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 GUN CONTROL --- GUNS . . . The tank, the B-52, the fighter-bomber, the state-controlled police and military are the weapons of dictatorship. The rifle is the weapon of democracy. --Edward Abbey (19271989) American author. _Abbey's Road_ [1979] Among the natural rights of the colonists are these: First a right to life, secondly to liberty, and thirdly to property; together with the right to defend them in the best manner they can. --Samuel Adams (17221803) American revolutionary leader. "The Rights of the Colonists: The Report of the Committee of Correspondence to the Boston Town Meeting" [20 November 1772]. - Then Timur returned to Khorasan with a fixed purpose of taking revenge on [the city of] Seistan whose inhabitants went out to him asking for peace and agreement, which he granted them on condition that they should hand over their arms to him, of which they produced the whole equipment which they had, hoping in this way to escape from their extremity; and he put them on oath and ordered them to swear plainly that no further weapons were left in the city. And as soon as they had given this guarantee, he drew the sword against them and billeted upon them all the armies of death. Then he laid the city waste, leaving in it not a tree or a wall and destroyed it utterly, no mark or trace remaining. --Ahmed Ibn Arabshah (13881450) in M.J. Cohan and John Major (eds.) _History in Quotations_, p. 256 [2004]. - The laws that forbid the carrying of arms ... disarm only those who are neither inclined nor determined to commit crimes. Can it be supposed that those who have the courage to violate the most sacred laws of humanity, the most important of the code, will respect the less important and arbitrary ones, which can be violated with ease and impunity, and which, if strictly obeyed, would put an end to personal liberty so dear to men, so dear to the enlightened legislator and subject innocent persons to all the vexations that the guilty alone ought to suffer? Such laws make things worse for the assaulted and better for the assailants; they serve rather to encourage than to prevent homicides, for an unarmed man may be attacked with greater confidence than an armed man. --Cesare Beccaria (17381794) Italian philosopher, Milanese jurist, economist, and criminologist. _On Crimes and Punishments_ [1764] [John Adams quoted this in his opening argument at the Boston Massacre trial, Thomas Jefferson copied this into his "favorite quote" journal a few months before drafting the Declaration of Independence.] No kingdom can be secured otherwise than by arming the people. The possession of arms is the distinction between a freeman and a slave. He, who has nothing, and who himself belongs to another, must be defended by him, whose property he is, and needs no arms. But he, who thinks he is his own master, and has what he can call his own, ought to have arms to defend himself, and what he possesses; else he lives precariously, and at discretion. --James Burgh (17141775) Scottish author. _Political Disquisitions: Or, an Enquiry into Public Errors, Defects, and Abuses_, [London, 1774-1775] Foolish liberals who are trying to read the Second Amendment out of the Constitution by claiming it's not an individual right or that it's too much of a public safety hazard don't see the danger in the big picture. They're courting disaster by encouraging others to use the same means to eliminate portions of the Constitution they don't like. --Alan Dershowitz (b. 1938) American political figure and law professor. Quoted in the Fall 1995 "Tennessee Law Review." We have pretty strong gun laws in this country but they do not seem to be having any effect. --British policeman Bob Elder, chairman of the Police Federation's constables' branch, on why bulletproof vests are now required in north London. [2004]. Among the many misdeeds of the British rule in India, history will look upon the Act of depriving a whole nation of arms as the blackest. --Mohandas K. Gandhi (18691948) Indian statesman and leader of the nationalistic movement against British rule. A 1928 entry in "Young India" [weekly journal published 19191932]. - As to such laws being self-defeating, the awowed purpose of such laws as the Sullivan Act [French gun control] is to keep weapons out of the hands of potential criminals. You are surely aware that the Sullivan Act and similar acts have never accomplished anything of the sort? That gangsterism flourished under this act? Criminals are never materially handicapped by such rules; the only effect is to disarm