Is immigration bad for the Second Amendment?

BY Herschel Smith
1 year, 7 months ago

Via David Codrea, this piece from Bearing Arms.

I am an immigrant and a Second Amendment advocate myself, and two, I have also written about long-term threats posed to our right to keep and bear arms (shameless plug ahead!) in a book co-authored with Greg Camp: “Each One, Teach One: Preserving and protecting the Second Amendment in the 21st century and beyond.”

In the above work, I touched upon how immigration plays into the various threats to the Second Amendment, not because immigration per se is dangerous, but as a factor that compounds the mass ignorance which is the real threat. Most immigrants, unless they’re naturalized citizens, cannot vote. So, the unrelenting attacks on the Second Amendment cannot be attributed to immigrants because the mass ignorance lies in the body politic of natural-born American citizens, who are the absolute majority of voters in this country.

As expected, the comments in reaction to Smith’s video have their fair share of people who think that immigration itself is a problem. From my vantage point, I find it totally ironic because every single vocal gun control activist that I know is a white progressive and an umpteenth-generation American, some even being descendants of American revolutionaries. On the flip side, some of the most ardent supporters of the Second Amendment are immigrants, who have taken it upon themselves to do a job that many natural-born American citizens refuse to do: unapologetically defending the U.S. Constitution and Bill of Rights.

My religious roots, cultural background, and upbringing are all contrary to gun ownership. I grew up in India and was raised vegetarian in a religious Hindu family. People from my caste background historically have been academics and priests who don’t wield weapons. My grandfather is a Gandhian who was part of the nonviolent independence struggle against the British. Yet not only do I own guns, but I am also an evangelist for gun rights. How did that come to pass?

The gist of what I wrote in my book is that immigration, along with other factors, is a threat only if you let it be a threat. The core of my prescription for preserving and protecting the Second Amendment is outreach to groups that have historically not been associated with gun ownership, and included prominently in that are immigrants and new Americans.

This commentary has the unfortunate feel of something that would be published at Bearing Arms.

To begin with, he exaggerates the case when he implies that immigrants constitute some of the most ardent 2A supporters.  I’ve pointed out many times before that immigrants from south of the border – which comprises most of our immigration, both legal and illegal – oppose gun rights by some 75%, and vote that way when they have the chance.

Second, he exaggerates the case that it’s even possible to conduct the outreach he claims is our responsibility.  How?  Media?  Church?  Pamphlets?  Books?  Someone else owns the media.  Churches have gone to the dogs.  Pamphlets and books are for people who will take the time to read them.

Next, he misses the point (and exaggerates again) when he insinuates that any of the above is a good remedy for a world and life view contrary to the Christian world and life view.  Only an understanding of being designed in God’s image supports the notion of firearms ownership and covenant responsibility, blessings and curses.  Seeing the relationship between people and their government as a covenant that can be nullified is broken is unique and solely a Christian belief and doctrine.  No other world and life view has such a concept.  Not … a … single … one.  And I’ve studied them.  If the writer believes in the RKBA, he does so in spite of his Hindu upbringing, not because of it.

Finally, he implies that it’s my responsibility to educate and indoctrinate new immigrants in the virtues of firearms ownership, when in fact it’s safer, tidier, and has a much better chance of success to carefully husband our borders and allow only those in who already believe in the American system.

Why would someone claim anything different?  This is analogous to someone claiming that it’s our duty to marry unbelievers and then try to convert them.  But then there’s that whole issue of being “unequally yoked.”

This is a bad commentary from a very questionable source, and I remain disappointed in the quality of analysis coming out of Bearing Arms, from their disdain for open carry to [apparent] support for unfettered immigration.

In short, “is immigration bad for the second amendment?”  Short answer: yes.

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Comments

  1. On March 20, 2023 at 12:11 am, Chris Mallory said:

    We should have slammed the borders shut in 1790 after the first Census. Maybe a dispensation for Spaniards in Florida and Frenchmen in the Louisiana Purchase. Otherwise, all immigration has been bad for America and Americans.

  2. On March 20, 2023 at 9:06 am, Don't mind me. said:

    If immigrants are so good for this country, why weren’t they good for their own countries?
    They don’t move here for freedom anymore, but for free handouts. They’re not interested in our culture or our laws. We insist on expanding the welfare state to people who aren’t even citizens, so they move here and swindle everything they can,before leaving.
    Most come from countries where gun ownership is illegal too, so they culturally have no interest in firearms.

  3. On March 20, 2023 at 3:33 pm, Frank Clarke said:

    https://dispatchesfromheck.blogspot.com/2021/03/gun-control-and-el-salvador.html

    Putting aside that “immigration control” is nowhere mentioned in the Constitution, recognize that we are a nation of immigrants, some of whom wrote the 2nd amendment.

  4. On March 20, 2023 at 6:35 pm, Heywood said:

    The only time I see Bearing Arms even mentioned is on this site. Haven’t been there in many, many years.

  5. On March 20, 2023 at 6:41 pm, Herschel Smith said:

    “We are a nation of immigrants.” Yeah, and so was every nation every created after Adam and Eve expanded out of the garden. That argument is profoundly unpersuasive.

    As for the constitution, we have the militia to protect our borders against invasion. Very well. Let the militia tackle the problem.

  6. On March 21, 2023 at 8:18 pm, Henry said:

    Immigration control isn’t mentioned in the Constitution because it is a state power. Don’t confuse this with naturalization, which is a federal power in the Constitution because it has to do with a common inter-state standard of citizenship. Immigration isn’t (necessarily) about citizenship. States have their metes and bounds described in their own constitutions because they are sovereign entities, and svereign entities control their borders. Under the Tenth Amendment, immigration belongs to them.

    The decision in the Chinese Exclusion Act cases was a joke of a fraud: an emanation of a penumbra of the “sovereign power to control immigration” wafted directly from the head of King George onto a collective compact of states — a compact that didn’t even exist at the time the revolution was won — without apparently ever passing through the language of the Constitution.

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