Why is it that Cecil Adams [February 10], as well as the NRA, have different copies of the United States Constitution from my own? The Second Amendment in my own library clearly starts out with the words “A well-regulated militia…” What is well-regulated about a private citizen with a stash of guns in his basement? The opening words of this amendment seem to clearly indicate that the possession of guns was not meant to be beyond control. –Ed Cohen, Chicago
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Let’s put it this way: it was not meant to be beyond regulation. The question is whether the power to regulate encompasses the power to ban. So far as guns are concerned, the courts have held that it does. You may say outlawing guns altogether was not what you had in mind. But it’s certainly what some people have in mind, at least with respect to broad categories of firearms such as handguns, and a few would happily prohibit guns, period. Federal case law currently offers virtually no protection against such draconian measures.
However odd it strikes us today, the framers regarded private gun ownership as one of the pillars of their liberty. They had recently defeated one of the most powerful nations in the world using an army that in the early going had consisted of amateur soldiers using their own weapons. They considered these citizen militias vastly preferable to standing armies, which in their experience had been instruments of oppression. They also had no professional police force upon which to depend for defense of their lives and property. It seemed natural to them that ordinary folk should have the right to own guns.
