Commentary
A 'well regulated militia' has little in common with the arsenals of today
by Gordon C. StewartThe Rev. Gordon Stewart is pastor of Shepherd of the Hill Presbyterian Church in Chaska and a source in the Public Insight Network for MPR News.
Had I grown up on a farm or a ranch, I might see things differently. Had I had a good use for a gun — to protect the sheep from the coyotes, or to put down an injured horse — I would likely feel differently.
We all see things through our own eyes. It's difficult to see through someone else's eyes when talking about the Second Amendment: "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."
Walk into a gun show or a gun shop. What do you see? Do you see the arms of a well-regulated militia necessary to the security of a free state?
The photos of gun shows send chills up my spine. What I see is a drug store for addicts — precision, man-made machinery. To a gun aficionado, do the wares for sale compare with methamphetamine or crack cocaine? Do they offer the means to reach an illusory high of power and invulnerability, a cocoon of godlike power over life and death?
A bow and arrow is a hunting instrument. One shot at a time is all you get or need. The "well-regulated militia" deemed "necessary to the security of a free state" assumed arms like that: Load, shoot, reload. Equally important, the well-regulated militia of the Second Amendment was a concession to the demands of the slave-holding states whose plantation economies were threatened by slave revolts. Those states insisted on the right to state-regulated militias. Once the slaves were freed, the militias took another form: They moved under the white sheets and hoods of the not-so-well-regulated militias of the Ku Klux Klan, burning crosses on the lawns of blacks and of whites who had forgotten who they were: members of a supposedly superior race. "The people" were male white supremacists then. Their weapons were midnight torch parades, burning crosses, rifles and nooses.
My experience with guns is shaped in no small part by playing cops and robbers or cowboys and Indians with neighbors in the back yards of the small town where I grew up. The closest we came to a gun was a water pistol or a cap gun. We'd yell, "Bang, bang! You're dead!" and the victim would fall down, playing dead ... and then we'd get back up to play again. We were also trying to make sense out the world of cowboys and Indians, cops and robbers — shorthand for "good guys" and "bad guys." But even then, we sometimes wondered whether maybe the Indians with their bows and arrows were better than the better-armed "good guys" who had conquered them and their land.
When I see a convention center filled with tables displaying every imaginable pistol and rifle, I see an unregulated store filled with shoppers sorting through different brands of methamphetamines. I see a form of legal insanity: the fascination with power and the worship of power over the lives of others.
Comments (38)
Respectively, a well armed militia has the purpose of defending the republic against a tyrannical government. It is responsibility of every citizen of the United States of America to defend the Constitution from usurpation. If you were to compare the arms used in the revolutionary war with the arms available to the British soldiers of the that available to the average citizen, the gap was FAR closer to the gap that exist today. The right to bare arms is not meant to hunt for food or shoot for pleasure, it is meant to uphold our patriotic duty to protect the Constitution of the United States.
Responding to Daniel's comment, thank you for the respectful tone of your disagreement. This is the kind of conversation we need across America. For that purpose, I would ask for your additional thoughts about the opening phrase of the Second Amendment, which is its premise: that a "well-regulated militia" is necessary to the security of a free state." The key words are "militia" and well-regulated" (presumably by "the state" whose security it defends). There is a huge difference between the 2A militia and un-regulated vigilantes like the KKK that take matters into their own hands as the protectors of what they perceive to be their "God-given rights." They declared themselves to be "the people." They read only the second half of the Second Amendment.
That being said, the U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that the Second Amendment does guarantee the right of individuals to keep and bear arms. The question under debate today is whether, and to what extent, laws that limit the kinds of "arms" that can be purchased "infringe" on the right to bear arms. Arms today are not only guns. Shouldn't the law, then, permit me to buy a tank, a bazooka, a drone, a nuclear device? We would all agree, I think, that there are limits to what kinds of arms belong in the hands of an individual's or group's hands. The question at hand is what those limits should be under the Constitution. Thank you, Daniel, for commenting. I look forward to more discussion.
