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WHY AN ARMED CITIZENRY?
From "AN ARMED SOCIETY" by Stephen P. Holbrook
Where Is Freedom Guaranteed
By A Heavily-Armed Civilian Population?
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In A Land
Where Assault Rifles Are Freely
In The Homes And Hands Of Her Citizens!
In 1444, at a small river in northern Switzerland
known as Saint
Jacob on the
Birs, some 1,400 Swiss Confederates wielding bows and arrows, polearms,
and
swords
attacked 44,000 French invaders, some of whom were armed with a
new
technology -- firearms. After four hours, 900 Swiss
were killed, but
the
remnent defiantly refused to surrender. They were promptly massacred
and thrown
into mass
graves. The audacity of the small Swiss force to assault a
massive,
seasoned army served to deter further invaders.
European tyrants of the
day
must have thought, "Don't mess with the Swiss -- they're crazy!"
Switzerland, Europes' most peaceful country, has no standing army.
Instead,
the country
is defended by a militia composed of virtually all male
citizens.
The government issues rifles to these citizens, and
the rifles are kept
at
their homes.
Such also was the intent of the founders of the United States and the
intent
of the
Constitution for the United States; that the executive could not
raise
armies, that responsibility resting solely with
Congress and then only
for
periods not exceeding two years; that standing armies should be
minimized in
times
of peace; and that defense of the nation should rest with the
armed
citizen militia. Such is the intent of the Second
Article of amendment
to the
Constitution for the United States.
Exemplifying the slogan, "What if they gave a war and no one came?"
Switzerland avoided
both World War I and World War II. Though
Switzerland was
surrounded by the Axis powers, even Hitler was afraid to
invade this
country of
riflemen.
Winston Churchill wrote in 1944: "Of all the neutrals, Switzerland
has the
greatest
right to distinction....She has been a democratic State,
standing for
freedom in self-defence among her mountains,
and in thought, in spite
of race,
largely on our side."
The Swiss call their rifles "assault rifles" to add to the mystique
and
convince foreign
rulers that these people mean business. These rifles
have
never been used for criminal purposes, although they would
certainly be
used
against any invader. Instead, they are used for essentially one
purpose: to
shoot as many
bullseyes on paper targets as quickly as possible at
sporting
competitions...
The Swiss have the reputation of being the world's foremost bankers.
The fact
that
many are regular shooters and presumably better able to protect
their
stashes can't hurt their reputation for protecting
your gold.
In Switzerland, firearms in the hands of the citizenry are considered
wholesome and a civic
duty. Newspapers and cosmetics are advertised in
shooting
programs I picked up at the rifle range. Can one imagine
the New York
Times
placing
an advertisement in a program for a U.S. pistol shooting event?
The backbone of Swiss defense and independence is the individual
citizen with
his assault
rifle, which he keeps at home and with which he stays
proficient by
entering matches such as today's Historisches St.
Jakobsshiessen.
The St. Jacob's historical shoot exemplifies aspects of Swiss culture
which
explain
why none of the belligerent countries invaded Switzerland in
World War
I or II. This country has a centuries-old tradition
of bloody and stout
resistance to the most powerful European armies. Its people have
continued into
the twentieth
century to be an armed citizenry whose members regularly
exercise
in weapon handling and practice.
My friends listened in disbelief as I explained that the then pending
"Crime
Bill"
in America would make it a five-year felony to possess a firearm
magazine
holding over ten cartridges if the magazine
had been made after 1994.
They
laughed contemptuously at the anti-gun claim that "assault rifles" have
but a
sole
purpose: to kill as many people as quickly as possible. To these
Italian
Swiss, a fucile d'assalto (assault rifle)
has only one purpose in
peacetime: to
shoot as many bullseyes as quickly as possible.
These Swiss saw this disarming of the American people, denying them
the right
to possess
assault rifles, as contrary to the rights of the citizen.
Indeed,
the rifles to be banned by the Crime Bill were not
real "assault
weapons," they
were semi-automatic sporters. The Swiss pointed out that for centuries,
no
European
power has dared aggress against Switzerland, a nation in arms.
An
armed citizenry in Alpine terrain has never been
very inviting. If
Switzerland
were to be invaded, the invaders would face assault rifles in the hands
of
skilled
shooters -- the Swiss citizenry.
