Most of the arguements about the Second Amendment made by both sides revolve around a single assumption - that the Second Amendment grants a citizen the right to bear arms. What both sides fail to understand is that the Second Amendment grants no such right, in fact, the Constitution grants no rights at all!
What the Constitution does do is identify what powers the people grant to the government. This is the whole purpose of the Constitution - to tell the goverment what it can and cannot do.
Read the Second Amendment closely, it doesn’t say the people have a right to bear arms but rather that the government can not infringe on that right. The same is true for most of the other amendments (the exception being the Sixth Amendment with establishes a right to a speedy trial).
Today, when a concerted effort is made to obliterate this point, it cannot be repeated too often that the Constitution is a limitation on the government, not on private individuals- that it does not prescribe the conduct of private individuals, only the conduct of the government- that it is not a charter for government power, but a charter of the citizen’s protection against the government.
— Ayn Rand
Couldn’t agree more, which has been my point for a long time. People keep talking about this or that right, yet don’t focus on the idea enough that that first 10 amendments are actually restrictions....on the the government.
Any arguments that the government provides and/or confers rights; also creates the argument that the government can also infringe or take away rights.