The right to bear Arms? Not necefsarily.

[NOVA]

"No free man shall ever be debarred the use of arms."
- Thomas Jefferson, Virginia Constitution, Draft 1, 1776

"I ask who are the militia? They consist now of the whole people, except a few public officers."
- George Mason, Address to the Virginia Ratifying Convention, June 4, 1788

"A militia when properly formed are in fact the people themselves…and include, according to the past and general usuage of the states, all men capable of bearing arms… "To preserve liberty, it is essential that the whole body of the people always possess arms, and be taught alike, especially when young, how to use them."
- Richard Henry Lee, Federal Farmer No. 18, January 25, 1788

"Guard with jealous attention the public liberty. Suspect everyone who approaches that jewel. Unfortunately, nothing will preserve it but downright force. Whenever you give up that force, you are ruined.... The great object is that every man be armed. Everyone who is able might have a gun."
- Patrick Henry, Speech to the Virginia Ratifying Convention, June 5, 1778

"The Constitution shall never be construed to prevent the people of the United States who are peaceable citizens from keeping their own arms."
- Samuel Adams, Massachusetts Ratifying Convention, 1788

Such a cute graphic, too.....like its the original founding fathers document....I wonder what they meant by M3-13 gangs back then.....

and pinheads trying to tell us that we got it all wrong....for over 250 years we've been reading the 2nd Amendment wrong......

I at a loss for words....

 

[Nordberg]

The British were attacking the new US country regularly. They came back in the war of 1812 and burned down Washington DC. That is why we needed a well regulated militia. It absolutely was not about fighting our brand new government. It was about preserving the US from outside countries. we were weak and badly organized in the beginning. We were heavily in debt. We required a well armed population to keep the union.

 

[CFM]

But we're not talking about a "modern version"; because the Constitution is what it is.

People like Rob use terms like "modern version" when they don't like what the founders wrote. However, The "Robs" of the forum constantly talk about what the founders meant when it is something they like. Contradictory?

 

[SmarterthanYou]

The British were attacking the new US country regularly. They came back in the war of 1812 and burned down Washington DC. That is why we needed a well regulated militia. It absolutely was not about fighting our brand new government. It was about preserving the US from outside countries. we were weak and badly organized in the beginning. We were heavily in debt. We required a well armed population to keep the union.

revisionist history bullshit. the founders FEARED a standing army as they had just had experience with one trying to oppress them. the constitution was written to keep that new government small and restricted in its power. The 2nd Amendment was written as a soother for the anti federalists to ensure that their new government would NEVER have constitutional power to take their arms and to ALWAYS ensure that the people would be superior to any standing army.

 

[USFREEDOM911]

Such a cute graphic, too.....like its the original founding fathers document....I wonder what they meant by M3-13 gangs back then.....

and pinheads trying to tell us that we got it all wrong....for over 250 years we've been reading the 2nd Amendment wrong......

I at a loss for words....

GEE, I wonder if everyone's been interpreting the other Amendments wrong also.

Maybe the 1st meant that people should just shut the fuck up.
Maybe the 3rd was only about placing 1/4 of a soldier in a house
Maybe they had a different meaning for "unreasonable", in the 4th.
In the 5th they mention "double jeopardy" and they could have been referring to the game show.
Was the 6th about limiting how long a trial should be, like maybe in less then 1 hour
The 7th never really define what "common" meant.
The 8th refers to "cruel and unusual"; but isn't that subjective
Maybe "enumerated", in the 9th, is a "typo" and then really meant numbered
Does the 10th possibly refer to A PRINCIPAL, as in someone who's in charge of a school
The 11th could mean they need to be inoculated.
Could the 12th really mean that they should run a foot race
According to the 13th, criminals can be used as slaves
The 14th could be seen as meaning that only CITIZENS have privileges
According the 15th, discrimination can be based on a religious belief
Does the 16th mean that they were supposed to build a levy; but the levy was dry
If a Senator becomes "unpopular" does this mean he's no longer elected
The 18th really meant that alcohol could be bought elsewhere and brought to the US
Does the 19th mean that if someone doesn't know what sex they are, that they can't vote
Is the usage of the word "term", in the 20th, refer to a written contract
The 21st sounds like they were OK with alcohol being on a Indian reservation
Is the 22nd moot, if there are no elections
For the 23rd to be accurate, shouldn't they have a census prior to that years election
According to the 24ht, voting rights can be restricted as long as it has nothing to do with a tax
Does "responding to Presidential disabilities", in the 25th, mean they thought disabilities had the power of speech
The 26th leaves open the right to deny voting by 18 year olds, as long as the reason isn't age
The 27th doesn't really say now long "after"

 

[Nordberg]

revisionist history bullshit. the founders FEARED a standing army as they had just had experience with one trying to oppress them. the constitution was written to keep that new government small and restricted in its power. The 2nd Amendment was written as a soother for the anti federalists to ensure that their new government would NEVER have constitutional power to take their arms and to ALWAYS ensure that the people would be superior to any standing army.

