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Comment by frostmatthew | Hacker News Reader

> Voting has been useless in the many elections I have participated in. When will people wake up and demand change?

If voting is "useless" it makes it impossible to demand change since voting is how we enact change in a democracy.

> how we enact change in a democracy

You're either thinking of another country or have it wrong. The way change (legislation) gets enacted in the US is through lobbying.

aka voting with dollars (only legal if you're a corporate-american).

Voting is not the exclusive way to make change in a democracy, even if it's the preferred...

We have a second amendment in the constitution for exactly this reason. The pen may be mightier than the sword but sometimes you must write with the blood of your oppressors just to begin to be heard.

Honestly, I meant mass-protests, blocking of work, passive resistance, and the like.

I don't think the situation is bad enough to warrant violent revolt (yet).

> We have a second amendment in the constitution for exactly this reason.

No. We have a second amendment to maintain a "well regulated militia" to protect the state - not to make it easier to overthrow it.

That is an interesting point of view, the government and the state are two separate things. You cannot overthrow a state (since it is a community) but you can overthrow a hostile government.

The American militia were part of the revolution to overthrow the British government and the recognition of that is codified in the Second Amendment.

You're confusing nation[1] with state[2][3] (though you may be correct that it might be more accurate to say "overthrow a government"). The writers of the Constitution didn't envision a standing army (or at least not a very large one) which is why they a) gave Congress the power to raise armies and b) highlighted the importance of a "well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state."

"Security" meant repelling foreign invaders and stopping insurrections, not starting them. To provide for calling forth the Militia to execute the Laws of the Union, suppress Insurrections and repel Invasions[4]

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nation

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sovereign_state

[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/State_(polity)

[4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Article_One_of_the_United_Stat...

What do you think the second amendment to the U.S. constitution is for?

If you think it's because they wanted to make sure the people could easily overthrow the government if/when needed then you don't understand much about the founding fathers.

The founding fathers were terrified of the people. This is why they created the electoral college - they didn't trust the general population to decide such an important decision. [They thought they had designed the system such that the college would never (or at least rarely) produce a winner and Congress would select the President]. Only the House was intended to be based on popular vote, senators were selected by state legislatures up until the 17th amendment was ratified in 1913.

If the founders didn't trust the people to select their own President or senators do you really think they trusted them with the decision of overthrowing the government?

"In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to control itself. A dependence on the people is, no doubt, the primary control on the government; but experience has taught mankind the necessity of auxiliary precautions."

John Adams

In the context of a discussion of the 2nd amendment's [intended] purpose and how those that wrote it felt toward the people I fail to see the relevance of a quote by someone who had no part in writing our Constitution. [John Adams was in Britain during the Constitutional Convention].

I can provide more quotes but i get the sense that nothing will convince you. The ability of citizens to maintain power over the government was a critical piece of how the US constitution was developed.

Hell, just read the opinions from DC v Heller.

You're correct, quotes won't convince me. Actions (i.e. what they wrote into the Constitution) mean much more than anything they said.

And what they wrote was:

* a House of Representatives selected by the people

* a Senate selected by state legislatures

* two executives selected by Congress (with the remaining members of the executive branch at most needing consent from the portion of Congress not selected by the people)

* a judicial branch selected by the executive (again, requiring consent only from the Senate, who were not selected by the people)

So out of the entire government they gave the people the ability to select half of one branch. And while that one branch would select the President (and VP) it would have no voice in selecting the rest of the executive branch or any of the judicial. The ability to remove members of either the executive or judicial branch also went to the branch not selected by the people.

Sorry, but when I read the Constitution I don't see much "ability of citizens to maintain power over the government."

As for District of Columbia v. Heller the question was if the 2nd Amendment grants the right to bear arms for lawful purposes - violently overthrowing the government is most assuredly not lawful, regardless of who you want to quote while doing it.

> What do you think the second amendment to the U.S. constitution is for?

Ensuring that states would have the ability to defend themselves in the against insurrection and invasion before the federal government -- which was, after all, not expected to have large standing forces -- could mobilize a response.

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