the peaceful citizen and put him fully at the mercy of the lawless. Such rules look very pretty on paper; in practice they are as foolish and footless as the attempt of the mice to bell the cat. --Robert Heinlein (19071988) American science-fiction writer. Letter to editor Alice Dalgliesh of Scribner's regarding her rejection of Heinlein's novel _Red Planet_ [19 April 1949]. Sir, it is not the natural limitations of this globe that I object to; it is the pantywaist nincompoops who rule it. These ridiculous regulations offend me. That a free citizen should have to go before a committee, hat in hand, and pray for permission to bear arms fantastic! Arm your daughter, sir, and pay no attention to petty bureaucrats. --Robert Heinlein (19071988) American science-fiction writer. _Red Planet_ [1949] - Guard with jealous attention the public liberty. Suspect everyone who approaches that jewel. Unfortunately, nothing will preserve it but downright force. Whenever you give up that force, you are inevitably ruined. --Patrick Henry (17361799) American statesman, instrumental in the adoption of The Bill of Rights. (J. Elliot, _Debates in the Several State Conventions_, 45, 2nd ed. Philadelphia [1836]) Farmers of all provinces are strictly forbidden to have in their possession any swords, short swords, firearms or other types of weapon. If unnecessary implements of war are kept, the collection of annual rent may become more difficult, and without provocation uprisings can be fomented ... Therefore, the heads of provinces, samurai [warriors] who receive a grant of land, and deputies must collect the weapons described above and submit them to Hideyoshi's government. --Toyotomi Hideyoshi (1536/371598) Japanese feudal lord and chief Imperial minister [15851598]. _Collection of Swords Edict_, article I [1588] The right of citizens to bear arms is just one more guarantee against arbitrary government, one more safeguard against the tyranny which now appears remote in America, but which historically has proved to be always possible. --Hubert H. Humphrey (19111978) 38th vice-president of the United States [19651969] and liberal senator [19491965] & [19711978]. Quoted in David Hardy "The Second Amendment As a Restraint on State and Federal Firearms Restrictions", in _Restricting Handguns: The Liberal Skeptics Speak Out_, pp. 184-85, Don B. Kates, Jr., ed. [1979]. No free man shall ever be debarred the use of arms. The strongest reason for the people to retain the right to keep and bear arms is, as a last resort, to protect themselves against tyranny in government. --Thomas Jefferson (17431826) American statesman and president [18011809]. Proposed Virginia constitution [June 1776]. "Thomas Jefferson Papers", 334 (C. J. Boyd, ed., [1950]. You must ... *instantly* introduce mass terror, *shoot and transport* hundreds of prostitutes who get the soldiers drunk, ex-officers, etc. Not a minute to be wasted ... You must act at full stretch: mass searches. Executions for possession of weapons. Mass deportations of Mensheviks and unreliable elements. --V.I. Lenin (18701924) Russian revolutionary and first head of the Soviet state (19171924). [Telegram of 9 August 1918.] Of all tyrannies a tyranny exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It may be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience. --C.S. [Clive Staples] Lewis (18981963) British scholar and novelist. _God in the Dock_ [1948] [The right to be armed] is the security without which every other is insufficient. --Thomas Babington Macaulay (18001859) English politician and historian. _Critical and Historical Essays_ [1850 ed.] An armed republic submits less easily to the rule of one of its citizens than a republic armed by foreign forces. Rome and Sparta were for many centuries well armed and free. The Swiss are well armed and enjoy great freedom. ... Among other evils caused by being disarmed, it renders you contemptible. ... It is not reasonable to suppose that one who is armed will obey willingly one who is unarmed; or that any unarmed man will remain safe among armed servants. --Niccolς Machiavelli (14691527) Florentine statesman and political philosopher. _The Prince_, ch. 14 [written 1513, published 1532] - Besides the advantage of being armed, which the Americans possess over the people of almost every other nation, ... [other] governments are afraid to trust the people with arms. --James Madison (17511836) Fourth president of the United States [18091817]. "The Federalist", No. 46, written under the pseudonym "Publius". ... and subsequent interpretation: The right