====================================================================== The Atlanta Declaration: Every man, woman, and responsible child has a natural, fundamental, and inalienable human, individual, civil, and Constitutional right to obtain, own, and carry, openly or concealed, any weapon -- handgun, shotgun, rifle, machinegun, \anything\ -- any time, anywhere, without asking anyone's permission. ====================================================================== L. NEIL SMITH'S \LEVER ACTION\ LETTER NUMBER 03b == HOW MUCH DO YOU WANT TO KEEP YOUR GUNS? == Would you agree to permit consenting adults to buy, sell, read, write, make, listen to, or watch whatever books, magazines, records, tapes, or movies they want, no matter how pornographic they might be ... ... if they agreed to let you keep your guns? Would you agree to tolerate anyone who practiced atheism, Buddhism, Islam, Jainism, Scientology, Satanism, Taoism ... ... if they agreed to let you keep your guns? Would you agree to let women control their own reproductive processes, even have abortions (at their own expense, of course) ... ... if they agreed to let you keep your guns? Would you agree to allow individuals to pursue their own sexual preferences, homosexual, bisexual, heterosexual ... ... if they agreed to let you keep your guns? Would you agree forget the "War on Drugs", to leave others alone, perhaps even to ruin their lives with alcohol, nicotine, heroin, cocaine, marijuana, LSD, or any other chemical substance ... ... if they agreed to let you keep your guns? Would you agree to respect the rights of anyone, no matter their race or national origin ... ... if they agreed to let you keep your guns? No sane human being would sacrifice the individual rights he personally considers most precious just for the sake of imposing his own tastes or opinions on others. Yet it often seems that each of us disapproves of -- and wants to outlaw -- some one little thing that somebody else cares about or wants. Little things add up. With over two hundred million of us, split up into countless thousands of pressure groups -- all working at the same time for one kind of Prohibition or another -- it's no wonder government controls are ratcheting tighter around our lives every day. Until now, it's been strictly a one-way process, with everybody on every side winding up the loser -- except, of course, for politicians, bureaucrats, and lawyers. Individualists can work together to reverse that process. They can make a commitment to one another to respect and defend each other's rights -- no matter how much each of us may personally disapprove of any particular exercise of those rights. That doesn't mean you'd have to do any of these bizarre, perverse things yourself; I'm married, straight, and I don't use drugs -- I'm literally an Eagle Scout -- and I don't even drink. But I don't give a damn what my allies do with their own lives -- as long as they want to be free and can help me stay that way. The one limit is an absolute obligation never to \initiate\ force against another human being, since that's the way we began losing our rights to begin with. Would this change the way we're used to thinking about personal freedom? Not at all, but it would make our thinking more consistent, put some teeth into the Bill of Rights, and limit the power of politicians, bureaucrats, lawyers -- and Prohibitionists -- to control the way we live. Which means that you, and every man, woman, and responsible child in this country, would be free to obtain, own, and carry, openly or concealed, any weapon -- rifle, shotgun, handgun, machinegun, \anything\ you feel is desirable for sport \or\ self-defense -- any time, any place you want, without asking anyone's permission. The other side's counting on us to remain divided and intolerant -- that's how they got us where they want us in the first place. How do you get started? Let me send you a document, the Covenant of Unanimous Consent, that some feel may turn out to be as important as the Declaration of Independence. If you have the courage and intelligence to renew your personal commitment to the American tradition of individual liberty, I need to hear from you \now\, before it's too late. I intend to keep my guns -- and the rest of my rights, as well. How about you? ====================================================================== L. NEIL SMITH'S \LEVER ACTION\ LETTER NUMBER 03b 111 EAST DRAKE ROAD SUITE 7032 FORT COLLINS, COLORADO U.S.A. 80525 L. Neil Smith is the award-winning author of 16 novels including \Henry Martyn, The Crystal Empire, BrightSuit MacBear, Taflak Lysandra, The Probability Broach,\ and the forthcoming FORGE OF THE ELDERS trilogy, beginning with CONTACT AND COMMUNE. 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