alter fundamentally the relationship between citizen and state – in favour of the power of the latter.
Importantly, the fervour with which each right is claimed should give us an indication of the practical political impossibility of altering the Constitution so each right is denied, weakened or even substantially regulated. The US Constitution has been amended only 27 times since its ratification – or only 17 times since 1791. Amendments require a two-thirds majority in both houses of Congress (impossible on Obamacare and that was mere legislation) and then ratification by two-thirds (or 33) of the 50 states.
Amendments are thus only really possible when there is a genuine national consensus or ambivalence on the issue at hand. Neither guns nor abortion are marked by consensus or ambivalence. Their significant regulation is a political non-starter. The greater surprise after Newtown will be a President Obama making gun control a central issue of his second term. Politicising the issue now would only further alienate the Republicans he needs on-side to cut a budget deal, as David Smith argues.
My argument is not about the moral rights and wrongs of access to guns and abortion. Rather, it is to observe why and how the US Constitution, by enshrining a right to them, renders both issues immune to political compromise and thus to technocratic regulation.
Gun rights will continue to lead to gun deaths; abortion rights will continue to lead to abortions. The willingness of both rights claimants to defend these consequences fiercely and often absolutely goes some way to explaining why neither guns nor abortion will be subject to greater federal regulation anytime soon.
Luc Brien
logged in via Facebook
This is why people-driven, grassroots movements, such as Occupy the NRA, are so important.
http://www.thenation.com/blog/171785/occupy-nra#
Peter Ormonde
Peter Ormonde is a Friend of The Conversation.
Farmer
A society founded on unconstrained individualism. It's a rather tense fit isn't it? Or it has become so in the wake of a succession of Supreme Court judgements based on sacred text rather than the embodied ideas of the US Constitution.
3 days after the Connecticut massacre the NRA and its acolytes were organising for the " second amendment fight of your life" ... here from one of my favourite journals of record: http://www.sofmag.com/special-commentary-prepare-second-amendment-battle-your-life
The solution - the best defence - according to this mob, would have been if one of the teachers - or perhaps a posse - reached into their desks and polled out their subcompact Glock. Yep - a shoot out - just like the OK corral. Like Clint. In a class room.
The solution to madmen having guns is more guns.
Those whom the gods wish to destroy they first drive mad.
Roberto Crispino
Public Servant
I am not sure comparing right to abortion and right to bear arms is valid. While the two figure significantly in the national conciousness of the Americans, the two are very different issues. This just dilutes the issue and blunts any possible change. It implies that if the USA were to abrogate the right to bear arms, they might as well force women to bear children they do not want or risk their life in illegal clinics.
A right to privacy would have been more consistent, but lacks the impact and does not hold women's rights at ransom.
Michael Shand
Michael Shand is a Friend of The Conversation.
Software Tester
I was with you up until you said that both abortion and gun rights advocates use the slippery slope arguement.......true but you are completely ignoring the context, the anti-abortion tea party crew explicitly state, as rick perry just did, that their goal is to ban all abortions everywhere.....have you heard such a statement from a Governer or senate leader on abortion? no, so why are you peddling this "Both sides do it" nonsense
What has Obama done on Gun Control? - extended rights to carry…
Read moreZvyozdochka
logged in via Twitter
I am glad you referred to the USofA as an Experiment. It's over. They're managed to totally confuse themselves over what are "rights" and what is liberty. How about the human right, as a child no less, to NOT be shot to death while attending school?
Otherwise the article is one giant strawman. The "right" to an abortion is nothing of the sort, it's a right for a woman to chose control of her own body. There is actually a supporting technocratic argument to such empowerment of women in actually reducing poverty, AND reducing the number of abortions (as is the experience in Europe).
Alex Cannara
logged in via LinkedIn
Our US "experiment" has always been "in progress", Z. And, the rest of the world has occasionally depended on it too, eh?
Alex Cannara
logged in via LinkedIn
Yes, we are fools. However, US Supreme Court Justice Scalia actually said something useful, once: the words of the Constitution should be interpreted "as they were understood at the time".
Exactly, for the meaning of a right "to bear arms". Anyone can have any number of late 18th century "arms" as they wish -- muzzle loaded, single-shot per barrel, non-cartridge, flintlock pistols/rifles.
Dianna Arthur
Dianna Arthur is a Friend of The Conversation.