to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed. The right of the whole people, old and young, men, women and boys, and not militia only, to keep and bear arms of every description, and not such merely as are used by the militia, shall not be infringed, curtailed, or broken in upon, in the smallest degree; and all this for the important end to be attained: the rearing up and qualifying a well-regulated militia, so vitally necessary to the security of a free State. --Nunn v. State, 1 Ga. (1 Kel.) 243, at 251 [1846] - - If someone breaks into your home in the middle of the night you can presume he is not there to read the gas meter. But current British law insists that he have the freedom of the premises. [...] Whatever became of the Englishman's castle? He did not lose the right and means to protect himself at once. It was teased away over the course of some 80 years by governments claiming to be fighting crime, but actually fearful of revolution and disorder. [...] At the same time as government demanded sole responsibility for protecting individuals, it adopted a more lenient approach toward offenders. [...] Meanwhile, much of rural Britain is without a police presence. And the statutes meant to protect the people have been vigorously enforced against them. [...] This trade-off of rights for security has been disastrous for both. Crime has rocketed. A UN study in 2002 of 18 developed countries placed England and Wales at the top of the Western world's crime league. Five years after the sweeping 1998 ban on handguns, handgun crime had doubled. As was forecast at the time, the effect of outlawing handguns has been that only outlaws have handguns. --Joyce Lee Malcolm, "Where I come from, our homes are still our castles", _London Telegraph_, [31 October 2004]. - To disarm the people that was the best and most effective way to enslave them. --George Mason (17251792) American statesman, wrote the Virginia Declaration of Rights. Attributed in "The Liberty Bell" [1984]. - The new law that it advocated, indeed, is one of the most absurd specimens of jackass legislation ever heard of, even in this paradise of legislative donkeyism. Its single and sole effect would be to exaggerate enormously all of the evils it proposes to put down. It would not take pistols out of the hands of rogues and fools; it would simply take them out of the hands of honest men. The gunman today has great advantages everywhere. He has artillery in his pocket, and he may assume that, in the large cities, at least two-thirds of his prospective victims are unarmed. But if the Nation's proposed law (or amendment) were passed and enforced, he could assume safely that all of them were unarmed. [...] It is all very familiar, and very depressing. Find me a man so vast an imbecile that he seriously believes that this prohibition would work. What would become of the millions of revolvers already in the hands of the American people if not in New York, then at least everywhere else? (I own two and my brother owns at least a dozen, though neither of us has fired one since the close of the Liberty Loan drives.) Would the cops at once confiscate this immense stock, or would it tend to concentrate in the hands of the criminal classes? If they attempted confiscation, how would they get my two revolvers lawfully acquired and possessed without breaking into my house? Would I wait for them docilely or would I sell out, in anticipation, to the nearest pistol bootlegger? [...] The real victim of moral legislation is almost always the honest, law-abiding, well-meaning citizen what the late William Graham Summer called the Forgotten Man. Prohibition makes it impossible for him to take a harmless drink, cheaply and in a decent manner. In the same way the Harrison Act puts heavy burdens upon the physician who has need of prescribing narcotic drugs for a patient, honestly and for good ends. But the drunkard still gets all the alcohol that he can hold, and the drug addict is still full of morphine and cocaine. By precisely the same route the Nation's new law would deprive the reputable citizen of the arms he needs for protection, and hand them over to the rogues that he needs protection against. Ten or fifteen years ago there was an epidemic of suicide by bichloride of mercury tablets. At once the uplifters proposed laws forbidding their sale, and such laws are now in force in many States, including New York. The consequences are classical. A New Yorker, desiring to lay in an antiseptic for household use, is deprived of the cheapest, most convenient and most effective. And the suicide rate in New