Can you picture such a thing? The people being more powerful than the country;'s armed forces? What country is like that? Can you even picture such a thing? You are not thinking things out very well. Amazing the stupid shit you can convince yourself of to justify your little gunnies. Nobody is taking away your weapons of manhood.

 

[CFM]

Nobody is taking away your weapons.

That's quite evident since you, one of those that says people shouldn't own guns, isn't doing a damn thing about trying to take them.

 

[Rob Larrikin]

Let's try to keep away from fiction. You are entitled to your own opinions, but not to your own facts.

Everything I write, in all my posts, is my opinion. That's a fact.

 

[Rob Larrikin]

In your unsubstantiated opinion.

[Groucho voice] Whose opinion did you want me to give?

I don't recall Jefferson ever being credited as author of 2A.

He oversaw and authenticated it. If his moth-eaten old half blind scribe didn’t screw up the copying, then some other old curmudgeon’s scribe did.

 

[Rob Larrikin]

When he's talking about Jefferson using "scribes", he must think that Jefferson was so stupid that he never read what was written and that's why the "mistakes" were left in.

Not ‘stupid’, since typos and mistakes happen to the best of us. When geniuses like Einstein or Stephen Hawking write books the editors find mistakes, and all the world’s best authors do the same. People who judge great men by whether or not they make typos have no idea what they’re talking about. The greatest men always make them. In this case it wasn’t a matter of great consequence, since the 2[SUP]nd[/SUP] was not very controversial. It was a relatively boring issue, and in the candlelight, Jefferson going over the scribe’s work, could easily have missed the changed capitals and commas.

 

[Nordberg]

That's quite evident since you, one of those that says people shouldn't own guns, isn't doing a damn thing about trying to take them.

Yes. I say that we should not have guns. Does that mean you are not allowed guns? Or can you understand my opinion does not threaten your guns? Probably not. You can sleep well hugging your ARs. Nobody is taking them away.

You are such an aggressive child. A day without threatening people on line, is a day not worth living for you. Relax, we are all impressed by your tough guy posts.

 

[Rob Larrikin]

there were numerous commentaries throughout the colonies that CLEARLY stated that this new Constitution they were representing to we the people gave the new federal government ZERO power or authority over the arms of the people. NO POWER AT ALL!!!!!!

Arms (with a capital ‘A’) doesn’t mean one man’s musket, Sherlock. It means armaments - muskets and cannon, ships and oxen, and all the things an army of those days needed, in a MILITIA.

It is only through the apathy of a majority of our idiot population and the torturous reinterpretations of the constitution that lets the federal government get away with the total usurpation of power that they have taken from we the people, or the states respectively. trying to blame this on scribes rewriting crap is nothing more than muddying the issue

Typos happen. Deal with it.

 

[Rob Larrikin]

People like Rob use terms like "modern version" when they don't like what the founders wrote.

I love what the Founders wrote. I even use a capital ‘F’ when referring to them. Languages change over time, and some of the meaning is lost on new generations, who need a translation to explain the meaning. In this case, here is the original wording (which I love), and the modern translation:

A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.

Translation:
A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State (the right of the people to keep and bear Arms), shall not be infringed.
​

I’m not suggesting for a minute that the original be replaced. In fact, it should be reinstated, since its ratified version was an error filled copy. No, restore the original but always tell people what it means, using the translation.

However, The "Robs" of the forum constantly talk about what the founders meant when it is something they like. Contradictory?

What’s wrong with talking about what the Founders meant? Gun nuts hate it when people do that because they know the Founders would be against Homer Simpsons buying AR15s.

 

[Rob Larrikin]

GEE, I wonder if everyone's been interpreting the other Amendments wrong also.