"I see a form of legal insanity: the fascination with power and the worship of power over the lives of others." The last sentence is the painful truth as I see it. I think that the intensity of the fear of government and of president comes from intentional deceptive hate propaganda that ...happens to be illegal in other countries. Fear and hate make for a miserable life.
Yes, it is true.
Those who fear and hate firearms are living lives of noisy desperation.
They are miserable beyond all understanding, but determined to force the normal people of our fine country into bondage, and make everyone as miserable as they themselves are.
We must not let the disturbed set the parameters of our lives. If they want to fear every tool that they do not like, fine. But we must never allow them to force their ignorance on the rest of us.
Thank you, Robert, for placing the discussion in the wider context of "intentional deceptive hate propaganda" that characterizes too much of talk radio and television. The fear that "the government" is coming to confiscate guns from our homes has no basis in reality. It is propaganda. And, when someone says that "the second best thing that could happen to Obama is impeachment...," the logical fill-in-the-blank is a line from the KKK playbook. It's ugly. It's irrational. It's fearful. It's hateful. It's hard to measure the corrosive effect of hateful, deceptive, misinformation delivered passionately as indisputable Truth by those who claim to be defending the U.S. Constitution. This is another matter for discussion. What are the appropriate legal constitutional limits of free speech that uses the people's airwaves and cyberspace? You can't yell "Fire" in a theater when there is no fire. I have no answers. Only questions. Have other nations placed legal limits on "intentional, deceptive hate propaganda" that would pass the test of the First Amendment right to free speech in the U.S. Constitution?
I enjoyed your opinion presented with such skill. I grew up in Oklahoma in a family that frequented gun shows. I think you're fairly accurate. Your blog at www.gordoncstewart.com is a wonderful source of thoughtful commentary.
So, people who stand up for our Second Amendment rights are KKK members...or drug addicts...or both?
You just gravely insulted many millions of good and law-abiding people.
The fact that you did it in such a pious, patronizing and passive aggressive way just makes it more pathetic.
Glad you got it off your chest and I hope you feel better now.
The level of discourse will just deteriorate if people like you keep trashing the other side.
Ponder that.
Pastor Stewart admits that his view is irrational and clouded by his ignorance based in his city upbringing.
The isolation from real life of city folks is a big part of the problem, and no one should be influenced by the biased views of feelings-driven city dwellers.
Pastor Stewart says, "I see a form of legal insanity: the fascination with power and the worship of power over the lives of others."
Is Pastor Stewart unaware that such a notion is just how most thinkers see religion, particularly HIS religion?
He dispenses "methamphetamines" every day, in his business, and gets well paid for it. Then he has the audacity to attack gun owners, who never hurt anyone or extort money from anyone, and call THEM drug dealers. He should look inward....and find the problem there.
Attempting to tie the 2nd amendment to slavery is pure fiction.
And, the KKK was a RELIGIOUS organization, not a gun club.
Pastor Stewart could really use an education. No one should give credence to ideas born from ignorance.
The hatred displayed by the Anti-Constitution crowd for their fellow Americans is ugly at best and will destroy the Country at worst.
Dennis, I'm aware that sharing my own perception easily leads to quick reactions - "gravely insulting many millions of good and law-abiding people." I wrote at the very beginning - please note this - that had I grown up differently, on a farm or on a ranch where the gun was used to protect the sheep or to put down an injured horse, I would likely see things differently. But I didn't. What I shared is what I see. As for "pious, patronizing and passive-aggressive," those descriptions may or may not be applicable. If I was 'pious' I repent. But there not one ounce of passive in this piece - it is completely forthright, expressing honestly what I see and feel. The problem with so much of the current "debate" is that the visceral feelings and perceptions stay underground. So long as they remain unuttered, we will get nowhere. This has been weighing on my chest for many years. I assume that you care equally about the violence that is sweeping across America and also are searching for the causes and the remedies. We will never get there without looking at the history and the historical context out of which the Second Amendment's "well-regulated militia" came to be. As for "So, people who stand up for our Second Amendment rights are KKK members...or drug addicts...or both" - the commentary does not claim that any one individual is either. I have too many good friends who differ with me to ever make that accusation. But when the reaction is swift to take offense, I wonder why.