York, as elsewhere, is still steadily rising. --H.L. (Henry Louis) Mencken (18801956) American journalist and literary critic. Baltimore "Evening Sun" [1925], reprinted in _The American Rifleman_ [1 March 1926]. - That rifle on the wall of the labourer's cottage or working class flat is the symbol of democracy. It is our job to see that it stays there. --George Orwell [Eric Blair] (19031950) English novelist. In the democratic socialist weekly "Tribune," [1940], quoted in _Orwell: The Authorized Biography_ by Michael Shelden [1991]. The supposed quietude of a good man allures the ruffian; while on the other hand, arms like laws discourage and keep the invader and the plunderer in awe, and preserve order in the world as well as property. The same balance would be preserved were all the world destitute of arms, for all would be alike; but since some will not, others dare not lay them aside. ... Horrid mischief would ensue were one half the world deprived the use of them. --Thomas Paine (17371809) English-American writer and political pamphleteer. "Thoughts on Defensive War", in _Pennsylvania Magazine_ [July 1775]. I am convinced that we can do to guns what we've done to drugs: create a multi-billion dollar underground market over which we have absolutely no control. --attributed to George L. Roman Armed people are free. No state can control those who have the machinery and the will to resist, no mob can take their liberty and property. And no 220-pound thug can threaten the well-being or dignity of a 110-pound woman who has two pounds of iron to even things out People who object to weapons aren't abolishing violence, they're begging for rule by brute force, when the biggest, strongest animals among men were always automatically 'right.' Guns ended that, and a social democracy is a hollow farce without an armed populace to make it work. --L. Neil Smith (b. 1946) American science fiction author and political activist. _The Probability Broach_ [1980] When I bought my home in New Hampshire, I asked the local police chief (it's a one-man department) about what I should do in the event of an attempted break-in. He said, "Well, you could call me at home. But it'd be better if you dealt with it. You're there and I'm not." The British police would rather die than admit that. So, instead of prosecuting the burglar, they prosecute the homeowner for "disproportionate response". You're supposed to wait until the burglar has revealed his weapon before picking yours. "Ah, forgive me, old boy, for reaching for the kitchen knife. I see you've brought not a machete but a blunt instrument. Be a good sport and allow me a moment to retrieve my cricket bat from under the bed, there's a good egg." This is insane, but, despite the visible deterioration of civic life in even the leafiest suburbs and villages, the British show no sign of rousing themselves to do anything about it. --Mark Steyn (b. 1959) Canadian journalist. Interview with John Hawkins [c. 2003]. [Of the 2nd Amendment:] The right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed, and this without any qualification as to their condition or degree, as is the case in the British government. This may be considered as the true palladium of liberty... The right of self-defence is the first law of nature; in most governments it has been the study of rulers to confine this right within the narrowest limits possible. Whenever standing armies are kept up, and the right of the people to keep and bear arms is, under any colour or pretext whatsoever, prohibited, liberty, if not already annihilated, is on the brink of destruction. --St. George Tucker (17521827) American lawyer & judge. _Blackstone's Commentaries: with Notes of Reference_ [1803] - When sexual assaults started rising in Orlando, Fla., in 1966, police officers noticed women were arming themselves, so they launched a firearms safety course for them. Over the next 12 months, sexual assaults plummeted by 88 percent, burglaries fell by 25 percent and not one of the 2,500 women who took the course fired a gun in a confrontation. And that, says a new brief submitted to the U.S. Supreme Court by police officers and prosecutors in a controversial gun-ban dispute, is why gun ownership is important and should be available to individuals in the United States. [...] The brief notes when the Georgia town of Kennesaw decided to require all residents, with exceptions for conscientious objectors, to keep a firearm at home, home burglaries fell from 66 to 26 to 11 in consecutive years. In Orlando, the deterrence to criminals who simply knew that their