Environmentalist
I cannot believe I have just read this article on TC.
Linking guns AND abortions?
There is no commonality.
This type of sophistry I would expect from some extreme blog site, not here.
To the people of The Conversation, if this is your idea of 'balance' may I suggest the following:
Nuclear power and anti-vaccination.
Gambling and Child care.
Yes to alcohol, No to cannabis.
Round earth and flat earth.
Aaaaaaagh!!!
Alex Cannara
logged in via LinkedIn
I agree with your ordering, Dianna, "nuclear power" indeed goes with "round earth".
;]
Dianna Arthur
Dianna Arthur is a Friend of The Conversation.
Environmentalist
Time for a larf:
http://www.crikey.com.au/2012/12/18/roger-its-rupert/
Note to Alex; you read the above cartoon from left to right. No, don't thank me I am always happy to help.
Steve Drummond
Retired (self funded)
Perhaps the second last paragraph was added after Dianna made her comment or more likely Dianna did not bother to read the whole article.
I understood the article to present a good summary of why US legislators are paralysed from taking action on a number of issues.
It seems to me that the much lauded "freedom" referred to in the US constitution is in fact a tyranny.
Alex Cannara
logged in via LinkedIn
Ace cartoon, Dianna! Happy Chrissie to you too.
Simon Kerr
observer
Actually, I thought the article was rather interesting because it tried to articulate the deep seated place that the US constitution and ideology has in the emotional fabric of American identity. I certainly didn't read this as an argument for/against abortion. It is unfair (and disingenuous) to spin this article as representing a moral statement.
Personally, I have struggled to get into the head space of Americans who are so opposed to gun control and this article was useful in that respect.Yes, perhaps choosing abortion as another example of this 'constitutional mentality' was unwise because it is a red flag to many (clearly), but in another sense the article sought to be balanced by showing the role of this 'constitutional mentality' on both sides of politics, not just on the nasty right wing gun control nutters. If it had only done that, THEN we could charge it as unbalanced.
BTW, I want gun control and I support abortion, just for the record.
Alex Cannara
logged in via LinkedIn
Nice comments Simon.
And, the NRA has just announced a press conference on Friday, and claim to wish to wrok so that this "never happens again". They -- Wayne LaPierre & other directors, appear to be realizing their own membership is now in the majority for gun control and assault-weapons-ban restoration, among other reasonable actions. They're in a situation like our dear GroverN is with his "no tax" pledge -- Republican Congress folks are awakening to the reality that both LaPierre and Norquist are more bark than bite now. Democrats, once cowed by the NRA are manning-up too.
So, we'll see, but the NRA management knows they have to appear relevant, if they want to continue getting member $.
A replay of Pres. Johnson's 1968 speech, upon getting 1/2 the gun control bill he wanted to sign (after our disgraceful wave of assassinations) is enlightening --we have slipped most of the way back to 1967, until 6 teachers and 20 little kids were sacrificed.
Robert Maillardet
Lecturer, Department of Mathematics and Statistics at University of Melbourne
This article takes the constitutional and legal status quo, lines it up against simple human outrage, and predicts that the former will inevitably slow change to a trickle. It ignores world political and cultural history - which is heavily populated by dislocation, revolution, and sudden change - often triggered by a single event that tips a balance. Constitutions do change, society values change, political ideas change - and often do so very quickly in response to defining moments.
With this…
Read moreLeo Kerr
Consultant
Does anyone on these pages really believe that democracy is alive and well in the US? Does anyone seriously believe that the plutocracy/corporatocracy that runs the US will give up their fat profits for a bunch of socialist liberals. Already the gun groups are stating that "the blood of these children is on the hands of the anti gun lobby".
Dianna Arthur
Dianna Arthur is a Friend of The Conversation.
Environmentalist
No, Leo I believe the USA has been an oligarchy for at least the past 15 years if not longer.
Robert Maillardet
Lecturer, Department of Mathematics and Statistics at University of Melbourne
Leo - if you think that democracy is dead in the US, try living in Eritrea for a while.
Or look at the groundswell of US public opinion currently developing on the internet around this issue.
As for the gun groups, even the NRA has realised how delicately poised the situation is, and declined substantial comment until a press conference later this week.
We should never let cynicism get in the way of people expressing or pursuing fundamental human strivings, like wanting a community that keeps its young safe and protected. The power to change anything resides first and foremost in the hope that can only exist inside each one of us.
