I sell to businesses and I can confirm that gun and ammo sales are booming. The more the talk of disarmament, the greater the gun sales.
The meaning is easily determined by the use of the word people in the amendment versus militia throughout the entire amendment. It is clear in my mind as well as the framers that militia and people are two different nouns with separate meaning.
Can you elaborate how this opinion relates to the deprecated syntactic constructions mentioned in the article? I'm confused. It's kinda cool you know what was clear in the framers' minds. That's a limited use superpower but a superpower nonetheless! Have you considered clerking for an originalist SCOTUS justice?
Given the debates and constitution having survived this long I would say the framers were very deliberate in the words they chose. If it was meant for the militia only the amendment would have been written as below. “A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the (strike out people and insert militia) to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.”
Ive always assumed they wanted the people to have and bear arms in order to take part in a well regulated militia.
That's all well and good but the amendment doesn't state people have be in a militia to maintain a right to bear arms.
So do you believe it was a mistake by the founders? Why did they even include the militia in the amendment?
That's an interesting point if I'm understanding you. Seems like everyone pretty much agrees that the drafters intended the First and Second Amendments were expressly limiting the power of the federal government only - not state governments? Both Amendments have a reference to the "people," but that presumably would not have prohibited the states from banning individual gun ownership if they chose to do so. Notably, the First Amendment directly refers to "Congress" while the Second Amendment does not. Unsure why the two Amendments seem to have been written so differently if the intended scope was essentially the same for each (to restrain the Federal government only). Maybe the Second Amendment didn't refer to Congress specifically because they wanted to make clear that the restriction on Federal power applied to the executive branch as well?
I think Carpe brings up a valid point that I’ve never thought of before. That is, what is the primary focus of this amendment? Is it the militia, or is it the people? I think the focus is on the people. To GT‘s point, I think mentioning militia is a reason for the people being armed, but not the sole reason. If they had mentioned the need of people to feed themselves and therefore need to be armed, would that prevent them from protecting themselves using the firearms? If it said because of the need for security the right to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed, would that prevent the citizens from using the arms for obtaining food? I think a lot of people read “militia” as being the sole reason for having the amendment. It could easily have been merely one of the reasons, perhaps even the primary one in their minds at the time, but the fundamental right of the citizens is to keep and bear arms.
That would be an interesting interpretation. I wonder if it’s ever been used in court. It seems that interpretation would mean that individual states can establish their own official religion, or shut down newspapers they don’t like, as long as the federal government doesn’t interfere.
No it was not a mistake to include people of the nation it was a reasoned amendment. They included militia for the State and people in the second amendment. The framers understood this was not enough and addressed the armed services for the nation as a whole. Article 1 section 8 addresses the armed forces of the nation The Congress shall have Power To lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises, to pay the Debts and provide for the common Defence and general Welfare of the United States; but all Duties, Imposts and Excises shall be uniform throughout the United States;
I could be wrong but thought it was pretty widely accepted that the drafters believed the Bill of Rights only limited the power of the Federal government. If it automatically applied to the states, then presumably the courts would not have had to analyze if and when to incorporate the various amendments based upon the subsequent 14th Amendment.
I'm on the other side of the fence. The state militias were very important to the founders in light of a national army and chose to ensure Congress could not infringe the states. I find this position somewhat validated by rights to personal firearms detailed in states' constitutions. In the 50 years following the ratification of the Constitution, 15 states included language to their constitutions expanding the right to bare arms to include personal defense in addition to state defense. For example, Article I, Section 26 of the Tennessee Constitution reads: "That the citizens of this State have a right to keep and to bear arms for their common defense; but the Legislature shall have power, by law, to regulate the wearing of arms with a view to prevent crime." The Florida Constitution contains a provision in Article I, Section 8: "The right of the people to keep and bear arms in defense of themselves and of the lawful authority of the state shall not be infringed, except that the manner of bearing arms may be regulated by law."
The answer is no because the US constitution is the deciding factor and maintains supremacy in these matters. This is why the Supreme Court of the United States exists and you see all forms of litigation concerning freedom of speech, religion and the press being brought before the court.
True today. From what I can tell, though, that wasn't the law even after the 14th Amendment was adopted. In U.S. v. Cruikshank (1876), the United States Supreme Court held the following about the First Amendment: *** UNITED STATES v. CRUIKSHANK ET AL. The first amendment to the Constitution prohibits Congress from abridging 'the right of the people to assemble and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.' This, like the other amendments proposed and adopted at the same time, was not intended to limit the powers of the State governments in respect to their own citizens, but to operate upon the National government alone. Barron v. The City of Baltimore, 7 Pet. 250; Lessee of Livingston v. Moore, id. 551; Fox v. Ohio, 5 How. 434; Smith v. Maryland, 18 id. 76; Withers v. Buckley, 20 id. 90; Pervear v. The Commonwealth, 5 Wall. 479; Twitchell v. The Commonwealth, 7 id. 321; Edwards v. Elliott, 21 id. 557. It is now too late to question the correctness of this construction. As was said by the late Chief Justice, in Twitchell v. The Commonwealth, 7 Wall. 325, 'the scope and application of these amendments are no longer subjects of discussion here.' They left the authority of the States just where they found it, and added nothing to the already existing powers of the United States. *** As gator_lawyer noted, SCOTUS has held (I believe for the first time in 2010) that the Second Amendment applies to restrict the states via the 14th Amendment. I thought he was saying that the incorporation doctrine should not have been applied, but that is not something I have studied. Suffice it to say, we have moved beyond relying upon what the drafters themselves may or may not have intended. Many have even noted that the Constitution does not expressly set forth the power of judicial review.