victims may have a gun and may know how to use it and may be willing to do just that had a significant impact, because while Orlando's rapes were plummeting, assaults were up 5 percent across the state and 7 percent nationally. --Bob Unruh, "Who'da thunk? Guns best crime deterrent after all," [28 February 2008] & note: Since the passage of the Concealed Handgun Law, the FBI Uniform Crime Report shows an 18% drop in handgun murders, down from 838 in 1995 to 688 in 2004. And a 32% drop in handgun murders per 100,000 population, down from 4.5 murders per 100,000 Texans in 1995 to 3.08 per 100,000 in 2004. In 2000, on the fifth anniversary of the Concealed Handgun Law, the National Center for Policy Analysis issued a report that indicated Texans with concealed carry permits are far less likely to commit a serious crime than the average citizen. According to the report, the more than 200,000 Texans licensed to carry a concealed firearm are much more law-abiding than the average person. The report illustrated that Texans who exercise their right to carry firearms are 5.7 times less likely to be arrested for a violent offense. They are 14 times less likely to be arrested for a non-violent offense. And they are 1.4 times less likely to be arrested for murder. H. Sterling Burnett, a senior policy analyst at the NCPA and the author of the report, concluded: Many predicted that minor incidents would escalate into bloody shootouts if Texas passed a concealed-carry law. That prediction was dead wrong, Burnett said. With 247,345 concealed handgun licenses active in Texas as of December 2005, the number of law-abiding licensees has had a positive effect on the crime rate. Texas Department of Public Safety Uniform Crime Report indicates the overall crime rate in Texas has continued to drop over the past 10 years. In 1997, DPS reported 5,478 crimes per 100,000 Texans, based on a population of 19,355,427 Texans. In 2004, with almost 3 million more Texans, the crime rate is 5,032 per 100,000." --Jerry Patterson "Texas Concealed Handgun Law: Ten Years Later" [5 January 2006] - - Before a standing army can rule, the people must be disarmed; as they are in almost every kingdom of Europe. The supreme power in America cannot enforce unjust laws by the sword; because the whole body of the people are armed, and constitute a force superior to any bands of regular troops that can be, on any pretense, raised in the United States. --Noah Webster (17581843) American lexicographer. "An Examination into the Leading Principles of the Federal Constitution" [1787], in Paul Ford, ed., _Pamphlets on the Constitution of the United States_, p. 56 [New York, 1888]. ... Now let's turn to gun control laws. What do Virginia Tech's 32 murders, Columbine High School's 13 murders, Jonesboro Westside Middle School's five murders, Germany's Gutenberg High School's 16 murders, the murder of 14 legislators in Zug, Switzerland, and the murder of eight city council members in a Paris suburb all have in common? Answer: All the murders were committed in "gun-free zones." So a reasonable question is: Does legislation creating gun-free zones prevent murder and mayhem? --Walter E. Williams (b. 1936) American Professor of economics and journalist. "Spending for things that do no good" _Las Vegas Review Journal_ [18 May 2007] Never forget, even for an instant, that the one and only reason anybody has for taking your gun away is to make you weaker than he is, so he can do something to you that you wouldn't let him do if you were equipped to prevent it. This goes for burglars, muggers, and rapists, and even more so for policemen, bureaucrats, and politicians. --Aaron Zelman and L. Neil Smith _Hope_ [2001]  ;void(0)) GUNS . . see: "MILITARISM" see: "VIOLENCE" see: "WEAPONS" see: "WAR & PEACE" for other related links After a shooting spree, they always want to take the guns away from the people who didn't do it. I sure as hell wouldn't want to live in a society where the only people allowed guns are the police and the military. --William S. Burroughs (19141997) American author associated with the Beat Generation. "The War Universe" (taped conversation), as quoted in Robert Andrews _The Columbia Dictionary of Quotations_ [1993]. [I] should, many a good day, have blown my brains out, but for the recollection that it would have given pleasure to my mother-in-law. --Lord Byron [George Gordon Byron] (17881824) English Romantic poet and satirist. Letter to Thomas Moore quoted in Thomas Mallon _Yours Ever: People and Their Letters_ [2009]. You can get a lot more done with a kind word and a gun, than