Restoring gun rights

[MadeInDixie]

2 parts to this.
1. What is everyone's opinion on nonviolent or nonsexual felons getting their gun rights back?
2. If you knew somwonebin this situation, what would be your advice to them on how to go about doing so?
Thank you.

 

[Dfalt]

Hey since nobody's replied to you yet I'll start:
1: everybody deserves the right to defend themselves and everyone should own a gun
2: I'd say lawyer up and look into getting a governor's pardon. I know I guy who got one and got his rights restored

 

[Dfalt]

one addendum though: if it's drug related there may be problems with the Feds on ever getting 2A rights fully back

 

[Rubicon]

2 parts to this.
1. What is everyone's opinion on nonviolent or nonsexual felons getting their gun rights back?
2. If you knew somwonebin this situation, what would be your advice to them on how to go about doing so?
Thank you.

I pretty much agree with Dfalt. Felons should have full rights, period. Time served should be the end of it. If someone is so dangerous that we need to limit their basic rights, they shouldn't be released. Definitely lawyer up and see about a pardon or getting your record expunged.

 

[Zero]

If you can't be trusted to have your rights back then you shouldn't be released back into the public, so if they release you and you have parole then after your time has been paid up you should get your rights back.

 

[MadeInDixie]

Some states do that, but most other states make you petition to get them back. Even if your crime was non violent or non sexual.

 

[MadeInDixie]

Some states do that, but most other states make you petition to get them back. Even if your crime was non violent or non sexual.

 

[Blackwarriorjammin]

I pretty much agree with Dfalt. Felons should have full rights, period. Time served should be the end of it. If someone is so dangerous that we need to limit their basic rights, they shouldn't be released. Definitely lawyer up and see about a pardon or getting your record expunged.

Unfortunately the end of their sentence isnt always the end of their criminal career. Plenty of frequent flyers out their. We as a society dont have the means or will to build enough prisons to lock up most of these guys for life.

 

[MadeInDixie]

If their crime was a violent or sexual one then they shouldn't be allowed to get their rights back.

 

[Blackwarriorjammin]

If their crime was a violent or sexual one then they shouldn't be allowed to get their rights back.

I agree wholeheartedly. Having spent all of my adult life dealing with these folks i have to say that their convictio s are often just a fraction of the stuff they've done so im hesitant to restore rights. Fortunately its not my decision to make.

I'm in full, throated support of every law abiding cirizen owning, possessing carrying, but felons give me pause.

 

[MadeInDixie]

So say for example a 50 year old man caught a possession felony in his 20s but has had no run in with the law since then. Do you think he should be able to get his rights back? Or should he be lumped in with the habitual offenders that have robbery, attempted murder, murder or assault cases?

 

[Rubicon]

Unfortunately the end of their sentence isnt always the end of their criminal career. Plenty of frequent flyers out their. We as a society dont have the means or will to build enough prisons to lock up most of these guys for life.

If we would stop putting people in cages for victimless "crimes", empty cells would be pretty abundant. Just saying.

 

[Blackwarriorjammin]

If we would stop putting people in cages for victimless "crimes", empty cells would be pretty abundant. Just saying.

Well some of their crimes might be victimless but not too many people only limit conduct to victimless crimes. They tend to dabble in a little bit of everything. Drug use for example is victimless until they drive high and plow into an innocent family.

 

[Blackwarriorjammin]

So say for example a 50 year old man caught a possession felony in his 20s but has had no run in with the law since then. Do you think he should be able to get his rights back? Or should he be lumped in with the habitual offenders that have robbery, attempted murder, murder or assault cases?

Like i said, I'm honestly glad that its not up to me to decide. My first question would be has he stopped or has he just gotten better at doing it without getting caught. There is no way for our system to make that determination for millions of convicted felons walking around. The default position is to err on the side of caution and deny them all. We lack manpower to examine everyone's life at that level. We're barely threading water as it is

 

[Rubicon]

Well some of their crimes might be victimless but not too many people only limit conduct to victimless crimes. They tend to dabble in a little bit of everything. Drug use for example is victimless until they drive high and plow into an innocent family.