Maybe the 1st meant that people should just shut the fuck up.
Maybe the 3rd was only about placing 1/4 of a soldier in a house
Maybe they had a different meaning for "unreasonable", in the 4th.
In the 5th they mention "double jeopardy" and they could have been referring to the game show.
Was the 6th about limiting how long a trial should be, like maybe in less then 1 hour
The 7th never really define what "common" meant.
The 8th refers to "cruel and unusual"; but isn't that subjective
Maybe "enumerated", in the 9th, is a "typo" and then really meant numbered
Does the 10th possibly refer to A PRINCIPAL, as in someone who's in charge of a school
The 11th could mean they need to be inoculated.
Could the 12th really mean that they should run a foot race
According to the 13th, criminals can be used as slaves
The 14th could be seen as meaning that only CITIZENS have privileges
According the 15th, discrimination can be based on a religious belief
Does the 16th mean that they were supposed to build a levy; but the levy was dry
If a Senator becomes "unpopular" does this mean he's no longer elected
The 18th really meant that alcohol could be bought elsewhere and brought to the US
Does the 19th mean that if someone doesn't know what sex they are, that they can't vote
Is the usage of the word "term", in the 20th, refer to a written contract
The 21st sounds like they were OK with alcohol being on a Indian reservation
Is the 22nd moot, if there are no elections
For the 23rd to be accurate, shouldn't they have a census prior to that years election
According to the 24ht, voting rights can be restricted as long as it has nothing to do with a tax
Does "responding to Presidential disabilities", in the 25th, mean they thought disabilities had the power of speech
The 26th leaves open the right to deny voting by 18 year olds, as long as the reason isn't age
The 27th doesn't really say now long "after"

One thing is for sure - nobody wanted to confiscate private muskets from anyone in those days, so the 2nd wasn't about that. It was about giving people the right to have their own Armed Militia (Arms meaning lots of muskets, cannon, oxen, carts, sleds, ships, etc).

 

[USFREEDOM911]

Not ‘stupid’, since typos and mistakes happen to the best of us. When geniuses like Einstein or Stephen Hawking write books the editors find mistakes, and all the world’s best authors do the same. People who judge great men by whether or not they make typos have no idea what they’re talking about. The greatest men always make them. In this case it wasn’t a matter of great consequence, since the 2[SUP]nd[/SUP] was not very controversial. It was a relatively boring issue, and in the candlelight, Jefferson going over the scribe’s work, could easily have missed the changed capitals and commas.

But it doesn't divert from the fact that you're an idiot.

 

[NOVA]

Yes. I say that we should not have guns. Does that mean you are not allowed guns? Or can you understand my opinion does not threaten your guns? Probably not. You can sleep well hugging your ARs. Nobody is taking them away.

You are such an aggressive child. A day without threatening people on line, is a day not worth living for you. Relax, we are all impressed by your tough guy posts.

You're certainly free to express your stupid un-American crap all you want....good and brave men ans women fought and died to defend your freedom to spout your ignorant
opinions.....so enjoy yourself....
You alone don't threaten us at all. The problem is your numbers are much larger than just you...and sadly you're all to stupid to see that you threaten the freedoms
of all of us.....you won't allow free speech if you it don't agree with you, you want to disarm the citizens, you insist on ignoring the federal laws in various ways and
you threaten our election system with your demands that illegals should have the right to vote.....and your comrades now threaten to overthrow the elected president
of the United States......so we see the danger as real.

 

[PraiseKek]

The sentence you just wrote is word salad. It should have been written thus:

That is just complete and utter, nonsensical word salad! The meaning is clear. The language is plain.”

Aside from the word salad, your statement is wrong. The original meaning is reasonably clear, but styles change over the centuries, and that makes it difficult for people to understand today. Add to that the fact that after the bad scribing (Jefferson had an injured right wrist) the meaning changed even further, making it easy for gun nuts to change the meaning altogether.

No, the meaning is crystal clear which is why you can't provide any other right "of the people," which is not an individual right.

Better still, show me any instance where individual ownership of muskets was an issue. Obviously there was no such instance, so why would Founders put such a “right” in the constitution. It would be like including the right to have a broom.

The Constitution was written in the context of preventing the government from becoming tyrannical just like the monarchy they had just gained their independence from.

No, it said:

A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.

Read the OP to see what this meant.

I read the OP, the first comma is irrelevant, because that is not what was ratified by the individual states. The 2nd comma is what was important:

"The Amendment's prefatory clause announced a purpose, but does not limit or expand the scope of the second part, the operative clause. The operative clause's text and history demonstrate that it connotes an individual right to keep and bear arms,"

http://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/07pdf/07-290.pdf

Furthermore; neither version says the "right of the militia to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed," in both versions that right is specifically reserved to "the people," as is the case of all of the inalienable rights found within the amendments, all of which are individual rights. Without an armed populace how is a militia made up of that populace supposed to form? It can't, which is why your argument is laughable.

Wrong. It was already understood that everyone had a musket – that was never in question. What was needed was a Militia, and that’s what the 2[SUP]nd[/SUP] was about. A Militia.

