[Dead Corpse]

The first part of the second amendment is the most important part.

Wrong. A prefatory clause gives an example of why the operative clause is true. It could just as easily read, "Carrots are required for good health, the Right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed" and still be both grammatically and logically true.

Everything else in your screed is an often used attempt to tie RKBA to militia service. This is backwards. We need the Right because it makes forming a citizen militia easier, however the Right is not predicated on suitability for militia service alone.

[Political Junkie Too]

No, you are wrong.

1. This is not "my screed," it is the writings of the future fifth President of the United States.

2. The articles of the Constitution (which pre-date the second amendment) already recognized the right of the people to be armed via Article I Section 8 clauses 11, 15, and 16; via Article I Section 10 Clause 3; and via Article IV Clause 4.

3. What the second amendment did was move us away from the old English way that arms were kept locked up in a central armory and distributed to the townspeople when the castle was under threat of attack. The arms were the property of the local Baron, not the people.

   The first Congress purposely changed that. The second amendment made clear that we moved away from the English armory and to the personal ownership and possession of any arms that an army might deploy against the People.

-PJ