by Diane Rufino, October 4, 2015

Obama Wants our Guns and It’s Time for the States to Make Clear: “We Will Not Comply…. We Will Nullify!”

Obama appears to be intent on burdening the second amendment – a fundamental and essential right of a free people.

The States need to decide where they stand: Either they will protect its people or the country is exactly what Abraham Lincoln envisioned – a country where the states are irrelevant and the federal government reigns absolutely supreme.

The States (and the local sheriffs) are the last line of defense between a rogue federal government and the People. The federal government appears to become more unhinged from the Constitution with each passing day and this should scare everyone. The need to erect lines of protection becomes ever more urgent. And this is where the States and sheriffs need to step in. They need to make clear that they will NULLIFY and INTERPOSE should the federal government attempt to infringe the right of the people to have and bear arms. We know what will be right around the corner should that happen… We only need to look at what happened to the unfortunate people of totalitarian regimes whose leaders confiscated guns. In this country, Patrick Henry explained it better than anyone else. A people who can’t defend themselves cannot assert their rights against the government and are therefore doomed to surrender them.

In 1775, after the British Crown and Parliament set out to punish the colonies for their “rebellious spirit” in frustrating its taxation schemes and its conduct in tossing tea overboard in Boston Harbor in protest of the monopoly established by the Tea Act by imposing the series of laws known as the Coercive Acts (unaffectionately referred to as the “Intolerable Acts” by the colonists), the colonies sought to appeal King George III to interpose on their behalf and end the arbitrary and oppressive treatment of them.

In September 1774, the First Continental Congress met in Philadelphia to address the colonies’ collective response to the Intolerable Acts. On October 25, it drafted a respectful response to the King, which would be known as the “Declarations and Resolves” and delegates were then dispatched to present them to him in person. Despite the anger that the colonies felt towards Great Britain after Parliament enacted the Coercive Acts, our first Congress was still willing to assert its loyalty to the king. In return for this loyalty, Congress asked the king to address and resolve the specific grievances of the colonies; in particular, it asked that the Acts be repealed. The petition, written by Continental Congressman John Dickinson, laid out what Congress felt was undo oppression of the colonies by the British Parliament. King George would ignore the Declarations and Resolves and rather, he would use them to mock the colonies. He laughed, claiming that while they publicly pledged their loyalty to him, they were probably preparing for armed revolution. He found them ingenuous and not very clever.

[Approximately eight months after the Declarations were presented to King George and without any response, on July 6, 1775, the Second Continental Congress adopted a resolution entitled “Declaration of the Causes and Necessity of Taking Up Arms.” On October 27, 1775 that King George appeared before both houses of the Parliament to address his concern about the increased rebellious nature of the colonies. He described the colonies as being in a state of rebellion, which he viewed as a traitorous action against himself and Britain. He began his speech by reading a “Proclamation of Rebellion” and urged Parliament to move quickly to end the revolt and bring order to the colonies. With that, he gave Parliament his consent to dispatch troops to use against his own subjects – the very people who looked to him for respect and protection].

On March 23, 1775, Patrick Henry attended a meeting of the Second Virginia Convention, with a very important issue he intended to address. It would be the second convention held after the Royal Governor of Virginia dissolved the colonial legislature, the House of Burgesses, for its solidarity with Massachusetts (after Parliament closed the port of Boston as punishment for the Boston Tea Party). The House of Burgesses would continue to meet, albeit in secret, but would operate in convention (These would serve as Virginia’s revolutionary provisional government).

While he knew the King had ignored the respectful petition by the First Continental Congress and had continued to treat them without the reserved rights afforded all English subjects, Henry could not know for sure that he would authorize military action against them. But he certainly saw it coming.

