By Nathan Barton

Since Mama Liberty (Susan Callaway – Lady Susan) began publishing, this publication has had a few very solid principles.  As her successor (not replacement: I cannot replace her), I hold to these same principles.

One of these is the God-given right of freedom of self-defense.  We here in the Fifty States know it better as the right to keep and bear arms. It is simple.  Because you are a human being, you have certain liberties.  Whether others recognize them or not. One of those is the right to defend yourself and your family (and community) against aggression.  (Some of us believe it is not just a “right” but an obligation – a moral obligation.)

This right was not granted by the Bill of Rights of the United States Constitution.  It pre-existed that document and will continue on long after that document is null and void, overtaken by history.

Let me see if I can give a simple explanation.

You have the right to own a weapon. You do not have an absolute right to harm someone with a weapon. This goes far beyond guns. You have the right to own anything so long as you do not violate the rights of others with it. Not just weapons.

(Which means that the “right to keep and bear arms” which is supposedly protected by the Bill of Rights is really a special case of another right: the right to own “things.” As well as being an expression of our right to self-defense.)

But as for weapons: This includes rocket launchers, artillery, explosives, nuclear weapons and all the rest. If there is any restriction on the right to bear arms, there is a precedent to eliminate ownership of ANY arms, AND the right to self-defense. In order to have the right to defend yourself, you must have the right to own whatever weapon (gun, etc.) you want without exception.

Which makes the position of The Price of Liberty and any other publication or organization or individual who loves liberty very simple.

Repeal all weapon laws and restore liberty.

That is all there is to it.

Everything else regarding ownership and use of weapons (as with ownership and use of ANY object) must be viewed in light of understanding our right to defend ourselves and others, and our obligation to exercise those rights without violating the rights of others.

Perhaps the ownership and use of weapons, especially firearms, offers more potential for misuse than the ownership of, say, food or clothing or a copier or phone. But there are many other things which we can own which present significant potential for misuse. Not just knives, not just baseball bats.  And not just cans of spray paint or drugs, for that matter. I am not sure if there is anything which humans can own which cannot be used, in some way, against someone in an initiation of force. That is, aggression.

But we as a society – and government, as our would-be master – handle firearms differently than these other things. (Admittedly, more and more governments are adding such things as knives to this short list of “too dangerous to allow certain people to have.”)

I cannot see, as a lover of liberty, any real moral justification for doing so.  Excuses?  Oh, my, yes.  But not justification. If someone misuses, abuses, something and uses it to attack us (or someone else), our right to defend ourselves justifies taking that object away from them, at least long enough to end their threat to us.

But we cannot do that just because we think that someone might use and misuse that to initiate force against us.  Or because someone else did use that same object against another person.

So the real reason for governments and nannies (controllers and would-be controls – the enemies of liberty – to push?  Precisely that – control.  These people, these groups, wish to control all people – to dominate us.  They know that weapons of self-defense are a defense against that attempt to control, that lust to dominate us.  And to that end, they push fear – fear of guns and other weapons. Fear of those who have them.

So The Price of Liberty fights back against that fear, against that lust. As indeed, I believe, most of those who read this do.

And to that end, we must teach others to do the same thing: to resist and defend ourselves and our liberty from those who would rule us and take that freedom away from us.

We believe this is a principled stand. And essential to our struggle for liberty.

Your thoughts?