Professor Jacobsen provides a case study on government mandates to buy things.

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I'm very big on all the Amendments generally, and the 1st and 2nd particularly.

This blog, of course, exercises the 1st, and my weapons exercises the 2nd.

The unconstitutional idiocy of the requirement that we buy health care insurance should be self-evident.

Professor William A. Jacobsen, Cornell Law, is one of my must-reads several times a day. And here's his nugget of thought concerning the efforts of a South Dakota effort to require all citizens, 21 and over, to "acquire" a firearm within 6 months of their 21st birthday; one "sufficient to provide for their ordinary self-defense."

Of course, all of those supporting the bizarre idea that we should be required to buy Obamacare will certainly rally around the efforts of the intrepid legislators of South Dakota... won't they?

The One Thing Missing From The Gun Mandate

Everyone is all excited because some South Dakota legislators have proposed a mandate requiring each citizen to own a gun (h/t reader Brian):

Five South Dakota lawmakers have introduced legislation that would require any adult 21 or older to buy a firearm “sufficient to provide for their ordinary self-defense.”

The bill, which would take effect Jan. 1, 2012, would give people six months to acquire a firearm after turning 21. The provision does not apply to people who are barred from owning a firearm.

Nor does the measure specify what type of firearm. Instead, residents would pick one “suitable to their temperament, physical capacity, and
preference.”

The measure is known as an act “to provide for an individual mandate to adult citizens to provide for the self defense of themselves and others.”

They have left out one thing, which was proposed here by a reader 10 months ago, a Guns and Tobacco Mandate:

Mandate that all US citizens must annually purchase one handgun, rifle, or shotgun.

While we're at it, everyone should be required to purchase 2 packs of cigarettes a week. Smoking them, of course, will be illegal.

The Guns & Tobacco proposal was subjected to a constitutional analysis here using the approach of Obamacare supporters to court challenges to the health care mandate, with the conclusion that if the Obamacare supporters were right, the Guns & Tobacco Mandate was constitutional:

Under the legal reasoning of the supporters of the health care mandate, I believe the Guns & Tobacco Mandate would pass constitutional muster.

The right to keep and bear arms specifically is protected by the Second Amendment to the Constitution. Since firearms are manufactured using metals and other materials shipped in interstate commerce, and are shipped across state lines, the federal government has a legitimate interest in regulating such activities, consistent with the Second Amendment. The mandated purchase of firearms would help maintain a well-functioning national weapons manufacturing and sales market, and thereby would further a legitimate governmental purpose.

More:

There you have it.

I oppose the South Dakota effort for the same reason I oppose Obamacare.

That said, I like the IDEA of everyone having to purchase a fire arm... imagine how much more civil our society might be... fewer robberies... fewer home invasions... rapes, murder, that sort of thing.

Criminals are, at base, cowards, and they're much less likely, IMHO, to attack someone equipped and capable of fighting back.

But unlike your run of the mill leftist, the Constitution isn't a series of mere suggestions to me. It's the basis for our laws and our government.

But if one can justify the intrusion of government into this part of the private sector to force us to buy insurance... then they can justify the requirement by government to force people to buy, as Professor Jacobsen relates, firearms and possibly, tobacco.
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