As tensions were mounting between Great Britain and the colonies, the Second Virginia Convention convened in secret at St. John’s Church in Richmond to discuss the Old Dominion’s strategy in negotiating with the Crown. The roughly 120 delegates who filed into Richmond’s St. John’s Church were a veritable “Who’s Who” of Virginia’s colonial leaders – George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Richard Henry Lee, and Patrick Henry, a well-respected lawyer and orator. Henry had long held a reputation as one of Virginia’s most vocal opponents of England’s oppressive taxation schemes. During the Stamp Act controversy in 1765, he bordered on treasonous activity when he delivered a speech in which he hinted that King George risked meeting the same fate as Julius Caesar if he maintained his oppressive policies. As a recent delegate to the Continental Congress, he resounded Ben Franklin’s call for colonial solidarity by proclaiming, “The distinctions between Virginians, Pennsylvanians, New Yorkers and New Englanders are no more. I am not a Virginian; I am an American.”

Henry was convinced that war was around the corner. And he arrived at the Virginia Convention determined to persuade his fellow delegates to adopt a defensive stance against Great Britain. On that fateful evening of March 23, he put forward a resolution proposing that Virginia’s counties raise militiamen “to secure our inestimable rights and liberties, from those further violations with which they are threatened.” The suggestion of forming a colonial militia was not shocking in itself. After all, other colonies had already passed similar resolutions and had begun forming militias. And Henry himself had already taken it upon himself to raise a volunteer outfit in his home county of Hanover. Nevertheless, his proposal was not met with the approval he had hoped for. Many in the audience were skeptical at approving any measure that might be viewed as combative. Britain, after all, was the strongest military power in the world. They still held out hope for a peaceful reconciliation.

After several delegates had spoken on the issue, Patrick Henry rose from his seat in the third pew and took the floor. A Baptist minister who was present that evening would later describe him as having “an unearthly fire burning in his eye.” Just what happened next has long been a subject of debate. Henry spoke without notes, and no transcripts of his exact words have survived to today. The only known version of his remarks was reconstructed in the early 1800s by William Wirt, a biographer who corresponded with several men that attended the Convention. According to this version, Henry began by stating his intention to “speak forth my sentiments freely” before launching into an eloquent warning against appeasing the Crown.

I consider it as nothing less than a question of freedom or slavery; and in proportion to the magnitude of the subject ought to be the freedom of the debate. It is only in this way that we can hope to arrive at truth, and fulfill the great responsibility which we hold to God and our country. Should I keep back my opinions at such a time, through fear of giving offense, I should consider myself as guilty of treason towards my country, and of an act of disloyalty toward the Majesty of Heaven, which I revere above all earthly kings.

Mr. President, it is natural to man to indulge in the illusions of hope. We are apt to shut our eyes against a painful truth, and listen to the song of that siren till she transforms us into beasts. Is this the part of wise men, engaged in a great and arduous struggle for liberty? Are we disposed to be of the number of those who, having eyes, see not, and, having ears, hear not, the things which so nearly concern their temporal salvation?

