California ban on high capacity magazines declared unconstitutional

[Brian37]

   Technically, murrica got serious about guns in the contemporary sense when we noticed that the black panthers had 'em.

That's exactly right. And gun control motivation from the fear of black people with guns goes back a lot further than that. The Dred Scott decision specifically states the fear of giving him the right to have guns as a reason for not recognizing him as a citizen. After the Civil War, southern states were trying all kinds of things to keep guns out of the hands of black people.

Since gun control has always been a racist thing before, why would anyone believe that it's not now? Everyone knows that it's not really the hillbillies and rednecks that we are trying to take guns away from. We want guns out of the 'inner cities'. It's always been a racist thing before. It is still a racist thing.

Um no, you are confusing the racism coming from that era for what the left wants now which is not racist, but safety. Blacks should be allowed to own firearms as well as any liberal. There is no political party oath or skin tone oath written into the 2nd Amendment. If you are going to go that far, then you'd have to call the entire constitution racist because the founders owned slaves. 

It is absolutely true that when the Country was founded it was far more racist and sexist than it is now. But I really hate the attitude that the Constitution is not a living document. if it were set in stone, there would be no ability to Amend it and we would still own slaves and women could not vote. Part of that constitution allowed those horrible things to stop as well. "The right to petition the government for a redress of grievance" combined with the attitude of free speech allowed women to fight for their right to vote, and allowed blacks to end segregation. 

If we insist on having a second amendment, it still is not racist today to say while firearm ownership exists, we still need to foster a safer society. It isn't about denying blacks firearm ownership. It is about creating safer urban, suburban AND rural zip codes. And living out here in the sticks where i do, I hear about shootings in my county just about every week, so it isn't just a urban plague. 

With any crime, regardless of any city in the world, the odds go up the bigger and more dense the population is, but especially so if that population is more poor on average. That isn't a black or white issue, that is an economic issue. Blacks are not committing crimes at a higher rate than whites, but they are still hurt worse by our justice system. Blacks are far more likely to be charged more harshly and or receive harsher sentences than whites. 

But with firearms, again, this isn't about punishing anyone of any zip code, this is about safety.