In early October, the US Supreme Court heard oral arguments in Garland v. VanDerStok, a case disputing the Biden administration’s attempts to regulate “ghost guns” — firearms built at home, often from pre-supplied parts kits, rather than manufactured in mass quantities and sold with individual serial numbers.

The issue, Justin Jouvenal writes at the Washington Post, is “whether weapons parts kits that can be readily assembled count as guns under the Gun Control Act, and whether a partially completed frame or receiver … can be regulated under the same law. The case does not directly implicate Second Amendment rights.”

Except, of course, that it does. Like a forlorn stood-up date, the Second Amendment continues to exist even if those who pretend they’re going steady with it pretend it doesn’t. It’s part of “the Supreme Law of the Land,” and its grammatical and historical meaning is unambiguous: Any law or regulation which infringes “the right of the people to keep and bear Arms” is unconstitutional and, therefore, void.

The Supreme Court’s job isn’t to determine whether an unconstitutional regulation conforms to the meaning of an unconstitutional law.

The Supreme Court’s job is to forbid enforcement of the unconstitutional.

When the court ghosts the Second Amendment, it does the opposite of its job and empowers criminals to impose their law-violating ways on the rest of us.

Cute repartee — like justice Samuel Alito’s leading question of whether an assortment of uncooked ingredients constitutes an omelet, and just Amy Coney Barrett’s smug retort (“Would your answer change if you ordered it from Hello Fresh?)” doesn’t change that.

While it’s true that a box containing an unfinished receiver and a kit for completing that receiver is, by definition, not a firearm and therefore can’t be regulated under the Gun Control Act, it’s also true that the Gun Control Act isn’t a law because it conflicts with a higher law that forbids its existence and enforcement.

When the  justices avoid that issue and  instead spend time entertaining specious arguments over word meanings in unconstitutional regulations, they’re not “working” — they’re loitering and kibitzing. If they were honest about what they’re doing, they’d resign, or at least dock their own pay for the wasted time.

It’s also true that even if the Second Amendment and the Supreme Court didn’t exist, all human beings would still enjoy an unalienable right to create (or acquire through voluntary purchase, trade, or gift) and possess any weapons  it pleased them to have.

Fortunately, neither the Biden administration nor the Supreme Court have any actual power to make Americans’ hundreds of millions of guns disappear. They can get away with verbally ghosting us — but we can, and certainly will, physically ghost them and their diktats.

Thomas L. Knapp (Twitter:@thomaslknapp) is director and senior news analyst at the William Lloyd Garrison Center for Libertarian Advocacy Journalism (thegarrisoncenter.org). He lives and works in north central Florida.

PUBLICATION/CITATION HISTORY

Florida’s proposed Amendment 4 would add the following language to the state constitution’s Declaration of Rights: “… no law shall prohibit, penalize, delay, or restrict abortion before viability or when necessary to protect the patient’s health, as determined by the patient’s healthcare provider,” except for requiring parental notification when a minor seeks an abortion.

I have an opinion on that ballot measure. I won’t share that opinion with you.

The opinion I WILL share with you is that the measure should indeed be decided by the state’s voters. In fact, it’s already being decided by those voters. Mail ballots have already gone out. Some, including mine, have been returned and counted. “The system,” such as it is, is doing its job.

Governor Ron DeSantis hates that.

After losing a state Supreme Court bid to block the measure, DeSantis, his party, and their cronies in government have worked overtime to prevent voters from having their say.

On October 3, the Florida Department of Health threatened television stations with prosecution for running ads supporting the ballot measure.

On October 14, the Florida Office of Election Crimes and Security issued a report claiming that Floridians Protecting Freedom submitted a “large number of forged signatures or fraudulent petitions” to put the measure on the ballot.

Whether the report’s claims are true or not, the obvious reason for issuing it is to build a case so that DeSantis can seek to prevent the votes from being counted, or just flat-out overturn the will of the voters if the measure receives the 60% required for passage.

This isn’t about abortion. It’s about control.

As an anarchist, I can’t say I really trust “the voters” very much. If nothing else, it’s worth noting that these particular voters elected Ron DeSantis governor. Twice.

But I trust them at least a little more than I trust DeSantis (or Andrew Gillum or Charlie Crist if one of those two had defeated DeSantis).

DeSantis obviously doesn’t trust the voters very much, either. He’s pulling out all stops to prevent them from even having the opportunity to return a result he may not like.

DeSantis reminds me of a lawyer who doesn’t like the looks he’s getting from the jury during closing arguments. He expects the verdict to go against him, so he’s begging the judge for a mistrial to avoid that verdict.

Politicians never really trust voters, but most are less obvious about it than DeSantis.

Thomas L. Knapp (Twitter:@thomaslknapp) is director and senior news analyst at the William Lloyd Garrison Center for Libertarian Advocacy Journalism (thegarrisoncenter.org). He lives and works in north central Florida.

PUBLICATION/CITATION HISTORY

In the past, I’ve written on (my friend and heroine) Caryn Ann Harlos’s challenge to Colorado’s law commanding that “[no] election official, watcher, or person shall reveal to any other person the name of any candidate for whom a voter has voted or communicate to another his opinion, belief, or impression as to how or for whom a voter has voted.”

Now (my friend and heroine) Susan Hogarth is similarly challenging North Carolina’s law mandating that “[n]o person shall photograph, videotape, or otherwise record the image of a voted official ballot for any purpose not otherwise permitted under law.”

In solidarity with those two courageous free speech activists, here’s me with my 2024 general election ballot (I voted early by mail this year as soon as I received my ballot):

They say a picture is worth a thousand words, so I guess this column is a lot longer than my usual 500.

“Any elector, according to Florida Statutes, Title IX, 104.20, “who, except as provided by law, allows his or her ballot to be seen by any person … is guilty of a misdemeanor of the first degree.”

In the US, speech is protected by the First Amendment. The government doesn’t get to tell you what to say or how to say it.

Except, many state governments insist, when it comes to ballot selfies.

They say they want you to vote.

They set up mechanisms facilitating your ability to vote.

But then they turn around and say you’re a criminal if you show others how you voted.

Those state governments are wrong. They should be challenged, and their evil and unconstitutional rules banning speech should be mocked, challenged, or at the very least ignored.

“Su voto es su voz!” Willie Velasquez told Hispanic Americans as he and the organization he founded encouraged and helped millions of them to register and vote: “Your vote is your voice!”

He was right as far as he went. Whatever else voting might be, and whether or not your vote has a significant effect on an election’s outcome (it usually doesn’t), voting is speech — your expression of your preferences in elections.

If you want to keep your vote secret, fine. Freedom of speech includes the freedom to speak, to not speak, or to speak only to some (vote counters, for example) and not to others (the general public, for example).

But that’s your decision to make, not the government’s.

Thomas L. Knapp (Twitter:@thomaslknapp) is director and senior news analyst at the William Lloyd Garrison Center for Libertarian Advocacy Journalism (thegarrisoncenter.org). He lives and works in north central Florida.

PUBLICATION/CITATION HISTORY