I have but one lamp by which my feet are guided, and that is the lamp of experience. I know of no way of judging of the future but by the past. And judging by the past, I wish to know what there has been in the conduct of the British ministry for the last ten years to justify those hopes with which gentlemen have been pleased to solace themselves and the House. Is it that insidious smile with which our petition has been lately received? Trust it not, sir; it will prove a snare to your feet. Suffer not yourselves to be betrayed with a kiss. Ask yourselves how this gracious reception of our petition comports with those warlike preparations which cover our waters and darken our land. Are fleets and armies necessary to a work of love and reconciliation? Have we shown ourselves so unwilling to be reconciled that force must be called in to win back our love? Let us not deceive ourselves, sir. These are the implements of war and subjugation; the last arguments to which kings resort. I ask gentlemen, sir, what means this martial array, if its purpose be not to force us to submission? Can gentlemen assign any other possible motive for it? Has Great Britain any enemy, in this quarter of the world, to call for all this accumulation of navies and armies? No, sir, she has none. They are meant for us: they can be meant for no other. They are sent over to bind and rivet upon us those chains which the British ministry have been so long forging. And what have we to oppose to them? Shall we try argument? Sir, we have been trying that for the last ten years. Have we anything new to offer upon the subject? Nothing. We have held the subject up in every light of which it is capable; but it has been all in vain. Shall we resort to entreaty and humble supplication? What terms shall we find which have not been already exhausted? Let us not, I beseech you, sir, deceive ourselves. Sir, we have done everything that could be done to avert the storm which is now coming on. We have petitioned; we have remonstrated; we have supplicated; we have prostrated ourselves before the throne, and have implored its interposition to arrest the tyrannical hands of the ministry and Parliament. Our petitions have been slighted; our remonstrances have produced additional violence and insult; our supplications have been disregarded; and we have been spurned, with contempt, from the foot of the throne! In vain, after these things, may we indulge the fond hope of peace and reconciliation. There is no longer any room for hope. If we wish to be free– if we mean to preserve inviolate those inestimable privileges for which we have been so long contending–if we mean not basely to abandon the noble struggle in which we have been so long engaged, and which we have pledged ourselves never to abandon until the glorious object of our contest shall be obtained–we must fight! I repeat it, sir, we must fight! An appeal to arms and to the God of hosts is all that is left us!

They tell us, sir, that we are weak and unable to cope with so formidable an adversary. But when shall we be stronger? Will it be the next week, or the next year? Will it be when we are totally disarmed, and when a British guard shall be stationed in every house? Shall we gather strength by irresolution and inaction? Shall we acquire the means of effectual resistance by lying supinely on our backs and hugging the delusive phantom of hope, until our enemies shall have bound us hand and foot? Sir, we are not weak if we make a proper use of those means which the God of nature hath placed in our power. The millions of people, armed in the holy cause of liberty, and in such a country as that which we possess, are invincible by any force which our enemy can send against us……. There is no retreat but in submission and slavery! Our chains are forged!

It is in vain, sir, to extenuate the matter. Gentlemen may cry, Peace, Peace– but there is no peace. The war is actually begun…… Is life so dear, or peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take; but as for me, give me liberty or give me death!

Less than a month later, shots would be fired at Lexington and Concord. The war that Henry saw coming had finally begun.

Patrick Henry had the intuition to understand that a leader “whose character is thus marked by every act which defines a tyrant” cannot be trusted to allow his people to enjoy the freedom that they petition for. And when push comes to shove, the more they demand it, the more oppressive his response would be. And thus, since that leader, King George III, was considered to be unfit to be the ruler of a free people, in the mind of Patrick Henry, if he indeed decided to use force to subjugate the people of Virginia should be prepared with a force of their own to defend their liberty. Henry would later refer to Liberty as “that precious gem.”

A leader “whose character is thus marked by every act which defines a tyrant is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.”

Americans still consider themselves a free people. And Americans still want to believe their government believes in their right to be so. But the one problem is that most Americans believe their “government” to be the federal government. A people who understand the foundations and underpinnings of liberty and freedom know that the federal government is not their government but rather their state government is their government. The federal government primarily serves the states, or at least, it was intended that way. Yet for limited objects, expressly defined in Article I, Section 8, its legislation can touch the people.

It is the state government, and not the federal government, that can protect an individual’s inalienable liberties. Which government in recent years has shown disregard for the fundamental rights of the People – federal or state? Which government has enacted the largest tax increase in our nation’s history? Which government has denied people the fundamental right to manage their healthcare? Which government has ignored immigration laws and attempted to fundamentally change the character of the nation illegally? Which government has demanded that marriage laws (based on natural criteria in place for thousands of years) be fundamentally altered? And which government has poised itself for years now to restrain the people in their right to have and bear arms? Again, a government “whose character is thus marked by every act which defines a tyrant is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.”