After shooting, we sat in the festival tent drinking Ticino Merlot
wine mixed
with
a clear Sprite-like soda, a regional favorite for a hot day.
Locals
excitedly told me the history of the Mesocco region,
and explained the
broader
Swiss ideal of freedom.
Swiss Freedom & Liberty
The idea, but not the reality, of liberta (liberty) existed in
medieval Milan
and spread
abroad, including to the Mesocco valley. The people were
poor and
uneducated, but yearned for freedom. Mesocco freed
itself from Milan in
1478,
but economics and political power continued to make it difficult for
peasants
to
own weapons. The three independent communities of Mesocco in that
century
are represented today by the blue, white,
and gray on the ribbons on
which the
shooters' medals are pinned.
Machiavelli's 16th Century political writings called Switzerland
"most armed
and most
free." Within parts of what is now the Italian-speaking part
of
Switzerland, however, there was an everpresent struggle
between the
ruling
classes and the peasants. The commoners were allowed to have "hunting
weapons"
under the
Articles of 1524, issued from Llanz by powerful lords in
northern
Italy. However, it would be naive to suppose that
peasants did not own
arms
before that date, or that their arms would not be used for the
imperatives of
personal
security and liberty, if not for rebellion against the elite.
The Swiss Confederation began in 1291 when three cantons united.
(Austria's
ruling
family, the Hapsburgs, had tried to send a judge to rule the
three Swiss
cantons, but the Swiss promptly killed the
would-be foreign ruler,
united and
have remained unmolested ever since). The Confederation grew over the
centuries
to
include more cantons -- it had 13 when the United States was founded
with 13
states.
Switzerland did not, however, remain unaffected by the European
social
revolution in
1848. Elsewhere, the forces of progress were crushed. In
Switzerland, the populace won. The Confederation, among other
things,
abolished
any cantonal prohibitions on possession of arms by requiring every man
to be
armed.
The country had no firearms regulations until after World War II,
when a few
cantons
passed some gun control regulations. The voters rejected giving
the
Confederation power to legislate on firearms until
1993, when the claim
was
made that "something had to be done about foreigners buying firearms"
in
Switzerland.
Yet no law would be passed until 1997.
To the surprise of the citizens, in early 1996 stringent gun control
regulations over law-abiding
citizens were proposed in the Swiss
Parliament.
These did not pass, largely due to the resistance of the Swiss shooting
societies;
had they passed, the shooting societies immediately would
have
mounted a referendum campaign to repeal them. I published
an article in
Neue
Zuercher Zeitung, Switzerland's largest newspaper, entitled "Avoiding
the
Mistakes of the
United States" in opposition of the proposed law.
As it turned out, in 1997 the Confederation passed a relatively
innocuous
federal firearms
law that requires a permit to carry a handgun in some
instances but exempts carrying to shooting ranges. However, the law
also allows
all Swiss citizens, male and female, to purchase surplus Sturmgewehr 57
assault
rifles (converted
to semi-automatic only) for about $50 each.
The Swiss have, through referenda, consistently rejected membership
in the
United Nations
and the European Community. The majority of the Swiss
felt U.N.
membership was inconsistent with independence, and
that the EC would
impose
German-style gun controls.
Lawyers, judges, bankers, cheesemakers, and watchmakers -- all seem
to have
firearms.
Armed and disciplined, the Swiss people have what Machiavelli
called
civic virtue. In a world seemingly manipulated
by the goddess fortuna
(the
banking cartels), the tradition of having a heavily-armed civilian
populace has
been
this small nation's guarantee of freedom and self-determination.
Stephen P. Halbrook, Ph.D., J.D., is the Fairfax, Virginia attorney
who
successfully
argued the Brady case, Printz v. U.S. in the U.S. Supreme
Court.
Author of That Every Man Be Armed, Halbrook's latest
book is Target
Switzerland: Swiss Armed Neutrality In World War II (1998, Sarpedon
Publishers,
Dept. AG, 49 Front
St., Rockville Centre, NY 11570).
An aid to your understanding of the reasons for the Second Article of
Amendment to the
Constitution for the United States.
Reproduction of all or any parts of the above text may be used for
general
information.
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