with a kind word alone. --Al (Alphonse Gabriel) Capone (18991947) American gangster. The quotation is apocryphal according to William Safire in _No Uncertain Terms_, p. 16 [2004]. The three great elements of modern civilization, Gunpowder, Printing, and the Protestant Religion. --Thomas Carlyle (17951881) Scottish historian and political philosopher. _Essays_ "The State of German Literature" [1838] Flag burning? I think about the time June and I went to Viet Nam in 1969 and saw the burning flesh.Whether the war was right or not, a lot of people sacrificed their lives. I cherish all the freedom we have, including the freedom to burn flags. But I also have the freedom to bear arms, and if you burn my flag, I'll shoot you. --Johnny Cash (19322003) American country singer and songwriter. (In Raymond Obstfeld's _Twang: The Ultimate Book of Country Music Quotations_ [1997], "Rednecks, White Socks, and Blue Ribbon Beer") Nothing in life is so exhilarating as to be shot at without result. --Winston Churchill (18741965) British Conservative statesman and Prime Minister [19401945, 19511955]. _The Malakand Field Force_, ch. 3 [1898] - It was hot here on the streets of Tel Aviv, and hotter still where he was going, of course. The streets were busy with people scurrying about shopping or pursuing business. There was the expected number of police about, but more discordant was the occasional civilian toting a Uzi sub-machine gun, doubtless on his or her way to or from a reserve meeting. It was the sort of thing to shock an American anti-gun nut (or warm the heart of a pro-gun nut). Ryan figured that the weapons display probably knocked the hell out of purse-snatching and street crime. Ordinary civil crime, he knew, was pretty rare here. But terrorist bombings and other less pleasant acts were not. And things were getting worse instead of better. That wasn't new either. --Tom Clancy (b. 1947) American novelist. _The Sum of All Fears_, ch. 5 [1991] - Not everyone with a gun is a bad guy. Not everyone without one is a good guy. A bad guy without a gun can still do a hell of a lot of damage. A good guy without a gun can't always stop it from happening. --Sir Arthur C. Clarke (19172008) English science-fiction writer. w/ Michael Kube-McDowell in _The Trigger_ [1999], p. 441 (paperback edition). [Harry Callahan (Clint Eastwood) speaking:] I know what you are thinking. Did he fire six shots or only five? Well, to tell you the truth, I've kinda lost track myself. But being this is a .44 Magnum, the most powerful handgun in the world, and would blow your head clear off, you've gotta ask yourself one question: Do I feel lucky? Well, do ya, punk? --Harry Julian Fink, Rita M. Fink, and Dean Riesner "Dirty Harry" [1971 film] (In the 1983 film "Sudden Impact," Eastwood said, "Go ahead, make my day!" to another trapped gunman. (Q).) We can manage without butter but not, for example, without guns. If we are attacked we can only defend ourselves with guns not with butter. --Joseph Goebbels (18971945) German Nazi leader & minister of propaganda. Speech in Berlin [17 January 1936]. Would you rather have butter or guns? ... Preparedness makes us powerful. Butter merely makes us fat. --Hermann Goering (18931946) German Nazi leader. Speech in Hamburg, Germany [1936]. - THE PERILS OF OBESITY Yesterday my gun exploded When I thought it wasn't loaded; Near my wife I pressed the trigger, Chipped a fragment off her figure. 'Course I'm sorry and all that, But she shouldn't be so fat. --Harry Graham (18741936) British writer and journalist. _Ruthless Rhymes for Heartless Homes_ [1899] - [Business card:] Have gun. Will travel. --Television catchphrase "Have Gun, Will Travel" [American TV show 19571963] - An armed society is a polite society. Manners are good when one may have to back up his acts with his life. --Robert Heinlein (19071988) American science-fiction writer. "Beyond This Horizon" [1942] (The original quote "An armed society is a peaceful society" is a Colt marketing slogan from the 19th century.) Be wary of strong drink. It can make you shoot at tax collectors and miss. --Robert Heinlein (19071988) American science-fiction writer. _Time Enough for Love_ [1973] - A gentle Quaker, hearing a strange noise in his house one night, got up and discovered a burglar busily at work. He went and got his gun, came back and stood quietly in the doorway. "Friend," he said, "I would do thee no harm for the world, but thou standest where I am about to shoot." --attributed to James Hines. (Quoted in "The Rotarian" [April 1948] without attribution.) [When asked by a press