The American states, after fighting and winning a costly war for their independence, had to decide on the best form of government to embrace the values they proclaimed in the Declaration of Independence. They asserted the same rights that the British held dear and which they fought to defend, spanning hundreds of years, but their task was to secure them more firmly so that their posterity – “millions yet unborn and generations to come” (from the anti-Federalist paper, Brutus I) – would enjoy the same degree of freedom. They didn’t want Americans to endure the same tortured history as the British, who enjoyed freedom under benevolent kings but oppression and even death under tyrants. Freedom, according to Thomas Jefferson, including as alluded to in the Declaration of Independence, was the right to be free from an aggressive or oppressive government. To that end, the government established by the Constitution of 1787, with powers limited in DC and balanced by the bulk of powers retained by the states, with its separation of powers and elaborate system of checks and balances, with its week judicial branch, and with a Bill of Rights, was believed to provide the best system to preserve the rights they fought for. Furthermore, in America, rights are understood to be inalienable, endowed by our Creator. In Britain, on the other hand, rights are those generously granted by government. Rights were only those limitations on government that Kings recognized by a signature on a charter.

The US Bill of Rights, modeled after the English Bill of Rights of 1689, exists to protect the individual against the government. Included in our Bill of Rights are the rights to be free from a national religion, the right to the free exercise of one’s religion and the rights of conscience. It includes the right of free speech, the right of assembly, the right to a free press, the right to petition the government, the right to have and bear arms, the right to be free in one’s home, papers, and effects from unreasonable searches and seizures, the right to a jury trial, various rights of a person accused of a crime, the right not to have one’s property arbitrarily confiscated by the government, the right to be free from cruel and unusual punishment, and others.

The second amendment is currently under unrelenting attack by our current administration, with Obama leading the charge. Just two days ago, he spoke not only about the need for gun control but hinted about possible confiscation. When Obama spoke in reaction to the heinous October 1 attack on Umpqua Community College, in Oregon, he went beyond his usual calls for more gun control and suggested instead that the United States consider following the path taken by Australia and Great Britain.

In the mid-1990s Australia and Great Britain both instituted complete bans on firearm possession. And Obama referenced those bans: “We know that other countries, in response to one mass shooting, have been able to craft laws that almost eliminate mass shootings. Friends of ours, allies of ours – Great Britain, Australia, countries like ours. So we know there are ways to prevent it.”

What Obama didn’t clarify is that Australia has no constitution nor does it have a Bill of Rights. The rights of the people are not absolute. Great Britain, which also does not have a constitution, per se, does protect gun rights to some degree in its Bill of Rights of 1689. That document allowed for Protestant citizenry to “have Arms for their Defense suitable to their conditions and as allowed by law,” and restricted the right of the English Crown to have a standing army or to interfere with Protestants’ right to bear arms “when Papists were both armed and employed contrary to Law.” It also established that regulating the right to bear arms was one of the powers of Parliament and not of the monarch. Thus, the right was not absolute and it was clearly articulated as such. In fact, Sir William Blackstone wrote in his Blackstone’s Commentaries on the Laws of England (1765) about the right to have arms being auxiliary to the “natural right of resistance and self-preservation,” but subject to suitability and allowance by law.

As Mark Levin explained: “The second amendment isn’t in the Bill of Rights to protect you in your hunting rights. The second amendment isn’t there to protect you in your sports-shooting rights. The second amendment was added to the Constitution to protect you against a centralized government. The militia part of the second amendment underscores this point. The point is that the states can maintain militias to protect the states from an oppressive tyrannical central government. I don’t mean to be provocative, but that’s just history. That’s why we have the second amendment.”

What is that history? Our Founding Fathers, having just broken away from Great Britain, understood the new federal government they were ratifying might one day become just as tyrannical. If it had the authority to control citizen access to firearms, then it could disarm them, just as the British attempted to do. This would make any attempts to restore liberties futile. The second amendment was specifically included in the Bill of Rights to prevent this.

