Tim Walberg: “I thank the gentlelady, my friend from Missouri, for holding this opportunity for us to speak on the Second Amendment.…”

“I thank the gentlelady, my friend from Missouri, for holding this opportunity for us to speak on the Second Amendment. I've often said at town hall meetings that we're talking about the Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, the Second Amendment in the Bill of Rights, that namely speaks to the issue that was declared so strongly in the Declaration of Independence, that document, one of two documents that could be considered the greatest manmade documents ever penned, the Declaration of Independence and then the Constitution. The Bill of Rights understood what the Declaration said, that all men are created equal and endowed with certain unalienable rights, namely, the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. I think the Framers and Founders understood with the First Amendment, the right to free speech and the freedom of religion, but also that understanding that the right to life involved making sure that I could defend myself, protect myself, care for myself, feed myself with the use of a weapon in the field in hunting, but not simply that. Mr. Speaker, I will say, it was there to make sure that a citizen, a free citizen of the United States, was able to care for himself or herself, his family or her family, in any shape or form. And so I see the First Amendment as important, but I see equally important the Second Amendment, the right to keep and bear arms. And as my friend Ted Nugent says: ``Keep'' is defined as ``It's mine. It's not yours.…”