A religious person basing outlook on fear and ignorance?
Color me surprised.
Mr. Stewart, "when the reaction is swift to take offense..." it simply means what you have said is offensive. Don't try to read more into it or pretend it didn't happen. That's what abusers do.
You lumped gun owners in with the KKK, drug addicts, and finally, the mentally ill.
And now, like a typical abuser, you slyly deny it with, "Oh, I didn't really mean that."
As to history--you simply don't know it.
The Second Amendment has its roots in the traditions of very early England, where men were REQUIRED BY LAW to practice with the longbow once a week to maintain English weapons superiority.
The Founding Fathers, in keeping with the wisdom of that history, simply wanted to encourage Americans to practice to maintain the superior shooting skills that had defeated the English in the Revolution.
The rifleman, with his boots on the ground, is the foundation of the military....and the Founding Fathers knew it well.
Such practice, obviously, must be done with contemporary weaponry--meaning weapons that are similar to those currently used in warfare.
So, the meaning of the Second Amendment is plain and clear when one actually judges by the correct history.
Steve, a word of clarification. I am not a city boy. I grew up in a town of less than 1,000 population. Our fathers had come home from WWII. They were patriots, Veterans. Military heroes. They were upset when we played war w/ the water-pistols, the cap-guns, and cringed at our fascination with the real thing. They were patriots. I consider myself a patriot. My father, a former Army Air Force Chaplain, stood between an angry mob and the home of the first African-American family to buy a house in our town. The mob had come with bricks and rocks shouting words I can't repeat here. My father and other Pastors stood with the family and addressed the crowd. BTW, this was not the South. This was the North. "If you're going to throw your rocks, you'll have to thrown through our heads!" That was courage. That was the Christianity in which I was raised. The KKK paraded behind a different cross - the killing cross, not the cross on which Jesus of Nazareth was executed. The "crowd" in the Gospels of the New Testament shouted for the release of Barabbas, he armed insurrectionist, instead of the man of peace.
The KKK deserves your criticism, as does every form of religion or secularity that assaults the dignity of human life or that dishes out methamphetamines to keeps people's eyes closed to reality. I hope you will engage the substance of the article re: the well-regulated militia. I look forward to hearing your argument against universal registration.
Hi again, Dennis, Thanks for your response and the contribution to the English history behind the Second Amendment. In addition, I invite you read http://truth-out.org/news/item/13890-the-second-amendment-was-ratified-to-preserve-slavery#.URAMoB5aVwo.wordpress on the history to which I referred, also part of the story behind 2A.
Two stories from my own experience as a pastor. 1) A wife calls to report that her husband is suicidal. He has a gun. Would I go to the house? I go. He is waving a pistol back and forth at his own head and at me. I talk him down. We sit. He hands me the gun. I take it away. 2) A 45 year-old husband and father goes into his home's basement. He calls upstairs for his 13 year-old son. His son comes down the stairs. The father puts the gun to his mouth and pulls the trigger. I was the pastor to that horrified family. I was the first one there. Those memories are still raw. The horror was real. 3) a retired Marine calls me over for a drink one night when his wife is out of town. He opens the box that has been on his mantle since WWII. His wife has no knowledge of its contents. "I can't hold on to this anymore." He unlocks the box and takes out a Japanese soldier's helmet, two eye teeth and a lock of hair he had pulled from the soldier he had killed in hand-to-hand combat, and a pistol. A 75 yr. old 250 lb. Marine like a baby. "I've hated the Japs ever since. I sit in the pew every Sunday. I can't do hate that poor bastard any more! God help me!"
Gordon...I am sure your father was a good and decent fellow, and not a KKK member, and that you are a decent sort yourself.
But, we are talking in general, about a general problem, not a specific problem of yours or your family. Therefore, your personal anecdotes are of no use whatsoever.
Fact is, people, using religion, have killed more innocent people than people using firearms. It isn't even close. The crack cocaine of religion is the biggest killer of folks, bar none.
