Constitutional Right to Keep and Bear Arms

Floor Speech

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Mr. DAVIDSON. Mr. Speaker, I don't think there could be a more serious matter before this body. Everyone in the country, frankly, everyone in the world knows we can't continue to see what is happening in our cities, in our schools, in vulnerable communities, we can't continue to see those things happening.

Sadly, Democrats have a preconceived play for every tragedy. A famous Democrat even coined the phrase, never let an emergency go to waste, never let a crisis go to waste.

It is a crisis for sure. But the crisis isn't the fact that America has guns or that individual American citizens have guns. We have always had guns.

What is different is the level of despair in our communities. We see it surging not just in mass shootings but in the rise of violent crimes, in the surge in suicides, in fatal overdoses. The leading cause of death for 18- to 45-year-olds is now fatal drug overdoses.

A lot of people will point to the mass shooters as they are ready to lose their lives. They have even coined a phrase, suicide by cop. They know how it is going to end when they go in doing it.

So what is driving this? Is it the gun? It is an inanimate object.

The solution, the Democrats say--it is a longstanding wish list. They have had a dream for a long time to repeal the Second Amendment. Frankly, they don't want to campaign on that.

Our colleague, Mr. Mondaire Jones from New York, when we were moving some of these bills through Judiciary Committee said, ``You will not stop us from passing gun control. If the filibuster obstructs us, we will abolish it. If the Supreme Court objects, we will expand. We will not rest until we have taken weapons of war out of our communities.'' Frankly, Justin Trudeau agrees, but he is the Prime Minister of Canada. Canada doesn't have a Second Amendment.

Just today, I was walking through the Capitol from the Senate side to the House side, and a reporter stopped me, and she pointed out inaccurately that the Second Amendment grants us the right to keep and bear arms.

No, ma'am, the Second Amendment does not grant us anything. In fact, the Bill of Rights grants us nothing. The Second Amendment is a limitation on the ability of government to infringe on our preexisting rights. Just as the Declaration recognized we were endowed by our creator with certain inalienable rights that among them are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

This is an extension of the right to life. And, hopefully, tomorrow we will see the Supreme Court defend life. You can't defend freedom without defending life. In the modern era one of the key instruments to defending life for adults is the right to keep and bear arms.

People have referred to some weapons as weapons of war. No, they are not the same weapons as weapons of war. Those were outlawed in the 1930s under the National Firearms Act. They have been outlawed for a long time. A semiautomatic rifle or a semiautomatic pistol is not a weapon of war, though sometimes they are used in that mode in combat. They are very effective in war, but our Founding Fathers didn't vest the defense of this Nation originally in a standing Army. In fact, they said we don't want a standing Army.

One of the limitations on this body is we have to fund the defense budget every cycle. We can't have it operate in perpetuity without reauthorizing it every time. We had a standing Navy, but we didn't have a standing Army.

Let's read the text of the Second Amendment. The Second Amendment says: ``A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.'' Famous words.

People want to pretend that somehow the Second Amendment granted the State the ability to keep and bear arms. Only if you are in the military. Only if you are in the militia. That is the same right to keep and bear arms the North Korean Army has. What a fallacy. I can't believe some of our countrymen fall for that, but some of them do. And that is why my colleagues repeat it. They know, though, but they say the lie anyway.

Well, what are we going to do about it? Well, we are certainly not going to surrender our freedoms because we know freedom surrendered is rarely reclaimed. We aim to keep our Second Amendment.

Just as Ben Franklin--recognized walking out of the Constitutional Convention--was asked: What have you wrought, sir? A Republic if you can keep it. The people, and we aim to keep it as the people's Representatives.

Who defends freedom in Congress? The Freedom Caucus. I am proud to be here with my colleagues taking this time tonight to defend this important freedom.

But I think people are right to say, So what are we going to actually do about it?

If you listen to the debate you might know that there are a lot of shooters that turn into active shooters, mass murderers, doers of evil deeds that people will say after the fact, well, you know, everybody kind of knew Johnny or whoever was crazy. You know, we kind of saw this coming. Maybe we could have stopped him. If only there was a red flag law.

So people in America might not realize that in every single State and in the District of Columbia it is already possible to stop such a person. The law is known as the Baker Act. It is possible to have a person, even involuntarily, against their will, adjudicated mentally incompetent. That law preserves due process. The person has a right to confront his or her accusers. That law locks up the right thing. You can't deprive a person--under the Fifth Amendment and the 14th, you cannot deprive a person of life, liberty, or property without due process.

Red flag laws reverse that. Not only do they get rid of the due process, it is essentially civil asset forfeiture. First, you seize the guns and you get to due process later. It seizes the wrong things. It locks up the guns.

The person is the dangerous thing. So you take the guns away from the person. The person, if they really are mentally dangerous, they can get access to guns in other ways, perhaps illegally, as a substantial portion of shooters do. Perhaps they could drive a car through a parade route. They could use a blade. They could use all kinds of ways to harm others, and frankly, they could also harm themselves, turning into one of the tragic suicides that occur every day in our country.

So, no, I think the Baker Act ought to be the thing that people focus on. Those are overwhelmingly State laws. And we have to focus on understanding why those laws aren't used.

My colleagues know of these laws, particularly the ones on the Judiciary Committee, but they don't bring them up. They pretend as if the only way to stop this is with the red flag laws. And you know, while I know the Democrats have had a longstanding desire to go after the Second Amendment, I will admit it is especially discouraging when Republicans break ranks on this core issue.

I was disappointed to see 10 of our House colleagues vote for some measure of gun control in the House. Five of them aren't running again, and five of them may find that they are not running again at some point. In the Senate there are already 10 that are openly supportive of this outline, framework of a deal. We haven't seen text, but we do know it encourages red flag laws, which ought to be ruled unconstitutional, as all civil asset forfeiture ought to be ruled unconstitutional.

When you look at civil asset forfeiture, it is disproportionately used in minority and disadvantaged communities.

Why? How? Because they don't have the money to get the assets back. The government seizes it. It spins due process on its head, and you have to go to court to prove the property is yours or that you are able to own it safely.

And when you talk about a gun, while guns aren't always cheap, lawyers are more expensive. So most people will simply buy another gun, rather than go back and fight the unjust action in courts. It is so ripe for abuse. It is horrible to see anyone who has sworn an oath to support and defend our Constitution support such measures. I hope people will pull back and rethink it; not rethink solving the problem.

Let's look at the Baker Act, and let's look at mental health. Let's look at these acts of despair that are wrecking our communities and individual lives, and let's stop falling for the fallacies that somehow gun control is going to end the actions of these doers of evil deeds.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for hosting this special order.

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