James Madison, the father of the Constitution, said in 1789 that “A well-regulated militia, composed of the body of the people, trained to arms, is the best and most natural defense of a free country.” When the Founders wrote of a “well regulated” militia, they meant that militias needed to be well-regulated through training and drilling in order to be effective in battle. It was merely common sense. This could only happen if citizens had unrestricted access to firearms.

The Second Amendment’s guarantee of an individual’s right to have and bear arms is the right which secures all other rights. The First Amendment protects the other rights by permitting the speech and the expression, and the assembly and the petition and the use of the press to call out the government when it tramples on those rights, but the Second Amendment, with its force, is able to secure them, should the government ignore the former. In other words, when the First Amendment fails, the Second is there to preserve and secure the people in their liberty.

The Preamble to the Bill of Rights expresses the States’ intention in demanding a Bill of Rights as a condition to ratification. It reads: “The Conventions of a number of the States, having at the time of their adopting the Constitution, expressed a desire, that in order to prevent misconstruction or abuse of its powers, further declaratory and restrictive clauses should be added, which shall extend the ground of public confidence in the Government, and will best ensure the beneficent ends of its institution” According to the Preamble, the federal government is PROHIBITED from even contemplating the issue of abridging the rights guaranteed in the second amendment. The liberty rights contained in the Bill of Rights demand an ABSOLUTE BAN by the federal government action in those areas. Being that the Supreme Court has been in the business of enlarging the rights contained in those amendments (ie, privacy rights, for example, rights of criminals), we can assume that our right to have and bear arms is similarly enlarged.

Although the Bill of Rights was adopted after the Constitution was ratified, it was the absolute assurance by James Madison that he would draft a Bill of Rights and have it submitted and adopted by the First US Congress (June 8, 1788) that convinced several skeptical, and important, states to finally ratify. In other words, BUT FOR the fact that a Bill of Rights would be added to the Constitution to further protect the rights of the People and the States, the Constitution would never have been adopted and the Union, as we know it, would not have been formed. After the delegates concluded their convention in Philadelphia in September 1787, it was clear that the Constitution that had been written was not very popular (particularly with the anti-Federalists). Some very important delegates refused to even sign it and some promised to do all they could to prevent its ratification by the states. Edmund Randolph and George Mason (both of VA), Elbridge Gerry (of MA), John Lansing and Robert Yates (both of NY), and Martin Luther (of DE) all refused to sign because of a lack of Bill of Rights and a deep concern that the government created would endanger the rights of the States. Yates would go on to write some of the strongest anti-Federalist essays, under the pen name Brutus, and fellow New Yorker, Governor George Clinton, would write some as well (under the name Cato). Two of our most important Founding Fathers, Patrick Henry and Richard Henry Lee, although asked to be delegates to the Convention, declined because they were suspicious of those running the Convention (namely Madison, whom they suspected to have ambitious plans for the meeting). They believed a government stronger than the Articles would compromise the sovereignty of the States.

Indeed, it was unclear whether the Constitution would be ratified by the States. The Constitution was in deep trouble in the conventions of four states – Virginia, New York, Massachusetts, and North Carolina. They were some of the biggest states. The first three were the most important and influential of the States. Without the guarantee of a Bill of Rights, those states were not going to ratify. The formation of a “more perfect union” appeared to be in jeopardy. Even with the guarantee, the votes for ratification were by a fairly slim margin. North Carolina had rejected the Constitution outright. It was not until a Bill of Rights was added that it called another ratifying convention to take another vote.

Does anyone believe that a constitution that expressly created a government as large, bloated, concentrated, oppressive, arrogant, monopolistic, and corrupt as the one in existence today would have been drafted and produced by the delegates to the Constitutional Convention of 1787? Does anyone believe that the delegates in attendance at that convention, the great leaders of our founding generation, knowing their concerns to respect the spirit of the Revolution and to protect their state sovereignty (and yield as little sovereign power as possible), would have drafted and signed such a document? And even if such a document would have been produced at the Convention, does anyone believe a single State would have ratified it and surrendered essentially all of its sovereignty? NO WAY !! There is no way that Virginia or New York or Massachusetts or North Carolina would have ratified it. NO WAY! None of them would have ratified it.

