By Mike Adriansen
[Editor’s Note: With the pace of nationwide gun buybacks roaring like a blaze in an early winter fireplace, City Councilman Jim B. Clarke forwards this provocative letter to the editor of the Santa Barbara News-Press by a resident of Buellton.]
I would like to introduce an idea into the gun debate — one which has a simplicity that makes me wonder why it has not been tried before.
The Second Amendment states: “A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state, the right to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.”
Why not enact legislation that requires all who wish to own a gun of any sort be a member of a well-regulated militia? This idea runs parallel to the Supreme Court definition of a militia (District of Columbia et al v. Heller wherein they wrote “the Militia comprised all … physically capable of acting in concert for the common defense”). Said militia could be sponsored by the state, the city, the Boy Scouts, the PTA or even the local senior center, and not limited to sponsors pre-selected by the government. Anyone could petition to form a militia so long as its members were committed to responsible, legal gun use.
Attendance at meetings of the militia would be mandatory to ensure continued eligibility to own a firearm. This would ensure that a contingent of your peers saw you were a responsible gun owner, continuing to understand the responsibilities of gun ownership over time (“the security of a free state”).
If you were deemed as unfit mentally, emotionally or physically by your peers (the militia), you would be asked to leave the militia, and forfeit the right to legally own a firearm. That right could be reclaimed by judicial petition if all other avenues were exhausted.
The government would have the right to disband a militia if it were found to be in violation of the law (insurrection, sedition, drug cartels, street gangs), and members would have to give up their guns or join another militia not organized around illegal activities.
I know this approach would lead to another layer of bureaucracy. The cost of that layer would not be borne by the government but by the gun owners themselves, in that they would fund, organize and regulate their own militias. Perhaps the NRA would like to be the first to form a militia, setting the standard for responsible oversight of gun owners.
I am aware that this is a simplistic “solution” to a complex problem. Perhaps it might stimulate someone else to offer an idea of substance and move our country toward a better gun policy.
