You will probably need to print a retraction or correction for Jason Arment’s “Bill of Rights applies differently to modern-day citizens” article.

As written, it implies the Dred Scott case involved the Supreme Court stating that the 14th Amendment meant Mr. Scott, although a former slave, was a citizen — and that a state could not abridge the privileges and immunities of citizens of the U.S. He goes on to use this as proof that the right to bear arms should have been long decided on the same grounds as Dred Scott; that the states had no right to abridge rights of citizens.

This article is a beautiful example of someone arrogantly asserting that everyone who believed there could be constitutional limits on the right to bear arms is muddle-headed and could not see the clear precedents which could only lead to a Supreme Court smackdown on anyone trying to restrict gun ownership.

The problem is that Mr. Arment makes factual errors, and then uses the errors as proof of his personal viewpoint. The Dred Scott case, which as far as I know has never been overruled, saw the Supreme Court deciding that Mr. Scott was not and could never be a citizen — he was property.

The 14th Amendment is passed 11 years later, in an effort to force the States to recognize former slaves as citizens. Even with this amendment, the late 19th century saw horrific disenfranchisement of African-Americans and the courts doing little to apply the 14th Amendment in the manner we view it today.

Mr. Arment may also want to note that the Amendment guarantees these rights to citizens, so it is questionable whether it could have caused a different result in Dred Scott.

Mr. Arment has fallen into doublethink, and this is double-plus ungood.

There are good reasons why gun control is not a decided issue. In part, it is an artifact of countless precedents, agreements and actions over time.

Allowing Confederate soldiers to return home with their weapons was, I think, an important turning point.

Countless judges, lawyers, politicians and citizens have argued these issues for a long time. To say that there could only be one correct decision, that the dots all connect, is to suggest at least half of those people were mentally deficient, unable to see something which Mr. Arment makes out to be clear as glass.

Aside from the obvious problems, I would like to point out a more general problem with this article. If Jason Arment is trying not to be ignorant of what is going on in the judicial system as part of his perceived duty as a good citizen — a noble goal — how could he have missed the other cases of the past few years which have stripped away, curtailed, ignored and curbed apparent rights.

Too many recent cases suggest that the Bill of Rights is considered optional, or at least something applicable only to certain people and corporations, when it does not interfere with national security or other political causes.

Cai Guise-Richardson, Ph.D.

Othmer Library Fellow, Chemical Heritage Foundation