The recent decision by the Supreme Court overthrowing the handgun ban in Washington DC should be a wakeup call to the nation. By only one vote, the Supreme Court held that individual citizens had the right to bear arms. While many are applauding the decisions, others such as me are concerned over the division of the court on this issue.

                Writings and speeches given by the founders of our nation leave no doubt as to the fact that the Second Amendment applies to individuals. Thomas Jefferson is known as the author of the Constitution, and he made his views very clear: "No Free man shall ever be debarred the use of arms." (Thomas Jefferson, T. Jefferson Papers, 334,[C.J.Boyd, Ed., 1950])

                The fear of the founders of this nation was that the government would become to invasive in peoples’ lives. That is one reason they put the right to bear arms within the pages of the founding documents.  "[T]o disarm the people - that was the best and most effectual way to enslave them,” George Mason.

"Before a standing army can rule, the people must be disarmed; as they are in almost every kingdom of Europe. The supreme power in America cannot enforce unjust laws by the sword; because the whole body of the people are armed, and constitute a force superior to any bands of regular troops that can be, on any pretense, raised in the United States" (Noah Webster in `An Examination into the Leading Principles of the Federal Constitution', 1787.

"The Constitution shall never be construed....to prevent the people of the United States who are peaceable citizens from keeping their own arms" (Samuel Adams, Debates and Proceedings in the Convention of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, 86-87)

                "To preserve liberty, it is essential that the whole body of people always possess arms, and be taught alike especially when young, how to use them." (Richard Henry Lee, 1788, Initiator of the Declaration of Independence, and member of the first Senate, which passed the Bill of Rights, Walter Bennett, ed., Letters from the Federal Farmer to the Republican, at 21,22,124 (Univ. of Alabama Press,1975)..)

                These are only a few of the thousands of quotes made on the right of the people to keep and bear arms, but even with all of this, the Supreme Court came within just one vote of throwing the Constitution in the garbage. 

                I believe that our rights are taken from us a little more each day. Recent legislation frees communication companies from liability when they assist the government conduct warrantless wiretaps of our phones, and it isn’t just foreign terrorists who are being spied on. 

                I would like to ask the readers of this column to do something that they haven’t done since school, read the Constitution and Bill of Rights. I stand convinced that the main reason that our rights are being taken away from us is that most of us don’t even know what those rights are. When you’ve finished reading the founding documents, let us know your opinion.