Well for,one thing it would have meant everyone who had one, owned it. Most soldiers had to bring their own weapons. We had no regular standing army and no established masive arms companies to just go to and get thousands of guns and hand them out to men.
The Continental Army was a regular standing army. It had 3 divisions, 6 brigades and 38 regiments. There were also state militia regiments available, but those were not regular army. Look at the date that the Army claims as the official date of its formation.