They can do whatever the hell they want, but NOT claim that the 2nd A confers (last time I include the anti-strawman caveat that you can use whatever word you want) a "right to own guns".
First of all, the general population was THE militia, period, well regulated or not. (Gen Washington found them to be generally anything but "well regulated.") It has to be what is referenced in the 2nd amendment because it was all there was. It was only the militia -- the general population -- that had guns. The federal government had a few left over army soldiers that had government issued weapons, and the states were not allowed to have their own "army" Then, the federal government cannot tell the states what to do . The states could have a well regulated militia if they wanted, or not if they didn't. Until later when the feds found out they could bring the states in line by sending them money.
The military was very small on purpose. To give an idea, the average size of graduating classes for the first decades of West Point was around 50 officers. That's it, only around 50 new officers each year, which was just about enough to keep up with attrition. And when the United States Army was first organized it only had 718 soldiers. The idea had long been to follow the British model. In that there would be a core of trained officers and NCOs, who would then become the core of a much larger unit once the militia had been called up and augmented the army. And this can even be seen in the most famous and one of the last militia units, the 1st US Volunteer Cavalry. It was a rather traditional militia unit, and like a great many others commanded by the one who primarily paid for their equipment and training. However, when they were called into service, the Regiment was placed under the command of a regular US Army officer. The rich amateur was a good commander by all accounts, and he did read and study every military manual he could get his hands on in addition to managing to acquire some former officers and NCOs who had actual combat experience to assist in the training and organization. But he was not experienced, so reduced to second in command when it came time to go into combat, and a regular officer placed in command. And that was always the idea of how the regular Army would be used. And how a Major who was a doctor suddenly found himself a Colonel in command of a Regiment. And a year later a Brigadier General. Until after WWII, regular Army officers and NCOs generally saw rapid promotions in the expanded military during conflicts as they were the ones with the most experience and training. Plus there were often "blanket promotions" where everybody was promoted as the Army rapidly increased in size. That is how Ike went from Lieutenant Colonel to General of the Army in less than 5 years.
I'm only talking about the well-regulated one. These threads are about the 2nd A. No! There were state militias and there was the was the well-regulated militia in the 2nd A. The well-regulated militia in the 2nd A is the one that is called by Congress in defense of the nation. This one is controlled by Congress and, even though it was composed by members of the state militias, Gen Washington specifically LOBBIED for the part saying "composed of the body of the people" which was in the version approved by the House, be removed by the Senate. Because he did NOT want the body of the population to be part of the militia that might be called up by Congress. Correct. But the one called by Congress in defense of a free state WAS well-regulated. Anyway... irrelevant to this thread. You can look at the topic here and comment if you want. http://www.politicalforum.com/index...form-part-of-a-well-regulated-militia.589757/
Except that made no sense at the time. Militias were not permanent. They existed only as the need existed The militiamen provided their own arms. In fact, that presented a problem with standardization of repairs and ammunition. In order to maintain proficiency, they owned and used the arms when the militias were idle.
He does not understand that his silly interpretation is not consistent with the entire framework of the constitution
His specious interpretation would be akin to saying that when a fire breaks out-volunteer fireman would have to run travel to a central location and get gear and then go to the fire and they couldn't train with it until a fire broke out
Not really, as every member had to have the equipment to make their own bullets. As well as having replacement flints (about the only thing that commonly broke on a flintlock rifle). And flints were interchangeable, it literally is a piece of flint held by a grip on the hammer. And at that point in time, when you bought a rifle the bullet mold that matched the barrel was one of the things you got with it. But the Militia Act of 1791 explains all of that: https://www.mountvernon.org/educati... it enacted by the,States, to call forth such The army provided the powder and lead ingots, it was up to the soldiers to make their own bullets. This is actually rather accurately shown in the 2000 movie "The Patriot". But standardization had yet to really reach the point where bullets could be mass-produced. That was still about half a century in the future, at that time rifles were still largely made individually with nothing really interchangeable. For the US, that was the Springfield Armory, who did make standard weapons but not in sufficient numbers to issue one to everybody until the time of the Civil War. And even then, they were also well known for modifying already existing weapons as it was the only way to meet demands because their manufacturing capacity was so limited. Hence, the 1884 Springfield Trapdoor, which was a modification on the 1873 Springfield that allowed it to fire breechloading cartridges instead of muzzle loading powder and ball. It was not really until the Civil War that the nation started to standardize and equip the militias with weapons. Especially as by that time the army had standardized on the Springfield 1861, which fired the Minie Ball and used a percussion cap. As opposed to the flintlocks of earlier periods. That was still "cutting edge technology" of the era, and individual soldiers simply could not afford weapons of that quality so the government issued them. But until WWI, there was still no "training camp", all of the militia who showed up were expected to already know how to shoot and operate as a military force.
Or an off-duty or reserve law enforcement officer could not take their weapon home with them, but had to go to their station to pick it up before responding to an emergency when they are off-duty. Which was the very point of the Heller decision. Where an cop was prohibited from having his duty firearm in his home when off-duty. Which was a catch-22 as with most departments, the officers were required to maintain their gun either on them at all times, or easily accessible.