But you want to degrade honest decent people who just happen to enjoy a sport you are not familliar with or care about. And, most of them are also Constitutional Patriots, willing to defend the citizens of this country, including you. As I have said, you need an education. And some Christian love of your neighbors.
Now, you keep bringing up "a well-regulated militia", as if that somehow proves your anti-gun position.
It does not. In fact, it proves you wrong. I don't think you have any idea what it means.
"A well-regulated militia" means a group of Patriots that frequently practice with their weapons & become proficient in the use of them, can take them apart, clean & reassemble them, can march as a drilled unit, rise early and fall into line, and are competent in all things military.
It has nothing at all to do with being "regulated" by the Government.
Any more than a "Regulator" clock needs govt rules, instead of being called that because it is a precision instrument.
See?
In reply to B. Blevins: Greetings. Fear and ignorance are real issues. One of the fears and conclusions of ignorance is that people such as I are out to take the guns away or that we are "Anti-Constitutional." Neither is true, at least in my case. I argue for universal registration for the same reason anyone who wants to drive a car has to be licensed and pass a driver's test. That's a far cry from disarming the American population.
Re: "Those who fear and hate firearms are living lives of noisy desperation," please read my latest response to Dennis.
" They are miserable beyond all understanding, but determined to force the normal people of our fine country into bondage, and make everyone as miserable as they themselves are."
Is it miserable to search for solutions to the likes of Newtown, and the random killing of a 9-year-old boy in Oakdale? Is it misery, or is compassion? Is it unreasonable misery that leads former silent victims to break their silence to call for a halt to the madness? There is no argument that these deaths did not happen at the end of a gun. They did. Many of the shooters were young men who seem to have suddenly snapped, likely the sudden onset of paranoid-schizophrenia that usually appears out of the blue in the late teens or early 20s. It's fact.
We must not let the disturbed set the parameters of our lives. If they want to fear every tool that they do not like, fine. But we must never allow them to force their ignorance on the rest of us.
Mr Stewart,
Comments on various notions you mention in the article & comments. Its true the arms seen at typical gun shows are NOT those connected with a well-regulated milita, as assault rifles & select-fire weapons are tightly controlled. When we start to see M4s, M14s, SCARs, MP5s, etc,, then they will be. Pistols, some tactical shotguns, hi-cap mags etc. are, but most long-guns & carbines are a step down from militia-grade arms.
The Militias are charged when needed with enforcing federal laws, supressing insurrections, repeling invasions, and now for defense against rebellion & terrorism, and to serve as federal reserves for the standing armies & in wars overseas. What type of arms do you think they should be armed with? Most effective ones I would think.
But let's be clear; just because a group calls itself a militia, does not mean it is one-not the ones referred to in the Constitution. Bubba & his KKK pals armed with ARs are NOT the well regulated Militias.
Then there is the SCOTUS. When referring to their decision, it would also be good to note Scalia's definition of 'bear arms' - 'arms that could be hand-carried'. Tanks, nukes and cannon are not included in those arms secured by the 2nd. 'Hand RPGs may be decided on "very carefully in the future"'.
Our reduced milita roles allow limits on arms; but only those that strict scrutiny shows the Congress has an interest in enacting. And not whole classes of guns the people choose for self-defense puposes.
Mr. Stewart, your anecdotes are sad--and relevant only as evidence that there are a lot of troubled people in this world.
I understand that you, as a pastor, naturally see more than your fair share of these troubled and tragic people.
That fact, no doubt, plays into your opposition to guns and your strong feelings against gun owners.
That makes it easier to forgive your earlier insulting remarks against gun owners.
My anecdote is this: I have used guns of all kinds for over 60 years. I have shot no children or human beings of any kind in that time (intentionally or accidentally) and have not seen a human being shot nor have I seen a gun drawn in anger.
I'm retired with 35 years of public service and 22 years in the military. I'm quite happily sane, never charged with a crime--and I shoot guns often at the range for recreation--ALL kinds of guns--and, I keep and carry guns for the purpose of self-defense as is my right according to the Second Amendment.
