I can assure the people of Mississippi that, as God is my witness, I strongly oppose the Blair-Holt Act and will fight harder than any human being alive to protect law-abiding Mississippians Constitutional right to keep and bear arms.
I don't think the federal government has any business keeping a list of law-abiding Americans who exercise their constitutional right to keep and bear arms.
I will also continue to strongly oppose any reauthorization of the Patriot Act that does not protect the rights and freedoms of law-abiding Americans with no connection to terrorism.
I have strongly supported the right to keep and bear arms. I truly believe that firearms in the hands of law abiding citizens makes our families and our communities more safe, not less safe.
The NRA believes America's laws were made to be obeyed and that our Constitutional liberties are just as important today as 200 years ago. And by the way, the Constitution does not say Government shall decree the right to keep and bear arms. The Constitution says 'The right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.'
Bad people will find a way to do harm, whether it's homemade explosives, illegal weapons, or flying planes into buildings. Restricting law-abiding citizens' right to bear arms is not the answer.
What about your constitutional right to bear arms, you say. I would simply point out that you don’t have to exercise a constitutional right just because you have it. You have the constitutional right to run for president of the United States, but most people have too much sense to insist on exercising it.
I want to protect our constitutional right to bear arms in a legal and thoughtful way with background checks that also don't want people to get shot and murdered, but it doesn't mean that you can't own a gun.
It is unclear how disarming law-abiding citizens would better protect them from the dangers and threats posed by those who would flout the law. It is at just such times that the constitutional right to self-defense is most precious and must be protected from government overreach.
If the constitutional right to keep and bear arms is to mean anything, it must, as a general matter, permit a person to possess, carry and sometimes conceal arms to maintain the security of his private residence or privately operated business.
We welcome the National Rifle Association here to Indianapolis. It's tens of thousands of freedom loving Americans. I was grateful to be able to speak to them and interact with them and I really do believe that the right of law-abiding citizens to keep and bear arms makes our communities more safe, not less safe.
Most laws that we make to protect people from guns are usually ignored by the criminals and obeyed by the law-abiding people. And so I think that if you had better data, there'd be no one more in favor of it than law abiding gun owners because they don't want to be smeared and lumped in with the criminals who use guns.
It would also be strange to find in the midst of a catalog of the rights of individuals a provision securing to the states the right to maintain a designated "Militia." Dispassionate scholarship suggests quite strongly that the right of the people to keep and bear arms meant just that.
Parents all over the country are using their right to keep and bear arms to protect their kids.
In truth, we are the only developed country on earth with a constitution that recognizes the God-given right to keep and bear arms, and the human right of individual armed defense of self, family, home and country.
I believe strongly that we can protect our people without undermining our constitutional rights and I worry very, very much about the huge attacks on privacy that we have seen in recent years - both from the government and the private sector. I worry that we are moving toward an Orwellian society, and this is something I will oppose as vigorously as I can.
Let every nation know, whether it wishes us well or ill, that we shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe to assure the survival and the success of liberty.