The key problem with the original article was its assumption that the situation is irretrievably hopeless.
Or, if it resonates better with your perspective, take a leave out of Pablo Casals book:
"The situation is hopeless. We must take the next step"
Alex Cannara
logged in via LinkedIn
" the USA has been an oligarchy for at least the past 15 years" -- that short a time, really?
Didn't the British Empire bring that form of commercial governing to many peoples on many continents?
;]
Alex Cannara
logged in via LinkedIn
Sure. We have democracy, hanging on by a slim thread, but feeling an interesting demographic wind at our backs.
Our forrmer NY Attorney General last night on air suggested pension funds and other major investors divest from holding of the hedge fund (Cerberus) that owns the holding company for most US gun manufacturers.
The Calif. Public Employees Retirement fund announced later they were considering such -- CALPERS is the largest in the US.
At 1am NY time, the hedge fund announced it was itself divesting from the gun holding company (euphemistically named Freedom Group).
http://dealbook.nytimes.com/2012/12/18/cerberus-to-sell-gunmaker-freedom-group/
Perhaps though decades of adults couldn't pry the rifle out of Charleton Heston's "cold dead hands", 20 murdered kids can, with the help of our old US wisdom : "follow the money".
Alex Cannara
logged in via LinkedIn
RobertM, good comments. I'll just add that Wayne LaPierre is indeed a bit nervous that his $1 million salary at NRA may be at stake, should his mistakes in leadership continue.
Comment removed by moderator.
Peter Ormonde
Peter Ormonde is a Friend of The Conversation.
Farmer
EEEEK!!!!
I just found myself listening to a 2nd Amendment enthusiast from the US.
He listed three reasons for keeping guns:
(1) Defence
(2) Sport
(3) To act against any US government that oppresses the people.
He cited the Arab Spring as a model to illustrate point 3.
Given the insane fabrications regarding Obama and Obamacare ( and countless others) I'd be thinking quite a few folks would be reading up on option 3.
What a pity the "Founding Fatherpersons" didn't spell out what…
Read moreAlex Cannara
logged in via LinkedIn
Peter, just tell him he can';t be an American unless he agrees on how to read the words of the Constitution as Justice Scalia said: "as they were understood at the time" -- the time when "arms" required lots of work to make 1 shot.
;]
Sandra Kwa
Grad Cert Ethics and Legal Studies, CSU
Yep. I saw a Mike Adams Natural News video - he thought he was being witty, proving in an idiotic fashion how a gun just won't kill, no matter how loudly you order it to. But in his final justification of your point (3), he said imagine if every Jew had had a gun in their home when Hitler was rounding them up. The Holocaust would never have happened.
So guns are insurance for disgruntled citizens against their own govt, should things ever get beyond the pale, subjectively speaking. Maybe some think at least there's assassination as a last resort, a last heroic deed for the nation's sake.
The frenzy this country whipped itself into over the carbon tax ... lucky for our PM we don't have a propensity for that sort of extreme. Obama may have to watch his own back, though.
I too would like to know exactly the preamble, the objectives, the purposive meaning behind the 2nd Amendment. No time to look it up. Kids on holidays now, got to make arty cards for cousins.
Peter Ormonde
Peter Ormonde is a Friend of The Conversation.
Farmer
Alex,
Scalia too is a bit literal for my liking ... better outcome, but still this blind attachment to the words rather than the ideas.
It's a sort of Constitutional fundamentalism.
Strange isn't it how, over time, something that sent shockwaves through an ossified arthritic Europe can become a straight-jacket.
"We, the people hold these truths to be self-evident..." - wonderful, deeply subversive, liberating ideas and words. Sad to see these wonderful ideas reduced to this sad frightened caricature. Great things being transformed into their opposites by time and history...
The process of renewal is ongoing and endless. Don't think I'd get far with that view in the States. Probably end up in Gitmo.
Alex Cannara
logged in via LinkedIn
Actually, Peter, our founders estimated that the Constitution would need rewriting in 30 years or so -- not a bad estimate, given that it effectively allowed slavery!
My use of Scalia's words is simply to show the absurdity of them and the absurdity of anyone arguing the 2nd Amendment means they can posses technology that could never have been imagined by the writes of our Constitution.
Folks, like the fellow you mention, are simply manipulated & manipulative.