I am not a member of the KKK, or a drug addict or insane.....I'm just a regular guy.
There are about 80 million more like me in America......and the number increases every day as police budgets are cut and people realize that they are their own first responders.
I recognize your right to choose not to keep a gun for self defense. Please recognize my right and the rights of the 80 million to choose otherwise.
I grew up in gun culture and have a very different personal experience from Rev. Stewart. His descriptions in the comments of domestic scenes with guns are chilling.
I will say that the comments here calling him an 'abuser' and ranting about how people who fear guns are 'living lives of noisy desperation' are depressingly unsurprising, given the nature of this culture. I find so many of these comments ridiculously paranoid and acutely embarrassing.
I wish that people could discuss this more calmly, but I suppose the violence inherent in this topic lends an urgency to the debate which is impossible to ignore.
It does seem that refraining from personal insults shouldn't be so hard, however.
Steve, I see. You see. We "see" differently things differently. And that's the way life is. They say that perception is nine-tenths of reality. Whether that's a good thing or something to lament is arguable, I suppose. But, to the extent to which it is true, your personal experiences and my experiences shape the way we see the world and our place in it. These experiences (anecdotes) are hardly beside the point. They have taught us and shaped us. The determine, in fact, how we see and what we see. It may surprise you that I, too, see "Crack cocaine" religion as a curse, a deadly thing. Always has been. Always will be. As someone said, "The correctness of one's opinion is not guaranteed by the strength of your conviction." :-) I like that! Toxic religion has been a horrible curse to humankind. But there is more to it than that. The love ethic at the heart of most religious traditions - "You shall love your neighbor as yourself" and its more radical correlaries "You have heard it said you shall love your neighbor and hate your enemies, but I say to you, 'Love your enemies and do good to those who persecute you, for [God] makes the sun to rise on the just and the unjust...." rebukes every "crack cocaine" killing of whatever sort. There are many forms of ideology (blinders) that blind our eyes - the taken-for-granted, largely unexamined and unarticulated convictions that shape our lives and what we see both within and without. I appeal to you to look beyond to this core.
Joe from CA - Thank you for taking the time to read the piece and respond so thoughtfully. It was a pleasure to read.
Gordon......we don't see things differently.
Indeed, we see things exactly the same.
We agree that the monumental h0rrors done in the name of religion are not religion's fault, but the fault of the people who were mis-using religion for their own purposes.
Likewise, we agree that the monumental horrors done with the tool of firearms, instead of the tool being religion, is also the fault of the person mis-using the gun, not the tool itself (knife, gun, religion, etc....the tool).
We also agree that taking religion away from those who do NOT mis-use it, such as yourself, is a silly and ridiculous reaction that will do nothing to stop those who do choose to mis-use religion.
And, of course, we must therefore agree that to take guns away from those who do NOT mis-use them is a silly and ridiculous reaction that will do nothing to stop those who do choose to mis-use firearms.
You see, now, that reasonable people CAN agree on general principles.
Welcome aboard the Rational Being Train.
Haddayr, Thank you for sharing your different experience. As I said in the opening sentences, had my experience been different, I would likely see thing differently. We all see through the eyes of our experience and it's important to know what those formative experiences are that shape us.
And thank you for your reply to the "abuser" comment. That's a first in my 70 years. Every day is a new experience.
"Love your enemies and do good to those who persecute you...."
Ah, if only......
I was in the street protesting the Iraq War for weeks before Bush actually attacked Iraq (a brutal attack that resulted in hundreds of thousands of casualties and made refugees of many thousands more).
In all that time I did not see a SINGLE Christian church joining the protest--not one.
When I asked our pastor why our church was not in the street protesting he looked at me in horror and disbelief. I had to laugh.
I could see the fear in his eyes. Of course, as a pastor, one cannot lead his church in protest against an illegal war of aggression.
It would be controversial. It would rock the boat.
It could cost him his job and his comfortable and considerable income.
So, does it not seem odd to use the above words from the Bible? Words that are clearly and consistently ignored by Christians?
