An Arizona man who has waged a 10 year campaign to stop a flood of illegal immigrants from crossing his property is being sued by 16 illegal immigrants who accuse him of conspiring to violate their civil rights when he stopped them at gunpoint on his ranch. Roger Barnett, 64, began rounding up illegal immigrants in 1998 and turning them into the U.S. Border Patrol when the Border Patrol was unable to stem the flow of illegal immigrants that were crossing his property.

Mr. Barnett took matters into his own hands after the illegal immigrants destroyed his property, killed his calves and broke into his home. Immigrants tore up water pumps, destroyed fences and gates and stole trucks. Some of his cattle died from ingesting the plastic bottles left behind by the immigrants. Mr Barnett’s ranch is littered with trash 10 inches deep, including human waste, used toilet paper, soiled diapers, cigarette packs, clothes, backpacks, empty 1-gallon water bottles, chewing gum wrappers and aluminum foil used to pack the drugs the immigrants smugglers give their “Clients” to keep them running.

Since 1998 Mr Barnett has turned over 12,000 illegal immigrants to the Border Patrol. He said he carries a pistol during searches of his 22,000 acre ranch for protection against immigrant and drug smugglers, who are often armed. He has spent over $30,000 installing electronic sensors to detect the immigrants as well as installing an 8,000 gallon water tank so the immigrants would stop damaging his tank to get water.

His ranch became an illegal-immigration highway when the Border Patrol diverted its attention to several border towns nearby, thus diverting the flow of illegal immigrants to Mr. Barnett’s ranch. The lawsuit alleges that while stopping five women and eleven men who were trying to cross illegally into the U.S. Via his ranch Mr. Barnett threatened to shoot anyone trying to flee and also threatened to have his dog attack them. Mr. Barnett is also accused of yelling obscenities and kicking one of the women. The immigrants are being represented in the lawsuit by the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund (MALDEF). The lawsuit seeks $32 million in actual and punitive damages for civil rights violations, the infliction of emotional distress and other crimes.

It seems to me that the Border Patrol should be paying Mr. Barnett for services rendered as it seems Mr. Barnett has done more by himself to stem the flow of illegal immigrants than the Border Patrol itself. It wasn’t too long ago when what Mr. Barnett has done to protect himself and his property would have been roundly praised. But in this upside down world where burglars sue their victims and win in court it seems like the criminals have more rights than their victims. With thousands of criminals streaming across his property, destroying everything as they went, Mr. Barnett had little recourse but to protect his land by whatever means were effective. Lest anyone forget, these illegal immigrants are also trespassers, thieves and vandals. Their civil rights go out the door when they commit crimes here in the U.S.

When the day comes that a court gives one dime in damages to illegal immigrants who are in the country illegally, committing crimes themselves, it will be a very sad day indeed. While the illegal immigrants are decrying the violation of their civil rights, where is the hue and cry for the violation of Mr. Barnett’s civil rights? Mr. Barnett deserves to be able to live on his land without having to fight a war to preserve what is his. And when it comes down to whose version of events to believe, I will take the side of Mr. Barnett any day. I fear the time will come when citizens will be helpless to defend themselves and their property without being sued or charged with a crime. If that day comes the Constitution and the Bill of Rights will become meaningless pieces of paper.

The constant erosion of our right to keep and bear arms as defined by the Second Amendment of the Constitution is something that threatens our future freedom and liberty. Every citizen should be alarmed by this attack on this right that our founding fathers were wise enough to add to the Constitution. Even if you do not own a firearm and never plan to, you should still be concerned with the history of legislation that has been passed in recent years that severely restricts our rights as stated in the Second Amendment.

The Second Amendment clearly states our rights and is not subject to interpretation. Any law passed that infringes on these rights is unconstitutional. I will not get into the history of gun control legislation but if you would like to read more about this tragic history you can go here. In words that clearly define these rights the Second Amendment states:

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.

Could it be any clearer? Any law that infringes on our right to keep and bear arms is a violation of the Second Amendment and is unconstitutional. The Second Amendment was adopted by an emergent republican ideology founded upon the view that:

To deny arms to some men while allowing them to others was an intolerable denial of freedom.

