If I recall correctly:
Jefferson said "no free man shall ever be debarred the use of arms" which might imply that someone who is not a "free man" can be debarred the use of arms and that the "right of the people to bear arms" does not extend to those who are not free men.
it doesn't matter what jefferson said... what matters is what is written in the second amendment... the right of the people... shall not be infringed...
everyone has the right to self-protection, by re-interpreting the meaning of the amendment, you are close to being as guilty as the leftists in reinterpreting it.
teeman8r
So far I have not tried to reinterpret anything. I'm trying to get people to think.
"...what matters is what is written in the second amendment..."
What isn't written and why it was left out also matters. As I pointed out, "The second amendment says nothing about 'the right of the people to keep and bear arms' except that it shall not be infringed." What isn't written leads to disagreements among gun rights advocates today and their energy would be better used against the anti-gun folks than each other.
The reference to Jefferson and so forth was an attempt to shed some light on what people were thinking at the time of the writing or the second amendment.
So, what do you think is the extent of "the right of the people to keep and bear arms"? How does that right stack up against property rights for instance? If there is a conflict between these two sets of rights, which should prevail and why?