On Friday, an anti-gun group caught the attention of the Firearms Policy Coalition with an interesting proposition: an “international lawsuit” that could compel the Untied States to adopt harsh gun control measures. As usual, this was met with much laughter and mockery, but in the comments, there was a healthy mix of defiance sprinkled in. I actually found some new memes featuring blue helmets (a rare treat these days).
This might sound scary to some, but it’s nothing more than a stunt designed to fool anti-gun midwits into parting with more of their money.
WTF Is An ‘International Lawsuit’?
If you’re naive enough to take the Boston Globe article by Jonathan Lowy and Manuel Oliver at face value — it parrots often-debunked Gun Violence Archive statistics — you’ll conclude that anti-gunners have finally found the ultimate weapon to use against us: an international court that can beat even the U.S. Supreme Court.
As the pair of gun control activists write . . .
It’s time for a new approach. That’s why we are bringing the “Lawsuit for Survival” before the Inter-American Court of Human Rights. It’s the first suit to demand that the United States uphold the human right to live, free from gun violence. It’s part of a broader global Campaign for Survival to reframe the gun debate by ensuring that all nations, including the United States, recognize and protect our most fundamental right.
We are counsel and plaintiff in the lawsuit, which is filed in the names of Joaquin Oliver, who was killed in the 2018 Parkland high school gun massacre, and his parents, Patricia Oliver and myself, Manuel Oliver. Our suit asks the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, which has jurisdiction over the United States as part of the Organization of the American States, to affirm that international law requires nations to protect people from gun violence, and that by enabling and tolerating ubiquitous shootings, the United States violated its obligations under human rights laws and Joaquin’s right to live.
After losing badly at SCOTUS, it’s apparently dawned on the gun control movement that they’re dead men walking (so to speak). But fully realize that the party’s finally over, you have to actually be informed. As we know, the average gun control proponent has the IQ and self-awareness of Kamala Harris, so the gun control industry is still getting donations to promote policies that will simply never happen in this country.
Even a flatworm feels pain, though, and even the dumbest people will eventually figure out when they’ve come up against a dead end. The gun control industry can only lose so many post-Bruen court cases before they have some ‘splainin’ to do. So gun control “thought leaders” have been gathering somewhere in closed-door meetings, pounding coffee and chain-smoking, trying to come up with a new angle they can use to keep the simps donating, the money flowing, and themselves gainfully employed.
Lax US gun policy has caused an international public health and safety crisis, and blatantly violates human rights laws. The Constitution does not dictate this policy, not even under the Supreme Court’s recent erroneous, gun-friendly Second Amendment rulings. As Justice Robert Jackson famously said in 1949, the Constitution is not a “suicide pact”; the court has consistently constrained the exercise of all other rights when public safety is threatened. It’s high time to constrain gun rights the same way.
They’ve beavered away for over a year, but it seems they’ve finally come up with a new approach. The ploy here is that there’s an even higher court than the U.S. Supreme Court they can appeal to. The American gun control industry — and Jonathan Lowy in particular — has been exploring more international efforts recently such as the failed attempt by Mexico to sue U.S. gun makers.
That sounds credible (allegedly) because there really are international courts and they really can compel national governments to do things. There’s the International Criminal Court, the International Court of Justice (aka the “World Court”), and a Permanent Court of Arbitration. These courts have put people in prison, told individual countries what to do inside their own borders, and more. There are also regional courts, like the European Court of Human Rights.
Some of these courts are even run by organizations that the United States is a part of. The Boston Globe article describes an effort to get the Inter-American Court of Human Rights to declare a lack of gun control a violation of the human right to live. This court is part of the Organization of American States (OAS), and the U.S. is a member of the OAS, so it’s a slam dunk, right?
Like other international courts, this one isn’t controlled by United States law, isn’t limited by the restrictions of our Constitution, and isn’t accountable to American voters, even indirectly. So, it’s the perfect place to force America to enact the gun control laws the civilian disarmament types have failed to achieve through the legislative process.
Why This is Utter BS
There’s just one thing standing in their way: the fact that none of these international courts have any jurisdiction at all over domestic laws in the United States.
Yes, the United States is a member of the UN, the OAS, and other international bodies that run some of these courts, but for the courts to exercise any power in a particular country, that country has to sign and ratify a treaty giving each court that kind of power.
Looking specifically at the OAS, it started as an anti-communist league of countries in the Americas. In those days, South American and Caribbean countries largely aligned with the United States against the Soviet Union, and received certain assurances from the U.S in return. But, the U.S. never agreed to give the OAS the power to dictate US domestic law, because American leadership wisely foresaw that the OAS could one day be used against us in cases very much like this.
So, no, the court in question can’t force gun control restrictions on us and then send in the blue helmets to enforce it.
What Really Frightens These Anti-Gun Groups
I totally get it. Telling these people online that we’ll shoot anyone they send in to take our guns is fun. Some of the memes are pretty hilarious. And, yes, there are those who really would love to shoot at invaders like it’s ‘Red Dawn.’ But, that’s not really what scares the kind of people who dream up these fantasies. They know the blue helmets aren’t coming.
What really frightens the anti-gun groups is that their members and donors might find out that it’s all just a scam. If that happens, it could affect their funding and — GASP — their jobs. So, be sure to spend at least part of your online time cluing them in. Let the people cheering this nonsense on know that it’s all just a steaming pile of BS, and that there’s no international court anywhere that can impose the kind of gun control they’ve fought so long and failed so hard for.
Read the full article here
