In having a BETTER pro-WE THE PEOPLE and pro-Second Amendment
argument, I would recommend some essential reads.
The first is something cited in Justice Scalia's D.C. v.
Heller argument.
-- Cramer, Clayton E. and Olson, Joseph Edward,
What Did "Bear Arms" Mean in the Second Amendment?. Georgetown
Journal of Law & Public Policy, Vol. 6, No. 2, 2008.
Available at SSRN:
https://ssrn.com/abstract=1086176
The second essential read is
Elliot's Debates, Volume 3 pp.
410-426, which is effectually
The Debates in the Several State Conventions on
the Adoption of the Federal Constitution
Saturday, June 14, 1788
and
Monday, June 16, 1788.
On page 425 it contains the must quote of
Mr. GEORGE MASON. “Mr. Chairman, a worthy member has asked who
are the militia, if they be not the people of this country, and if we are not
to be protected from the fate of the Germans, Prussians, &c., by our
representation? I ask, Who are the militia? They consist now of the whole
people, except a few public officers.”
The third and fourth essential reads are both U.S. Supreme
Court cases:
United States v. Miller, 307 U.S. 174 (1939)
and
District of Columbia v. Heller, 554 U.S. 570 (2008)
It should also be noted that, on its presentation for Convention, “The right of the people
to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed” was presented first, foremost and
almost separately from the Militia clause, which followed it.
See Gale’s & Seaton’s History Of Debates in Congress p.
451
http://memory.loc.gov/cgi-bin/ampage?collId=llac&fileName=001/llac001.db&recNum=227
Because of the intensity and length of discussion in the
Convention’s debates on the Militia with regard to the Constitution (go to
debates following the reading of Article 1 Section 8), and that the right of
the people being armed as a check to abuse of power using a standing army, and
that firstly a well regulated (we must not disinclude anti-Indian raid, as well
as anti-smuggler robber band, anti-insurrection) Militia at the local level,
with officers thereto appointed by the State in which they resided -- much like the Minuteman shock troops militia
was made up on average of 20 to 30 men per town, as even men of Acton and other
local Massachusetts towns were among the first and foremost as well as
co-heroes of Lexington, supported by others who too were able to take up and
bear arms and of a conscience not blocked by religious conscience so as to keep
from doing so -- the Second Amendment
was rephrased after its initial introduction to the Convention, in a manner
that centered around a need for a
Militia and concerns over control and abuse of power, as, 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.
It did NOT take away the right of the people to keep and bear
Arms, nor infringe upon it, but carried the experience of what we obviously
know was nearly a century and a half of dealing with Indian raids, as well as
ocean and river arriving robber bands, insurrections from local populations and
even, from time to time, out of control localized slave uprisings as well. Even when the localized Militia fell from
tight-knitted organization and mobilization to the wayside, as we saw with the
War of 1812’s successful British army attack that burned down the White House,
the right of the CITIZENS OF THE UNITED STATES / the right OF THE PEOPLE
maintained the right to keep and bear arms from those days to this, regardless,
because the Constitution is an unbreakable contract as the Supreme Law of the
Land (as it calls itself in Article 6) with WE THE PEOPLE, the citizens of
these United States of America.
According to the Introduction of the Second Amendment well
after the Constitution debates regarding the Militia a year prior, the intent
of the Second Amendment was made clear with its introduction that there was
first and fundamentally a right to bear arms APART from being armed by an act
of Congress or of the States themselves.
It was framed as thus:
“The right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be
infringed;
A well armed and well
regulated militia being the best security of a free country: but no person religiously scrupulous of
bearing arms shall be compelled to render military service in person.”
Gale’s & Seaton’s History Of Debates in Congress p. 451
The essence was, whether or not Congress or the States armed
the militia, who at that time in history were mostly self-armed men of the town who had to supply themselves with their own up to military specifications rifle and powder and a minimum of 24 balls of lead to shoot as well as having essential gear, any United States Citizen who had or could at any time acquire their own arms had the right to keep and bear Arms. It should be remembered with all our wars from the Civil War onward, that Arms given out by Congress or the
State are pretty much ALWAYS expected to be returned BACK to the government at the end of military
service. It is a tradition still to this
day.
But the Constitution of the United States in the Second Amendment is clear: “The right of the people to keep and bear
[their own] arms shall not be infringed”.
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