clydefo -
"Seem to restrict the creation of a database"? The statute comes right out and says specifically that it isn't to be done. I'm not sure how Congress could have made it any more clearer. Maybe if they had adopted my bold-faced type on that part. lol.
But I think Ashcroft's actions are pretty well supported with the combinatoin of that restiction on the database and the Congressmen's repeated statements that this info won't be used for anything other than a background check. So I really don't think Ashcroft's refusal to use the background check info is an example of the NRA's political muscle. Although, I'm sure that the NRA will throw their weight behind getting that law followed and destroying that information. (at least I certainly hope so)
Computer Hobbyist - Well voting to change the law is a whole other issue. As is ranking the importance of individual rights enumerated in the Bill of Rights. Personally, I think that the rights are all pretty important. As your post demonstrates, soon as you start quanitizing their importance, it become pretty easy to curtail them. And that effectivley neuters the Bill of Righs alltogether, since the freedoms contained therein will vary according to who is reading it. And that seems to frighten me a bit more than it does you.
BTW, that "fire in the theater" example is often used by the anti-gun crowd as an example of how the Bill of Rights can be limited. It stems from a Supreme Court decision where Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes actually said: "But the character of every act depends upon the circumstances in which it is done. The most stringent protection of free speech would not protect a man in
falsely shouting fire in a theatre and
causing a panic. It does not even protect a man from an injunction against uttering words that may have all the effect of force. The question in every case is whether the words used are used in such circumstances and are of such a nature as to create a
clear and present danger that they will bring about the substantive evils that Congress has a right to prevent."
But it's not a very good example of how the second amendment can be limited because they usually leave out the parts about about doing something 1) falsely that 2) that causes panic, and 3) is a clear and present danger.
So analogizing that supposed limit on the first amendment to limits on the second is only really useful in curtailing second amendment freedoms in cases like shooting a gun at imaginary bad guys in a crowded theatre. But it doesn't do much to convince me that a right to purchase, own, or carry a gun can be constitutionally curtailed. But I digress.
On a completely unrelated and brazenly off-topic note, here's something I came across when I was researching the Holmes quote. I found it rather funny:
Quote:
Drug prohibition is another example of the triumph of hope over experience. Proof positive that stupidity, not hydrogen, is still the most abundant element in the universe.
- Unknown
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