And yet we’ve allowed the government – what it’s become – to assert, unchallenged, that whatever it does and says is the supreme law of the land. Tyranny is defined as the action of an unjust and oppressive government. For a country that defines the boundaries of government on its people through a written constitution, tyranny occurs when unconstitutional laws are forced – enforced – on the people. After all, when a government assumes powers not delegated to it, it naturally has to usurp them from their rightful depository, which in the case of the United States is the States and the People.

Our government – all three branches – continue to act to mock individual liberty and states’ rights. Certainly our president does so at every given opportunity. Our government – all three branches – continues to act to ignore and frustrate the will of the People even though a democracy is their birthright. As Daniel Webster once wrote: “It is, Sir, the people’s government, made for the people, made by the people, and answerable to the people.” (note that this quote is the forerunner to Lincoln’s famous line in the Gettysburg Address).

The federal government, which was conceived as a “government of the people, by the people, for the people,” unfortunately now only rests on two of those legs. In has failed for many years now to be a government “for the people.”

Enough is enough.

Gun Rights mark a line in the sand. That line represents a tolerance of government that absolutely cannot be crossed. If government should attempt gun control that burdens or attempt confiscation, the line will have been crossed. The Supreme Court WOULD HAVE TO IMMEDIATELY STRIKE THAT ACTION DOWN. Hell, the Supreme Court has held over and over again that any action by government that should happen to burden even ever so lightly a woman’s right to have an abortion cannot be tolerated. And an abortion actually and absolutely KILLS another human being – an innocent and helpless one. The right to an abortion is NOT mentioned in the Constitution and certainly NOT in the Bill of Rights. The right to have and bear arms is. It is addressed plainly and without condition or pre-condition in the second amendment. By applying the same rational as the Court uses to ensure women their unfettered right and access to an abortion, the government MUST NOT in any way, shape, or form burden an individual’s right to have and bear arms. The right to bear arms is rooted in the natural rights of self-defense and self-preservation. The right to have an abortion is rooted in the selfish goal of convenience.

When the government crosses that line, the Declaration of Independence tells us what the Peoples’ rights are, under the theory of social compact (which the US Constitution is):

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.–That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, —That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.

Should the government attempt to burden or deny the American people of their gun rights, our natural right of self-defense (even from our own government) and self-preservation (to live free, as our Creator endowed us and as nature intended) allows us to dissolve our government – that is absolve us from allegiance to it – and establish a new government that is dedicated to the protection of our God-given liberties. Personally, I believe the Constitution is perfect; it just needs verbage that makes it absolutely clear that its very terms are its limitations, there are no elastic clauses or implied powers, there is no independent legislative power attached to the General Welfare or Necessary and Proper clauses, no object expressly delegated to the legislative branch is allowed to be delegated to an un-elected group of people, Congress is expressly forbidden to tax and spend for any reason other than what is listed expressly in Article I Section 8, a provision should be included to give the states the power to audit the spending budget of the government for strict constitutionality, a provision should be added to require Congress to balance its budget every year, the Supreme Court can only offer an opinion which is subject to an appeal to the State courts, the “Wall of Separation” is removed from federal court jurisprudence, the president’s powers must be severely limited by additional language in the Constitution, presidents will no longer be allowed to issue executive orders, the bar for impeachment of a president will be lowered and in certain cases Congress MUST issue articles of impeachment and seek to remove him, consequences will be provided for in the Constitution for representatives and officials who violate their oath of office, the 14th amendment must be clarified as not intending to include the incorporation doctrine (so that the Bill of Rights once again only applies to the actions of the federal government), the 16th and 17th amendments must be repealed, an outright prohibition and a provision should be added that states that when the federal government over-steps its authority that threatens the balance of power between federal government and the states, it shall be viewed as a fatal breach of the compact that binds the states and as such they have the option of dissolving their allegiance. However, if the Constitution cannot be amended to assure that a future government remains adherent to its limits, then James Madison has set the example for us. We don’t have to “amend” the Constitution if we believe it to be seriously flawed. We can simply start from scratch.

