Skipper, the actual intent of the framers of the Constitution and the Bill of Rights was to ensure that each state within the United States would have a trained, official, "well-regulated" fighting force in place in order to prevent the federal government from becoming overly powerful. This actually has absolutely nothing to do with the citizenry itself having weapons on a private basis. Another important historical consideration is that in Colonial days, it was fifty years before even large cities had organized police departments to protect the citizenry. The times were entirely different.
My own personal opinion is that if an American revolutionary could time travel into my living room, and see all the damage guns do in American society, which is significantly more violent than civilized societies with fewer guns, that revolutionary would agree that the argument, and the amendment, are irrelevant to modern-day life.
Revolutionaries are by definition free thinkers and futurists. I think this body of very gifted men would have a cow, so to speak, at the way their words have been perverted to make parts of our society a real mess.
The Third Amendment is also hopelessly passe and useless. I think that proves that not every one of the Bill of Rights was designed to last several centuries. These are historical documents, not guaranteeing obscure rights necessarily into the space age, in my opinion.
Do you really think that you can out-shoot the U.S. government? Do you think your attempt to do so is one of your protected rights under the Constitution? I am not sure that I think it is.
I value my freedoms, and consider them impinged upon considerably when I have to avoid whole neighborhoods, and stay in at night, because so many criminals are armed. I have absolutely no objections to shooting as a sport, having been an avid archer as a child, but how about having shooting ranges where your weapons are stored?
If you assume that the right of ndividuals to bear arms is ironclad in our Constitution, you should at least read the following tract with an open mind and then maybe we can discuss it some more:
handguncontrol.org |
