Unfortunately there are some, including here on FR, that see the word militia and their minds glaze over. They seem to ignore the remaining part of the 2nd Amendment.
"Unfortunately there are some, including here on FR, that see the word militia and their minds glaze over. They seem to ignore the remaining part of the 2nd Amendment."
You are right and it is unfortunate. It is as if people think that the authors of the Constitution had no idea that governments will form a military. Of course the authors assumed that federal and state governments would form a military, so claiming that the word "militia" in the 2nd Amendment referred to a military branch under the command of a government, and the words "free state" referred to a state government, is simply nonsense.
Why would the authors need to verbalize in an amendment that *the people* can form a military branch in service of their state *government*? Are they saying that the state government is somehow incorruptible, and its only the federal government we need to arm against? Why would the same authors who took great pains to make sure that power was in the hands of the people first and the government second stop at state governments when handing out the single most important power? Of course they would hand it directly to the people, else, the people would never really have any power at all. Brave men just got done using firearms to free themselves from an oppressive government, why would anyone think they would make an obvious mistake that would lead to just another oppressive government. In this case, a state government who is in bed with a federal government. The authors were not stupid.
The "well regulated militia" the 2nd Amendment is referring to is a well trained, well armed *peoples* militia that can be used against *any* abuser, whether of government authority or not. To read the 2nd Amendment in any other way renders it meaningless.
Enemies of freedom are using confusion to try to remove this precious right of the people. If people really can't understand the 2nd Amendment as written, I am all for an Amendment to the 2nd Amendment. Let's clean up the language once and for all by changing it to: "The right of the people to keep and bear any and all weaponry, in any quantity, in any location, shall not be infringed, regulated, monitored, or legislated in any way. This means you."