Worse, to somehow fit these words into a debate about taking away human rights of gun owners?
Spare us the religiosity, please. If you actually have a good argument for taking away Constitutional Rights--just go ahead and spit it out.
You say that "the fear that 'the government' is coming to confiscate guns from our homes has no basis in reality. It is propaganda." This might be true, for now, at the federal level. However several states, including Minnesota, have recently introduced legislation that would confiscate "assault weapons".
What is an assault weapon? It's just a semi-automatic (not fully automatic) rifle with a detachable magazine that happens to include some cosmetic features such as collapsible stocks, pistol grips, and bayonet lugs. Nothing that has anything to do with the functionality of the weapon itself.
What would be the goal in banning rifles with certain cosmetic features? Is it to significantly reduce gun violence? If that were the case, it is interesting that the conversation is focused on regulating "assault weapons". FBI statistics show that only 4% of shootings involve any kind of rifle.
Moreover, the previous 1994 AWB, according to the Department of Justice, had no significant impact on gun violence! Yet some people are wont to disregard data and statistics in favor of emotion. If we were serious about reducing gun violence, it would make more sense to focus on handguns, which account for the vast majority of shootings.
On the topic of universal registration, it was tried in Canada and failed miserably. Just last year they repealed the program due to cost overruns and privacy/security issues. We don't need another program to spend money we don't have for no gain.
I have to agree with Reverend Stewart's view, and I particularly applaud his willingness to engage in calm and reasoned debate in the face of such scorn and hostility. There's actually a pretty simple dynamic at work here -- nobody wants to take away guns from law-abiding people, unless those law-abiding people start sounding so paranoid and irrational that they begin to seem dangerous. Rather than trying to intimidate the Reverend, perhaps those who disagree could explain why assault weapons or even handguns shouldn't be a little more regulated?
Mr. Schwartz, you say, "nobody wants to take away guns from law-abiding people, unless those law-abiding people start sounding so paranoid and irrational that they begin to seem dangerous."
So......we're back to linking gun ownership with mental illness? That's how Mr. Stewart started all this.
I don't think the Reverend Mr. Stewart has even apologized for lumping gun owners together with the KKK, drug addicts and the mentally ill.
How can you have a rational discussion about irrational accusations?
Dennis, I'm sorry. I'm not your pastor. I have stood OUT FRONT and with the full knowledge of the churches I've served against the Vietnam War, the first Iraq War, and "Desert Storm" that blew fire and sand back into our faces. You're talking to the wrong person here. That the core teaching of your tradition and mine are so often ignored or contradicted in now way nullifies the teachings. It strikes me that you have good reason to be disappointed and angry with your church and your pastor because YOU were trying to follow what you'd been taught while they were horrified by the very thought of standing up to join you. As for making a lot of money, how does $24k sound? Living high on the hog? In it for the money? I'm sorry, but I decided when MPR agreed to post this piece that I would respond to most every comment that was made. The danger in that decision was and is that my choice of replying to comments would be interpreted as acting defensively. That is not my purpose. When allegations that this pastor is a money-grubbing coward who refused to take the heat from his/her congregation or the general public is below the belt.
Furthermore, your comments completely disregard the argument about the meaning of a "well-regulated militia." The argument was made in this piece. If you care to engage the argument by offering reasonable counter arguments, as some others have here, I'm more than glad to hear them. Otherwise...I wish you well.
After seven hours of sitting here responding to readers' comments, I've reached the point of physical endurance and need to sign off. I would offer one last thought on addiction. Addiction is an illness; addicts don't get addicted because they want become addicts. It usually happens bit by bit. We live in a militarized society that has shaped not only foreign policy but domestic life - the likes of video games that apparently obsessed the alleged shooter in Oakdale. Our culture is saturated with violence. Weapons are part of that violence, and the god of personal and national security sits enthroned in power. We are addicted to Mars. It's time to stop smoking crack, sniffing powered cocaine - the addictive habits that come out of fear. Thank you to all of you who have engaged civilly.
