“We’ll start with the word. From Dictionary.com:”
Nope. We will start with the state statutes.
Let's go to the first dictionary of the English language by Samuel Johnson ca. 1755:
1. Attack; hostile onset; opposed to defence. Her spirit had been invincible against all assaults of affection.
Shakespeare.
Not to be shook thyself, but all assaults,
Baffling, like thy hoar cliffs the loud sea wave. Thomson.
2. Storm: opposed to sap or siege.
Jason took at least a thousand men, and suddenly made an assault upon the city.
2 Macc. v. 5.
After some days siege, he resolved to try the fortune of an assault: he succeeded therein so far, that he had taken the principal tower and fort.
Bacon.
3. Hostile violence.
Themselves at discord fell, And cruel combat join’d in middle space,
With horrible assault, and fury fell.
Fairy Queen.
4. Invasion; hostility; attack.
After some unhappy assaults upon the prerogative by the parliament, which produced its dissolution, there followed a composure.
Clarendon.
Theories built upon narrow foundations, are very hard to be supported against the assaults of opposition.
Locke.
5. In law. A violent kind of injury offered to a man’s person. It may be committed by offering of a blow, or by a fearful speech.
Cowel.
6. It has upon before the thing assaulted.
That makes your preference that of a gun-grabber and supporter of common criminals. Hopefully, you don't want to be either.