So you're saying that drug use is exactly like alcohol use, victimless. Endangering people by driving drunk or high is a separate action than simply using (or owning)drugs or alcohol. It's like owning an AR-15 vs using an AR-15 to murder people. You can do one without the other, people do it all the time.

This is supposed to be the land of the free. So why are we locking people up based on what arbitrary objects or substances they've chosen to posses?

 

[Blackwarriorjammin]

So you're saying that drug use is exactly like alcohol use, victimless. Endangering people by driving drunk or high is a separate action than simply using (or owning)drugs or alcohol. It's like owning an AR-15 vs using an AR-15 to murder people. You can do one without the other, people do it all the time.

This is supposed to be the land of the free. So why are we locking people up based on what arbitrary objects or substances they've chosen to posses?

Hey brother I didn't write the drug laws, i just enforce them. If you think that there are no consequnces to decriminalization then good luck with that. We cant even keep a lid on alcohol abuse but hey lets open the floods gates. If all the folks who drank all stayed home and never endangered anyone Id say you had a winning argument. Society put a limit on how much they can consume and we deal with DUI's and vehicular homicides daily. In a classroom we could pretend that simply possession is where most of this ends but we know that there are plenty who cross the line.

How much crack or meth are you confortable wih your kids school bus driver consuming on the job?

 

[MadeInDixie]

Just because someone made a mistake a long time ago doesn't mean that that are still doing it but just hiding it better. Some people actually reform and change. And on the flip side you have the opposite where they continue being criminals. You can't lump them in all together. That's the same as stereotyping.

 

[Rubicon]

Hey brother I didn't write the drug laws, i just enforce them. If you think that there are no consequnces to decriminalization then good luck with that. We cant even keep a lid on alcohol abuse but hey lets open the floods gates. If all the folks who drank all stayed home and never endangered anyone Id say you had a winning argument. Society put a limit on how much they can consume and we deal with DUI's and vehicular homicides daily. In a classroom we could pretend that simply possession is where most of this ends but we know that there are plenty who cross the line.

How much crack or meth are you confortable wih your kids school bus driver consuming on the job?

"I just enforce them"

That's just as bad, you must see that.

"We cant keep a lid on alcohol abuse"

Did prohibition help alcohol abuse? No. It started a war on alcohol that lead to organized crime taking control of the industry. It lead to alcohol being a substance that was surrounded by violence and conflict. As I recall, it lead to innocent consumers being poisoned. Prohibition on other drugs is doing the same exact thing.

I'm not pitching a Utopia here. There will still be instances where non alcoholic drugs are related to real crimes, there will just be fewer of them. How common is it for two liquor stores to have a violent turf war? All I'm saying is that we should leave eachother alone until someone is actually being a danger to people or their property. Having arbitrary object/substance # 39956A in your pocket isn't anyone's business. There's no reason that a "free" man shouldn't be able to carry whatever he wants in his pocket if it belongs to him.

You realize that you're using anti 2nd amendment arguments, right? They've just been retrofitted for prohibition. Let me illustrate this.

Prohibition argument:

In a classroom we could pretend that simply possession [of a drug] is where most of this ends but we know that there are plenty who cross the line [and do bad things while on a drug].

Gun control argument:

In a classroom we could pretend that simply possession [of an assault weapon] is where most of this ends but we know that there are plenty who cross the line [and commit murders with assault weapons]

 

[Blackwarriorjammin]

Just because someone made a mistake a long time ago doesn't mean that that are still doing it but just hiding it better. Some people actually reform and change. And on the flip side you have the opposite where they continue being criminals. You can't lump them in all together. That's the same as stereotyping.

I agree. I'm saying our system isn't capable of or interested devoting the resources to investigsting the backgrounds of prior felons to assure that theyve not engaged in additional criminal conduct so that their rights can be restored.

Law abiding citizens in too many states are already struggling with having their rights respected, there isnt that much interest in devoting the resources to investigating felons and i cant imagine that there is a legislature thats going to stick its neck out to give guns to felons

 

[MadeInDixie]

But you are still lumping all felons in the same group. I personally know felons that have became pastors, successful business owners and productive members of society. I also personally know felons that were institutionalized while locked up and are still living that life. If someone can go 10 years without getting into trouble with the law after their sentence is done then I believe they should have every right restored.