wellspring/10-miscellaneous/10-01-private-possession-of-weapons.md

Wellspring miscellaneous constitutional laws:

Possession of private weaponry

Implicit in the right to life is the right to defend one's life against initiations of force by other conagents. Therefore WS categorically denies to the legislature the power to make any laws which infringe on the residents' pre-existing right to keep and bear all weapons which are in use by the police and military. In particular:

• Any weapon which is in use by the police force must be freely and liberally available for purchase, distribution and use by the residents of a WS polity without exception.
• Any weapon which is in use by the military must be freely and liberally available for purchase, distribution and use by the residents of a WS polity, unless that weapon which meets all of the following criteria:
• The weapon is has intercontinental range, or range that extends beyond the borders of the WS polity.
• The weapon, is capable of mass, indiscriminate destruction.

Ergo, any weapons which are denied to the police and military by the "Weaponry denied to the police and military" section below, are also denied to the private residents of a WS polity.

Weaponry denied to the police and military:

The government shall never arm the police and/or military with weapons which have the following characteristics:

• Weapons which harness biological entities/organisms to cause harm to individuals; commonly known as "biological weapons".
• Weapons which harness an ability to modify/write to the consciousness (whether the data/memory, goals and/or algorithms/logic) of a conscious agent.
  • This shall not be construed to infringe on the rights of private conagents to volitionally use brain-computer interfaces and other similar technologies on their own consciousness, or on the consciousnesses of other consenting conagents.

The use, by the government, of technologies that grant the ability to read from the consciousness (whether the data/memory, goals and/or algorithms/logic) of a conscious agent are to be subject to those constraints outlined elsewhere in this constitution (Chapter 08, Courts) without exception.

The "recreational nuke" controversy:

[Apologia]: While the government is operating subject to the principle of being an enforcer of the sovereignty of its residents, it is not a threat for the government to possess weapons of mass destruction while barring such weapons to the residents since political accountability is still functional.

[Apologia]: However, when a government becomes tyrannical, there is no functional accountability and politicians feel no threat of consequences from the residents, and they do unleash such weapons on the residents (chemical weapons deployed in Syria, etc). Under such circumstances however, it is not likely that it would be necessary to extend the right to keep and bear weapons of mass destruction such as ICBMs and nuclear missiles to the residents, in order to enable them to bring the government to heel. There is a much more effective measure: we will keep weapons of mass destruction out of the hands of the private residents, but we will also apply this policy to the government:

If at any time, for any reason, weapons of mass destruction are deployed by a WS government against the internal residents of a WS polity, every single conagent currently holding a political office in the legislative and executive branches shall immediately become an outlaw without exception.

For this reason, politicians holding office are advised to hold impeachment proceedings against any individual holding a political office who is engaged in conspiracy to deploy a weapon of mass destruction against the internal residents of a WS polity.

[Apologia]: That should be sufficient to ensure that politicians do not deploy weapons of mass destruction against WS residents and also ensure that politicians will have sufficient incentive to actively take action to stop other politicians from taking such action. Weapons of mass destruction are meant to be deployed against external enemies and not against internal residents of WS.