He doesn't understand or refuses to understand the second amendment is not about what we can do (own guns) but what the Government cannot do and this is to INFRINGE ON ANYTHING involving the keeping and bearing of arms and that includes OWNERSHIP
By his definition, that obviously would mean that radio, TV and the Internet does not share "Freedom of the Press", as they are not printed on dead trees with ink. I always find it amazing how some become absolute literalists when talking about the Second Amendment, but flexible when it comes to others.
the gun banners' interpretations of the second amendment are not designed to make sense in the real world but to argue that their gun banning schemes are not unconstitutional.
as I noted, the gun banners work backwards in order to pretend their schemes are not unconstitutional. There interpretations of the second amendment are based on "what will allow us to ban guns"
Having the equipment to make their own bullets is precisely what I am talking about. That means they had to carry all that equipment with them rather than just being able to get flints, powder, wadding and bullets supplied by a central organization like the British had. It was a problem.
There is really not that much equipment needed. A steel crucible to melt the lead, and a mold to pour it into. I know people into black powder weapons, and they still do it even today. It was not until the modern cartridge that really became the norm. It was simply easier and more efficient to send lead ingots than it was huge numbers of bullets. Especially in the era of balls. Also, as the barrels wore down in that era they simply got a larger mold and continued to use the same rifle (or used another layer of wadding around the ball). Many early shotguns were simply muskets where the barrel had grown so thin it was not practical for balls, so they switched to pellets as it reduced the pressure and the chance of a barrel blowing out.
It adds weight for the individual soldier in addition to his rations and bedroll. You really don't want to go into battle where everyone makes their own ammunition. That means that everyone has to have enough ammunition for the battle. Having common ammunition allows a person who runs out of ammunition to be able to replenish at a central arms rather than having to stop and make more bullets. History books discuss having problems with not having common arms. All that was completely off subject. The fact that they supplied their own arms for the militia, provides the basis for keeping and bearing arms being a right because it was required for a well organized militia.
That is incorrect. The reason why there were strong curbs placed on standing armies was because the Founding Fathers feared that a large standing army would lead to tyranny. Not odd at all. The militia is distinct from a standing army. That is why National Guardsmen are not part of the militia. That is completely wrong and completely backwards. The STATES enacted the Second Amendment to prevent the FEDERAL government from weakening the militia. That is incorrect. They are one and the same. That is incorrect. A well-regulated militia may serve the states as well. And militiamen who have not organized or trained may be called up to federal service. That is incorrect. There is no "this one". It's all the same militia. That is incorrect. It was because he did not want the entire population to be organized and trained. That is incorrect. Congress can call up militiamen who have not organized or trained.
Nonsense. "The phrase keep and bear arms was a novel term. It does not appear anywhere in COEME—more than 1 billion words of British English stretching across three centuries. And prior to 1789, when the Second Amendment was introduced, the phrase was used only twice in COFEA: First in the 1780 Massachusetts Declaration of Rights, and then in a proposal for a constitutional amendment by the Virginia Ratifying Convention. In short, keep and bear arms was not a term of art with a fixed meaning. Indeed, the meaning of this phrase was quite unsettled then, as it had barely been used in other governmental documents. Ultimately, a careful study of the Second Amendment would have to treat keep arms and bear arms as two separate linguistic units, and thus two separate rights." https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/02/big-data-second-amendment/607186/ https://www.cato.org/commentary/mysterious-meaning-second-amendment "Searching the full phrase keep and bear arms in COFEA and COEME shows that it only appears when writers quote or allude to the Second Amendment. But that doesn’t tell us what keep and bear arms means." "The phrase keep and bear arms does not occur outside a Second Amendment context in the databases, so a corpus search of the phrase cannot resolve the matter." https://firearmslaw.duke.edu/2021/07/corpus-linguistics-public-meaning-and-the-second-amendment Nonsense. Where is your evidence that these are fundamental rights? I recall debunking the OP. As I recall it said some stuff about "bearing arms" but totally glossed over the meaning of "keep". Regardless, people cannot utilize a weapon or maintain it unless they possess the weapon. So thanks for confirming that the Second Amendment protects an individual right to possess military weapons. They do have ready access to the gun however. And don't forget the fact that the right to keep and bear arms historically always included the right to use those arms for self defense and in target shooting sports. Something that requires possession of the gun that is being maintained. More nonsense. "We performed another search in COFEA, about the meaning of keep arms, looking for documents in which keep and arms (and their variants) appear within six words of each other. The results here were somewhat inconclusive. In about 40 percent of the hits, a person would keep arms for a collective, military purpose; these documents support Justice Stevens’s reading. And roughly 30 percent of the hits reference a person who keeps arms for individual uses; these documents support Justice Scalia’s analysis. The remainder of the hits did not support either reading." https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/02/big-data-second-amendment/607186/ https://www.cato.org/commentary/mysterious-meaning-second-amendment "Our search yielded roughly 200 results, which included every instance of arms near some form of the verb to keep. Again, we reviewed 50 of these documents as a sample. From this lot, we discarded irrelevant searches (such as “she kept her arms above her head”), quotations from the Constitution, and duplicates. In the remaining 18 documents in the sample, about half referred to keeping arms in the military context, roughly a quarter referred to a private sense of keeping arms, and another quarter or so were ambiguous references." https://harvardlawreview.org/blog/2018/08/corpus-linguistics-and-the-second-amendment/ Who says it is inseparable? Got any evidence that the phrase was used at all before the Second Amendment?
What nonsense! The state militias functioned pretty more or less like the National Guard works today. They were civilians who met for military training on a regular basis at times of peace, ready to be called by the Governor of the State or Congress. Off-topic and irrelevant to this thread, but you keep being the bearer of made-up history.