The second paragraph of the Declaration of Independence continues:

…Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security….”

Our government has been intent on enlarging and redefining its powers almost from the very beginning. It has done everything it has wanted to do to achieve the things it believed it needed to do or simply wanted to do (as in Barack Obama’s case). A government dependent on the separation of powers for proper functioning has become a government monopoly to ignore proper functioning in order to become what the British Kings used to be…. Supreme, domineering, coercive, and oppressive. The people’s government has been replaced by the government’s government. Liberty-loving Americans have been disposed to suffer long enough. Threats to take away our gun rights, however, would be the final straw.

Should Obama and his administration do more than simply talk about gun control and possible confiscation, it would be incumbent upon the states to NULLIFY any legislation or policy and then INTERPOSE for the protection and security of the People to have and bear arms. The next step, should the government fail to back down, would be to declare the federal action or actions to constitute a FATAL BREACH of the compact that brought the states together in the union and therefore the bonds of allegiance are severed and the Union creating the “United States” is thereby dissolved. The federal government would therefore have no jurisdiction except within the District of Columbia, I suppose.

The states need to act – NOW. Each state needs to adopt resolutions and enact legislation protecting the gun rights of its citizens. Those that respect the second amendment need to start attracting gun manufacturing and ammunition industry to their states. The states need to put the president and the administration, and including the federal courts, on notice of their intentions.

If the federal government intends to or attempts to violate the second amendment, the People need to know they can count on their government – that is, their state government. I hope their response will be clear and collective – WE WILL NOT COMPLY… WE WILL NULLIFY! Liberty will require such a response.

References:

Patrick Henry’s Speech, History.com. Referenced at: http://www.history.com/news/patrick-henrys-liberty-or-death-speech-240-years-ago

Congress Petitions English King to Address Grievances, History.com. Referenced at: http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/congress-petitions-english-king-to-address-grievances

King George III Speaks to Parliament of American Rebellion, History.com. Referenced at: http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/king-george-iii-speaks-to-parliament-of-american-rebellion

Declaration and Resolves of the First Continental Congress. Referenced at: http://avalon.law.yale.edu/18th_century/resolves.asp

“Obama Trashes the Constitution and No One Says a Damn Thing!”, Mark Levin Show. Referenced at: https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=mark+levin+obama+trashes+the+constitution+and+no+one+says+a+thing Also referenced at: http://therightscoop.com/mark-levin-obama-trashes-the-constitution-and-nobody-says-a-damn-thing/

“Obama Goes Beyond Mere Gun Control; Hints at Confiscation,” Breitbart News, October 3, 2015. Referenced at: http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2015/10/03/obama-goes-beyond-mere-gun-control-hints-confiscation/

“The Second Amendment: It’s Meaning and Purpose, The Tenth Amendment Center, September 22, 2014. Referenced at: http://tenthamendmentcenter.com/2014/09/22/2nd-amendment-original-meaning-and-purpose/

“Madison’s Introduction of the Bill of Rights,” usconstitution.net. Referenced at: http://www.usconstitution.net/madisonbor.html

Appendix:

The Intolerable Acts included the following:
(i) Boston Port Act, which closed the port of Boston to all colonists until damages from the Boston Tea Party were paid.
(ii) Massachusetts Government Act, which gave the British government total control of town meetings, taking all decisions out of the hands of the colonists.
(iii) Administration of Justice Act, which made British officials immune to criminal prosecution in America.
(iv) The Quartering Act, which required colonists to house and quarter British troops on demand, including in private homes as a last resort.