No, it was understood that centralized governments have a tendency to slip into despotism just as in England prior to the glorious revolution when the Catholic King James the 2nd attempted to disarm the Protestants:

Between the Restoration and the Glorious Revolution, the Stuart Kings Charles II and James II succeeded in using select militias loyal to them to suppress political dissidents, in part by disarming their opponents. See J. Malcolm, To Keep and Bear Arms 31–53 (1994) (hereinafter Malcolm); L. Schwoerer, The Declaration of Rights, 1689, p. 76 (1981). Under the auspices of the 1671 Game Act, for example, the Catholic James II had ordered general disarmaments of regions home to his Protestant enemies. See Malcolm 103–106. These experiences caused Englishmen to be extremely wary of concentrated military forces run by the state and to be jealous of their arms. They accordingly obtained an assurance from William and Mary, in the Declaration of Right (which was codified as the English Bill of Rights), that Protestants would never be disarmed: “That the subjects which are Protestants may have arms for their defense suitable to their conditions and as allowed by law.” 1 W. & M., c. 2, §7, in 3 Eng. Stat. at Large 441 (1689). This right has long been understood to be the predecessor to our Second Amendment . D.C. v Heller

https://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/07-290.ZO.html

Or just as how King George the 3rd began gun confiscations against the colonies between 1774 and 1775:

The American Revolution against British Gun Control
By David B. Kopel*

Administrative and Regulatory Law News (American Bar Association). Vol. 37, no. 4, Summer 2012. More by Kopel on the right to arms in the Founding Era.

This Article reviews the British gun control program that precipitated the American Revolution: the 1774 import ban on firearms and gunpowder; the 1774-75 confiscations of firearms and gunpowder; and the use of violence to effectuate the confiscations. It was these events that changed a situation of political tension into a shooting war. Each of these British abuses provides insights into the scope of the modern Second Amendment.

Furious at the December 1773 Boston Tea Party, Parliament in 1774 passed the Coercive Acts. The particular provisions of the Coercive Acts were offensive to Americans, but it was the possibility that the British might deploy the army to enforce them that primed many colonists for armed resistance. The Patriots of Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, resolved: "That in the event of Great Britain attempting to force unjust laws upon us by the strength of arms, our cause we leave to heaven and our rifles." A South Carolina newspaper essay, reprinted in Virginia, urged that any law that had to be enforced by the military was necessarily illegitimate.

http://www.davekopel.org/2A/LawRev/american-revolution-against-british-gun-control.html

The 2nd amendment didn't create a new right it was merely a restoration and guarantee of an ancient existing right.

Now, regarding all your quotes, most of them are either wrong, uncertain or mashups, and I’ve been this a hundred times. Gun nuts love their misquotes. I’m not going to go through them all again for you. Go do your research and find out what is correct, before putting up quotes about guns or the tooshun.

No they're not you're a liar who has no idea what they're talking about, those are not unattributed quotes the primary sources for those quotes are listed and readily available:

Thomas Jefferson, Virginia Constitution, Draft 1, 1776

http://avalon.law.yale.edu/18th_century/jeffcons.asp


George Mason, Address to the Virginia Ratifying Convention, June 4, 1788

http://teachingamericanhistory.org/library/document/george-mason-speech/


Richard Henry Lee, Federal Farmer No. 18, January 25, 1788

https://thefederalistpapers.org/fou...om-a-federal-farmer-number-18-january-25-1788

Patrick Henry, Speech to the Virginia Ratifying Convention, June 5, 1778

http://www.let.rug.nl/usa/documents...ers/speech-of-patrick-henry-(june-5-1788).php

http://press-pubs.uchicago.edu/founders/documents/a1_8_12s27.html

Samuel Adams, Massachusetts Ratifying Convention, 1788

http://www.law.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/conlaw/emerson.html

 

[PraiseKek]

One thing is for sure - nobody wanted to confiscate private muskets from anyone in those days, so the 2nd wasn't about that. It was about giving people the right to have their own Armed Militia (Arms meaning lots of muskets, cannon, oxen, carts, sleds, ships, etc).

Lol the Monarchy that they had just gained independence from attempted to confiscate arms and the founders feared the same would happen with a centralized federal government with a standing army.

 

[PraiseKek]

The British were attacking the new US country regularly. They came back in the war of 1812 and burned down Washington DC. That is why we needed a well regulated militia. It absolutely was not about fighting our brand new government. It was about preserving the US from outside countries. we were weak and badly organized in the beginning. We were heavily in debt. We required a well armed population to keep the union.

It was absolutely about preventing the centralized federal government from slipping into despotism which is why the anti-federalists insisted on the inclusion of the Bill of Rights in the first place. This is what happens when they stop teaching civics.

 

[Timshel]

As you can see from the graphic, the original 2nd amendment was quite different from the copied version, which would give rise to men centuries later campaigning to have enemies of the state legally armed. When the amendment was ratified by the States, Jefferson had it copied by some scribe, working by candlelight, with poor glasses and failing eyesight, no doubt exhausted from hours of scribbling, using a quill. Whoever the poor chump was he copied the text incorrectly by removing commas and changing capital letters. That changed the whole meaning of the 2nd amendment.

Jefferson was not involved.