agent, "How do I get our leading lady's name in the Times?":] "Shoot her." --George S. Kaufman (18891961) American playwright, director, and producer. Quoted in Malcolm Goldstein _George S. Kaufman: His Life, His Theatre_ [1980]. Among other evils which being unarmed brings you, it causes you to be despised. --Niccolς Machiavelli (14691527) Florentine statesman and political philosopher. _The Prince_, ch. 14 [written 1513] Every Communist must grasp the truth, 'Political power grows out of the barrel of a gun.' --Mao Zedong (18931976) Chinese Marxist theorist, soldier and statesman who led his nation's communist revolution. Speech [6 November 1938]. [Hawkeye speaking:] I will not carry a gun. ... I'll carry your books, I'll carry a torch, I'll carry a tune, I'll carry on, carry over, carry forward, Cary Grant, cash and carry, carry me back to Old Virginia, I'll even hari-kari if you show me how, but I will not carry a gun! --_M*A*S*H_ [American TV show] "Officer of the Day" In 1882 I was in Vienna, where I met an American Jew whom I had known in the States. He said: 'Hang your chemistry and electricity! If you want to make a pile of money, invent something that will enable those Europeans to cut each other's throats with greater facility.' --Sir Hiram Stevens Maxim (18401916) American-born British inventor, in _The Times_ [11 July 1915]. (Taking the advice, Maxim invented the machine-gun.) [To the firing squad at his execution, 27 February 1902:] Shoot straight you bastards. Don't make a mess of it. --Harry "Breaker" Morant (18641902) English-born Australian poet and soldier. Quoted in Bill Hornadge _The Australian Slanguage_ [1980]. Any woman who does not thoroughly enjoy tramping across the country on a clear, frosty morning with a good gun and a pair of dogs does not know how to enjoy life. --Annie Oakley [Phoebe Anne Oakley Mozee] (18601926) American sharpshooter. Interview with "Minneapolis Times" [1900], as quoted in Isabelle S. Sayers _Annie Oakley and Buffalo Bill's Wild West_ [1981]. [Little Bill Daggett (Gene Hackman):] You just shot an unarmed man! [William Munny (Clint Eastwood):] Well, he should have armed himself. --David Webb Peoples, screenplay, "Unforgiven" [1992 film] A lawyer with a briefcase can steal more than a hundred men with guns. --Mario Puzo (19201999) American novelist. _The Godfather_, ch. I [1969] [When asked if he had a final request while facing the firing squad:] Why yes, a bulletproof vest! --James W. Rodgers (d.1960) ^ Alfred, Lord Tennyson (18091892) British poet, poet laureate [18501892] Tennyson was entertaining a Russian nobleman on his house on the Isle of Wight. One morning the Russian set off on a shooting expedition, returning later that day with the proud news that he had shot two peasants. Tennyson politely corrected his guest's pronunciation: 'You mean two pheasants,' he said. 'No,' replied the Russian,' 'two peasants. They were insolent, so I shot them.' --_Bartlett's Book of Anecdotes_ edited by Clifton Fadiman and Andrι Bernard [2000 ed.] ^ I think my favorite sport in the Olympics is the one in which you make your way through the snow, you stop, you shoot a gun, and then you continue on. In most of the world, it is known as the biathlon, except in New York City, where it is known as winter. --Michael Ventre, "L.A. Daily News" Is that a gun in your pocket, or are you just glad to see me? --Mae West (18931980) American stage and film actress. 1936 comment to a LAPD officer assigned to escort her home. Please do not shoot the pianist. He is doing his best. (Printed notice in a dancing saloon.) --anon., in Oscar Wilde _Impressions of America_ "Leadville" [c.18821883] We thought a gun was too violent an image. --Columbia Pictures spokesman explaining why promotions for "The Last Action Hero" showed Arnold Schwarzenegger holding a fistful of dynamite. ----- blunderbuss (noun) 1. Wide-mouthed gun: a short wide-muzzled firearm of the 17th century, used to fire shot with a scattering effect at close range. 2. Blundering person: somebody who is clumsy. end page | GAMBLING - GARDENS | GARFIELD - GENERATION GAP | GENEROSITY - GENTLEMEN | GEOGRAPHY - GERSHWIN | GHOSTS - GLASSES | GLOBALIZATION - GOALS | GOD | GOLF | GOOD DEEDS - GOODBYES | GOODNESS - GOVERNMENT | GRACE - GRASS | GRATITUDE | GRAVEYARDS - GREED | GREETINGS - GROWING | GROWING OLDER - PAGE 1 (A-L) | GROWING OLDER - PAGE 2 (M-Z) | GROWING UP - GULLIBLE | GUN CONTROL & GUNS | | A | B | C | D | E | F | G | | Return Home | The Credits | The Cast | Act 1 | Act 2 | Act 3 | The Reviews | |
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