We gun owners have nothing to worry about, says David T. Konig, who is described as a Second Amendment expert:
“My sense is that Obama does not want to interfere with an issue that will, for the time being, be left up to the states,” says David T. Konig, Ph.D., professor of history and director of the Legal Studies Program, both in Arts & Sciences, and professor of law. “The issue will turn to controls, such as sales at gun shows or other limited restrictions on purchases.”
Sales at gun shows and other limited restrictions on purchases? Perhaps this is among the very things we are concerned about. What the article doesn’t mention is Konig is a Second Amendment expert who filed an Amicus with The Court on the losing side of the argument.
Allow me to add a little emphasis, for clarity’s sake:
“My sense is that Obama does not want to interfere with an issue that will, for the time being, be left up to the states,â€
So really, it comes down to a matter of time, not rights, right?
An expert on U.S. colonial law at Washington University in St. Louis . . .
Freudian slip, you suppose?
“…for the time being…..”
“…limited restrictions on purchases…”
And this is some how supposed to make gun owners feel better how?
I think they meant to say British North American colonial law…y’know, the kind of crap laws our founding fathers rebelled against…
Just because he was on the losing side of Heller doesn’t _necessarily_ mean he isn’t an expert. However, if he IS an expert, AND was on the losing side, it does mean he’s a disingenuous pr!ck… :)
David T. Konig’s Second Amendment expertise lies in diverting attention away from the most relevant American historical information for understanding it.
Konig wrote an article emphasizing a Scotch connection to explain the Second Amendment as something other than a simple individual rights protection like the other Bill of Rights provisions of the first eight amendments. See: http://www.historycooperative.org/journals/lhr/22.1/forum_konig.html Considering the enormous amount of American historical information available concerning development of the Bill of Rights, trying to relate the Second Amendment to the Scottish arguments for passing a British Militia Law in the early 1700’s is pretty far-fetched and off-base. Why not instead examine the actual American arguments for a U.S. Bill of Rights? George Mason’s efforts to adopt a U.S. Bill of Rights, which are the actual steps leading to development of the Second Amendment, are completely ignored in Konig’s essay. Instead, Konig only uses Mason’s comments about misuse of militia powers, which are more directly related to a failed Article I, Section 8 militia powers amendment he proposed.
Professor Konig was one of the signatories of an amicus brief to the Supreme Court supporting Washington DC in the Heller case. [ 07-290tsajackn.rakove.pdf ] His brief, signed by a total of fifteen professional academic historians, including Jack Rakove and Saul Cornell, containes obvious errors of fact and substitutes the history of the failed militia powers amendment in place of the actual history of the Second Amendment. For a straightforward explanation of the errors in the professional historians’ brief and a better understanding of Second Amendment development, see my History News Network article:
http://hnn.us/articles/47238.html