The Second Amendment references a militia, “the security of a free State,” and two specific rights–the right to possess arms and the right to carry them–and all of this is bound together by a general, overarching right to self-defense. To put it simply, the Second Amendment is multi-faceted. [More]
True enough.
And ignoring core purpose, which so many do, is a grave mistake.
[Via bondmen]
It references a “militia” but doesn’t define or create one. Partly that’s because the folks who lived in the 1780s knew exactly what a militia is/was. Many of the colonial and later state codes REQUIRED military aged men to participate, the exception being Pennsylvania, which finessed the objections of large numbers of its citizens to bearing arms by making the Pennsylvania militia a “voluntary association.” Another of Benjamin Franklin’s inventions.
Kinda hard to fall in on the green ready for periodic training with your required equipment ready for inspection, and be subject to stiff fines if you didn’t measure up, and not know exactly what a militia was.
Did anyone get around to telling Bill Maher that he’s a member of a militia? Does he even own a militia grade weapon? You know, one of those “weapons of war?”