Appreciate your reply, but this part:
“The only reason for the Right ...”
... is not correct, and here is why:
Various wordings of the Second Amendment were tried during its development. The end result *purposefully* leaves out any enumeration of reasons why an individual has the right to keep and bear Arms. Any reason *why* an individual may or may not keep and bear Arms, was left to the states and the people thereof, to settle among themselves.
The only enumeration in the Second Amendment focuses on what to do about a group of men under Arms - what is to happen when individuals who bear military grade Arms are in a group, and they *are* capable of exercising martial power. What *then,* was to become of that power?
The answer was, that both the states and the federal government would rely upon *the group* being formally mustered, well-regulated, well trained to Arms, well discplined, and answerable to civilian authority.
Both the states and the federal government sought unity of function and preparedness of the militia of each state. The state militiae should be “well trained to Arms” and be capable of, and mindful of, lawfully exercising martial power and respecting lawful civilian authority.
In the old days up to around WW-I times and for a while thereafter, there was a tradition of local militia drilling on the common, the town green, or the county fairgrounds. It gave people an opportunity to remain somewhat familiar with military duty; it helped to keep them from becoming too rusty. It demonstrated the proper practices and discipline *for all to see.*
It is a shame that most communities and counties and states got out of that practice.
All the uses of weapons, firearm or not, for non-military purposes, were left to be decided by the states and their people.
Again, there would be no condition within the Second Amendment, by which you do, or do not, have the right to keep and bear Arms; because, the Founding Fathers correctly anticipated that any such enumerated condition might be used as grounds for an individual to either be forced to bear Arms or be stripped of their Arms.
The only refuge left for those who prophesy the downfall of the State governments is the visionary supposition that the federal government may previously accumulate a military force for the projects of ambition. The reasonings contained in these papers must have been employed to little purpose indeed, if it could be necessary now to disprove the reality of this danger. That the people and the States should, for a sufficient period of time, elect an uninterupted succession of men ready to betray both; that the traitors should, throughout this period, uniformly and systematically pursue some fixed plan for the extension of the military establishment; that the governments and the people of the States should silently and patiently behold the gathering storm, and continue to supply the materials, until it should be prepared to burst on their own heads, must appear to every one more like the incoherent dreams of a delirious jealousy, or the misjudged exaggerations of a counterfeit zeal, than like the sober apprehensions of genuine patriotism.
Extravagant as the supposition is, let it however be made.
Let a regular army, fully equal to the resources of the country, be formed; and let it be entirely at the devotion of the federal government; still it would not be going too far to say, that the State governments, with the people on their side, would be able to repel the danger. The highest number to which, according to the best computation, a standing army can be carried in any country, does not exceed one hundredth part of the whole number of souls; or one twenty-fifth part of the number able to bear arms. This proportion would not yield, in the United States, an army of more than twenty-five or thirty thousand men. To these would be opposed a militia amounting to near half a million of citizens with arms in their hands, officered by men chosen from among themselves, fighting for their common liberties, and united and conducted by governments possessing their affections and confidence. It may well be doubted, whether a militia thus circumstanced could ever be conquered by such a proportion of regular troops. Those who are best acquainted with the last successful resistance of this country against the British arms, will be most inclined to deny the possibility of it. Besides the advantage of being armed, which the Americans possess over the people of almost every other nation, the existence of subordinate governments, to which the people are attached, and by which the militia officers are appointed, forms a barrier against the enterprises of ambition, more insurmountable than any which a simple government of any form can admit of.
Well, we're here.
The State Militias (Armies) are gone, for all practical purposes, either under Federal Command, or deployed abroad. Most National Guard units are designated as the "State Militia", but can be called up by the Federal Government. The State Governments increasingly stripped of power and relevance by the apparent inability to resist the redistribution of tax money to the states with strings attached, yielding progressively more power to the Federal Government. Regulations and law have become a rubber stamp of the Federal version, imposed by popular demand for "Government money", in schemes which undermine the spirit, if not the letter of the Constitution.
We (not us, specifically, but the country) has elected that succession, with rare exception, and the progress made by those who daily craft legislation to destroy our Liberty in even the most minute things has continued unabated: Only the sunset clause in the '94 AWB removed that legislation, not a vote of the Legislature--and those pushing that and more now seek to make that permanent. Your light bulbs and toilets are at the mercy of the Congress, and having exerted themselves thus in minutiae with no meaningful resistance, they now want our arms.
The tyranny advances daily, and with it comes encumbrances on the fruits of those who labor.
Correct the numbers for the current population, however, and we are left with the bare fact that the People, in possession of their arms, constitute the last line of defense of Liberty.
All other uses for arms pale in comparison to this reason for their possession by the People.
Furthermore, in consideration of this reason alone, there should be no infringements on the Right, otherwise the People would be placed at a severe disadvantage.
Those in this succession of usurpers know full well that the totalitarian grip on America cannot be consolidated without the removal of the ability to practice the Right, and have chipped away at it to the point they think they can reduce it to meaninglessness with a single blow.
It is, and remains, only the potential of the force of arms in private hands which deters this.
IF we fail to secure the Right, by whatever means necessary, the last days of this Republic will be nasty, brutish, and short.