English and American political writers stated that society and government rests upon the popular possession of arms, that arms are the primary means by which individuals affirmed their social power and that arms are necessary for an individual to protect himself from vicious fellow citizens, corrupt authorities and to defend themselves against tyrannical rulers.

The concept of a militia in the United States dates from the colonial era. Based on the British system, colonial militias were drawn from the body of adult male citizens of a community, town, or local region. Militia persons were normally expected to provide their own weapons, equipment, or supplies. This rules out the argument by some that the term militia refers to organizations like the Army Reserve and the National Guard. The arms provided to members of the Army Reserve and National Guard are controlled by the government. This sort of defeats the whole purpose of one of the main justifications for the Second Amendment, to defend against corrupt authorities and tyrannical rulers. If the government controls access to arms the militia is basically defenseless. A key element in the concept of “militia” was that to be “genuine” it not be a “select militia”, composed of an unrepresentative subset of the population.

If you look closely at the relationship between gun control and crime you will see that gun control has done nothing to make Americans safer. Right after World War II many schools in the United States had firing ranges in their basements were basic firearms skills were taught to students. You could buy a firearm by mail and have it delivered directly to your door. The military would even sell firearms to citizens. An America where most of its citizens owned firearms was much safer and had far less crime than an America of today where its citizens are being slowly but surely disarmed. I defy anyone to provide statistics that prove that more gun control legislation and fewer citizens legally owning firearms has led to a decrease in crime.

The right of private citizens to keep and bear arms led to our very independence from tyrannical British rule. The militia that fought the British consisted of private citizens who provided their own firearms. The founding fathers recognized this fact,  which is why the Second Amendment was later added to the Constitution. How far west do you think this country could have expanded if the settlers had not had firearms to protect themselves from Indians and outlaws? The military at the time certainly did not have the resources to protect them. A large portion of the United States would still be owned by Mexico if there had not been armed private citizens and a militia present to defeat Santa Anna and the Mexican Army. Our very existence today is founded on the words of the Second Amendment. Our future existence and freedoms likewise still depend on the right of citizens to keep and bear arms.

So the next time you see legislation introduced whose aim is to further weaken the rights guaranteed to you by the Second Amendment, stand up for those rights so that you will be able to defend yourself against the threats to your freedom that the Constitution empowers you to protect against.

One small step at a time the United States is heading towards the socialist state that is now the United Kingdom. Too late it’s citizens are finally starting to awaken to the fact that they have lost their freedoms. Every right that is abrogated is a right that is never recovered. America needs to wake up to the fact that our rights are being eroded and that soon the Constitution of the United States will  just be a piece of paper that no longer has any meaning.

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221 years since the ratification of the U.S. Constitution, the U.S. Supreme Court decided for the first time what people of moderation and common sense have always understood. What the Supreme Court confirmed was that the Second Amendment pertained to an individual’s personal right to own guns. The Court struck down a set of gun regulations in the District of Columbia that effectively amounted to a ban on individual ownership of guns. For years, gun control advocates have argued that the Second Amendment is only about a state’s ability to form a militia and not about an individual’s rights. This flies in the face of the fact that seven of the first eight amendments to the Constitution clearly deal with an individual’s rights and not the states.

Just as the Court recognizes the constitutionality of limits to free speech, it also recognizes the limits to the individuals right to bear arms. Justice Scalia, in his majority opinion, was very clear in saying what the court’s ruling did not change.

Nothing in our opinion should be taken to cast doubt on longstanding prohibitions on the possession of firearms by felons and the mentally ill, or laws forbidding the carrying of firearms in sensitive places such as schools and government buildings, or laws imposing conditions and qualifications on the commercial sale of arms.

Virginia has little to fear from the Court’s ruling. None of the commonwealth’s current laws regulating the possession or sale of firearms rises to the level of the DC ban. There are other states and municipalities, such as New York City and San Francisco whose anti-gun regulations are almost as onerous as those of DC. Unfortunately there are extremists on both sides of the gun debate that will ensure the political and cultural war continues. But for now common sense and the original intent of our founding fathers has prevailed. Congratulations to Justice Scalia and the other Supreme Court judges for affirming our right to bear arms.