----- Original Message ----- From: "Jon Roland" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Sent: Monday, October 20, 2003 5:55 PM Subject: [inbox] Re: discussion: is gun registration unconstitutional?
> The key question is not whether some legislation was enacted, but whether > it was accepted without protest. The Sedition Act (and Alien Act) were > intensely opposed, so much so that the party that enacted them was thrown > out of office in the Election of 1800. If they had attempted to impose any I'm not sure that this even proves much. The flaw of the Sedition Act wasn't what it said, but the abusive manner in which it was used. It was a criminal libel statute of a sort--much like criminal libel statutes that are still on the books in many states and occasionally used even today. The "chilling effect" argument might be used against the Sedition Act today, but I'm not persuaded that it was necessarily contrary to the First Amendment as written--just as it was enforced. > It does seem, however, that inventories of personal weapons were less common > during the Revolution, when there was a danger of the inventory listings > being captured by the enemy, than before or after, when the enemy was not > mixed with the patriots to the same extent. This would be an interesting > line of investigation. Which inventories do you mean? The only inventories of that time that I can find are purchase records. Clayton E. Cramer [EMAIL PROTECTED]