Mr. Stewart, in your rush to defend yourself, you miss the point--which was that Christian CHURCHES were not in the street protesting the aggression against Iraq......while their doctrine says "love your enemies."
See? It had nothing to do with any one person......but the fact that the Christian Churches proved by their absence and apathy that their faith is a sham and rather than "love their enemies," they ignore their nation's war of aggression upon innocents.
For you to throw "love your enemies" into THIS debate about Constitutional rights was a bit misleading as well as being self-serving and irrelevant religiosity--unless you can somehow connect and twist it into a justification for taking away Constitutional rights.
As I said before, IF you actually have a good argument for taking away Constitutional Rights--just go ahead and spit it out.
Well, we're all against addiction, so I guess we end on a note of agreement as long as you're not trying to equate gun owners with addicts.
Addiction bad.
Not being addicted good.
I'm with you.
It was a long way to go, but we got there.
Pastor Stewart's comments about the connection between slave owners needs to defend themselves against slave uprisings is historical fact. What ever additional connection American gun rights have to English history is not as relevant here as the fact that when you examine the proceedings of the US Constitutional Convention you see the real motivations at work here. The Northern states and Federalists were afraid the slave holding states would not agree to Constitutional ratification without a right to bear arms. Looking at the meeting notes makes it clear the slave holders interest was in preserving their ability to make the rounds of slave quaters to check for insurrection. This is historical fact and therefore the 2nd amendment's validity is challenged by this fact. It is true that the KKK was a continuation of the slave holders interests. As a hunter I value the tradition that hunting represents. I use a semi automatic shotgun but I am limited to 3 shells in the chamber to make it a more fair chase for the birds and deer. I don't need a magazine that holds more than that to defend myself at home and wouldn't keep a loaded gun at home anyway. Yes our military does engage in illegal entry of private homes in foreign wars which I abhor and hopefully we are vigilant at home to not let our own military operate that way here unless of course slavery is once again a domestic reality. In which case i would support the confiscation of the weapons of slave owners.
The Second Amendment is not about hunting, or target shooting, or personal protection. To have defended such obvious "rights" would have been laughable to the Founders. As Daniel Skrove correctly said in the first comment, "a well armed militia has the purpose of defending the republic against a tyrannical government."
I will not dispute Pastor Stewart's experiences, or his compassion, or his convictions, or his courage. But consider history. Would Hitler and his henchmen have so easily committed the Holocaust if more of their would-be victims had been better armed. Throughout history, mass murder has only succeeded when the victims have been unarmed, disarmed, or inadequately armed (compared to the killers).
The fact: bullies will often back down in the face of opposition.
And what about guns and mental illness? In the Soviet Bloc, dissidents--political and religious--were imprisoned and dosed with powerful psychotropic drugs, to "cure" them of such anti-revolutionary ideas as the belief that The State was not God and ought not be blindly obeyed.
In the USA, which bureaucrats will decide who is mentally ill, and abrogate their constitutional rights? And who will have the power to stand up to those bureaucrats, when their decrees are backed by government agents in body armor carrying high-capacity fully-automatic assault weapons; and We the People have non-assault semi-automatic weapons with 10-shot clips, or one-shot muzzle loaders, or bows and arrows?
Steve M writes:
""A well-regulated militia" means a group of Patriots that frequently practice with their weapons & become proficient in the use of them, can take them apart, clean & reassemble them, can march as a drilled unit, rise early and fall into line, and are competent in all things military"
If he is seriously trying to convince us that the yahoos buying up assault rifles and "cop-killer" ammo intend doing this I have a bridge in Brooklyn to sell him.
Why is any attempt to rein in the senseless gun killings seen as "confiscation"?
Want a rifle and shotgun for hunting? Fine? Live in the boondocks and have a pistol in the house? No problem.
Obsessively collect an arsenal of weapons and hoard ammo?
You need an intervention.
The whole point is that the Federal Government does NOT have the authority to regulate the weapons that the private citizens own.