Robert Maillardet
Lecturer, Department of Mathematics and Statistics at University of Melbourne
Further to Alex Cannara's comments on the Cerberus Equity Fund selling its stake in the 'Freedom Group' of gun manufacturers, it is great to see the groundswell continuing to build on this.
Teachers and children die and other teachers do not want their pension funds invested in the guns that killed them. An equity firm does not want to lose the $0.75B they represent, so they divest their interests in gun manufacturers. Gun manufacturers stocks are now falling in the US in any event.
All this…
Read moreAlex Cannara
logged in via LinkedIn
Robert, the Cerberus folks may not be quite so honorable as we think, since:
a) They may have issued bonds to extract $ before this divestment loss;
b) Apparently Feinberg, head of Cerberus, was called by his father who lives in Newtown and told to get out.
The business world has very many degrees of freedom -- an engineering term!
;]
Terry Stavridis
historian
It is an interesting article which correctly points out the fundamental right of Americans to bear arms as enshrined in the US Constitution. I hope something can be done to restrict the circulation of weapons used at Newport etc. Personally this tragic event will be fade into the sunset like previous mass shootings. I hope that I am wrong that the death of these innocent little ones will lead to changes in US gun laws. My grand daughter is only two years younger than the little one murdered last week. I still cannot get my head around the idea of killing of such innocence, little angels etc.
Alex Cannara
logged in via LinkedIn
We're not going to let it "fade" this time, Terry.
;]
Kate Moore
logged in via Facebook
Sneaky, sneaky final paragraph
"Gun rights will continue to lead to gun deaths; abortion rights will continue to lead to abortions".
Oh really? That's a long bow to draw. The implication that the causal relationships are so direct or so simple is facile and deceptive.
For shame!
Alex Cannara
logged in via LinkedIn
Very true, Kate. The last statement was not only unnecessary but wrong -- the right to life is a guarantee for an American, whether a woman, man, or potential target for a killer.
When we see right-to-lifers guarantee adoption of the >100,000 teens in foster care whose rights to a "life" they ignore, maybe then we can move to discussing what right to life really means.
Sandra Kwa
Grad Cert Ethics and Legal Studies, CSU
With respect, I feel shackling gun control to abortion as issues, even if only on the level of comparative constitutional intransigeance, is a big and pointless mistake.
Bruce Tabor
Research Scientist at CSIRO
Timothy, the only issue I have with your argument is that you would expect it would surely not be possible to both grant a "right" and then remove it or vice versa. I mean at first you have to get two-thirds majority in both houses of Congress and then ratification by two-thirds of the 50 states, and then youi have to get similar majorities in the opposite direction. Surely impossible.
Well it happened. The 18th Amendment in in 1920 banned the sale, manufacture, and transportation of alcohol. The 21st Amendment in 1933 repealed the 18th Amendment! The US is in fact capable of waking up to itself. In time, once the carnage is great enough, it will repeal the 2nd Amendment and allow the government to sensibly regulate firearms. I don't think the carnage and outrage is great enough yet. It may well take a movement with the determination of the anti-saloon league.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prohibition_in_the_United_States
Peter Ormonde
Peter Ormonde is a Friend of The Conversation.
Farmer
Interesting comments Bruce.
This period - the growth of wowserism in the US - is very significant in this issue, if for no other reason than it saw the mobilisation of organised protestant christians to essentially swamp the american political process.
The Women's Christian Temperance Union provided a template for the organisation and operation of outfits like the NRA ever since, building on this heritage and the proven effectiveness of tactics such as targetting individual candidates or incumbents.
A curious business for a secular state. Even one that now is "one nation under God" and carrying "in God we trust" as a national motto (thanks Billy Graham).
It suggests that losing prohibition was far from the end of the story. After that they went for the whole she-bang - and got it. And bugger the Constitution and its secular principles.
Zvyozdochka
logged in via Twitter
Great read on the topic here;
Guns: Down With Big Gun - @Gawker http://gawker.com/5968807/down-with-big-gun
Alex Cannara
logged in via LinkedIn
And, this is what the federal judge appointed by G. W. Bush said after sentencing the little creep who killed people in Arizona and nearly killed Congresswoman Giffords...
http://tpmmuckraker.talkingpointsmemo.com/2012/12/loughner_judge_conservative_gun_control.php
Note the absurdity of the woman and gun at the top of the page.