Replies

The 2nd amendment is actually not that clear John. Long legal tomes have been written about its ambiguities. SCOTUS could go either way on it.

Regarding the NRA's jewel in the crown, the word "keep," some read "keep and bear" conjunctively, rather than disjuntively. Even if read disjunctively, Garry Wills in his book "A Necessary Evil," wrote thusly:

"The private ownership schoold cotinues to think that plural "arms" means nothing but a singular "gun" for each individual, that every militiaman has his own gun, and that 'keep arms' would be restricted to storing the gun at home. If the Congress had meant anything so outlandish, it could with greate verbal economy have said 'keep at home and bear ... .' But it would have collapsed with laughter at its own absurdity. The militias had common stores of arms - not only guns but bayonets, artillery, ammunition, flags, drums, and all the arma (equipage) of war."

"History, philology, and logic furnish no solid basis for thinking the Second Amendment has anything to do with the private ownership of guns."

The dirty little secret frankly, is that no one really knows what the 2nd Amendment text means exactly, or was meant to mean. Thus SCOTUS has wide latitude here.

And there you have it.

The dirty little secret frankly, is that no one really knows what the 2nd Amendment text means exactly, or was meant to mean.

Sheesh. First an NEA teacher. Now a leftwing attorney.

You two are demonstrating vividly what is wrong with this country.

You obviously were taught reading comprehension by a professor like Mr. Pitchfork.

""History, philology, and logic furnish no solid basis for thinking the Second Amendment has anything to do with the private ownership of guns."

Why then was it included in an enumeration of INDIVIDUAL rights? Why was it listed so highly upon that list?

You cannot ignore that context. If the Fourth Amendment grants a "Right to Privacy", despite NOT featuring ANY words to that effect, then the question should not be, "How does the Second confer an individual right?", but, "How does it NOT?".

Recall, a right surrendered is a right lost, permanently. Any errors made regarding the Bill Of Rights should be biased towards the INCREASE, not the decrease, of Rights. The burden of proof, therefore, is on the banners, as it is THEY who wish the curtailment or decrease of rights.

Garry Wills in his book "A Necessary Evil," wrote thusly:

"History, philology, and logic furnish no solid basis for thinking the Second Amendment has anything to do with the private ownership of guns."
-Torie-

BTW, torie, I was reading the footnotes to the "Communitarian" link I posted above. They had an interesting comment on your 'hero':

440
"Perhaps the oddest reinterpretation of the original intent of the Second Amendment is Garry Wills's theory that the Second Amendment, rather than guaranteeing a right of individuals, or a right of state governments, actually means nothing at all.

See Garry Wills, The New Revolutionaries, N.Y. Rev. Books, Aug. 10, 1995, at 50.
The Second Amendment has no content whatsoever, Wills argues, and was a conscious fraud perpetrated on the American public by James Madison, who used clever draftsmanship to render the Amendment meaningless.
See id.
Further, according to Wills, Madison's secret intention about the Second Amendment (never before discerned by any scholar other than Wills) showed control over the intent of the state legislatures that ratified the Amendment, naively thinking that they were ratifying the right of the American people to keep and bear arms."
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