A well regulated militia Does not mean a group of patriots. It means any citizen. The citizens should be armed and practice with them. The supreme court ruled that the citizens should be equally armed as the Federal army. They should have as many weapons as they want and can afford. It is all about the balance of power. The Federal government should NEVER have more power than it's citizens.
I just stumbled upon this discussion, and I have to say, at the risk of sounding uncivil, that the last remarks by Mark Swenson strike me as absolute lunacy. How is it remotely possible, or desirable, for the citizens of this country to possess, independent of their government-run and -funded military, an arsenal of weaponry capable of "balancing the power" of said military? Can you imagine our Founding Fathers, handed twenty-first-century weapons of war capable of planetary destruction, recommending that we have stockpiles of them in every backyard and that we all "practice with them"? What Supreme Court would assert such nonsense to be a Constitutional mandate?
This strikes me as precisely the kind of thinking (if I may use the word loosely) that the Reverend Stewart sees as proceeding from, and stoking, "an illusory high of power and invulnerability." Certainly, Mr. Swenson is not speaking for the average gun owner, who does not view the world as a great battlefield poised and eager for Armageddon, and himself as a member of a cosmic militia prepared to obliterate the Great Satan in Washington. But I fear that in our culture of aggression, competitiveness, and love of violence in play, in work, and in warfare, there may be enough who view the world as he does to prevent us from ever attaining the kind of rational, civilized culture - a culture which will include the reasonable use of firearms - which our supremely civilized founders hoped for and tried to create.
The issue over what the second amendment meant in its time seems irrelevant now. Didn't the supreme court already go over that and say that it meant individual citizens had the right to keep and bear arms? One of the comments earlier brought up a point that I always try to bring up in gun debates and is always mercilessly overlooked. Rifles, all rifles in 2011 accounted for 356 of total homicides of that year. Want to know what the number was for handguns? Over 6,200 homicides. And yet many gun control activists cry out for a ban against assault weapons. When I continually see this degree of ignorance amidst the gun control debate it makes me wonder which side of the debate is being rational. I have no problem with the idea of background checks but an assault weapons ban is moronic. Also as evidenced by the assault weapons ban in california from 94-04 there was no positive outcome. I appreciate your view but I did feel slandered. I do not own a gun but would like to when I feel financially set to do so. Thank you for your time.
Actually; "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." is not referring to citizen militias. The state runs the militias and the people bear the arms. The framers were in the grips of a tyrannical government whose commands were enforced by a "well regulated militia. So, they wanted to make sure that the "People" (that's us) always had the right to bear arms. In case we needed to over throw the government once again.
The militia is the representative of the government's authority in the street, we, the people, are the ones with the rights to bear arms.
Not sure why people feel that statement is so far fetched. Didn't we just witness the fall of multiple governments in the Arab Spring. Wouldn't it of happened faster if the people of Libia, Egypt and Tunisia had the RIGHT to bear arms?
The framers new that when governments become tyrannical they should be removed. They were hard men, the framers, brave hard men and smart too.
Not the soft, doughy, politicians of today.
Ever Hear of the National Defense author.Act of 2012?
The Congress of the Us gave the Government the "right" to kidnap any American, hold him /her forever without charges, never even tell your next of kin they disappeared you. Obama not only signed this abomination, he added a statement claiming the "right" to murder any American he feels like murdering. The British monarchs have not claimed this "right" for 800 years!
If that's the way the rulers think, it is no wonder they want to eliminate our ability to defend our Republic. They don't *want* a republic; they want an oligarchy, where they can exactly as they please, with no fear that the sheeple might someday get tired of being fleeced and do something about them. No American Revolutions.
during his second term, Bush's spokesmen casually admitted "yeah, we lied about Iraq being behind Sept 11 and having mass destruction weapons. whatcha gonna do about it?" The big banks got caught laundering trillions in drug money, paid a small fine, and went right back to it. Meanwhile a Somali guy got 30 years for allegedly helping other Somalis go back there to play Hatfeild and McCoy.
Any wonder these people want us disarmed? Look up what Hitler and Lenin said about gun control. (Hint: they were all for it.) Lenin also had a term for people like the pastor:"useful idiots."
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