Guns . . . August 29, 2023August 27, 2023 [A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.] You could read Michael Waldman’s The Second Amendment: A Biography (“With wit and erudition, Michael Waldman tells the story of how the Amendment’s meaning was turned upside-down and inside-out.” — George W. Bush speechwriter David Frum). Or Thom Hartmann’s Hidden History of Guns and the Second Amendment (“A brief but powerful analysis of a searing national crisis.” — Booklist) . . . But if you’re a slow reader like me, you may appreciate the analysis your fellow subscriber, Jim Burt of Ft. Worth, Texas, just sent me. (Jim had read the entire World Book Encyclopedia by the age of 8; became a 1966 Presidential Scholar out of high school; and then — yada yada yada — a successful attorney.) I’d love to find a a day or two to read the Waldman and Hartmann books, but here’s the six-minute nutshell: Self-proclaimed “originalists” tend to use their alleged doctrine as a fig leaf for enacting their prejudices. In addition to the subject of reproductive autonomy, that’s especially in evidence, it seems, with regard to the Second Amendment. The Supreme Court actually has a set of rules for legal interpretation which enshrines a version of “originalism.” While this interpretation manual actually departs from the traditional standard of legal interpretation concerning “originalism” – the traditional standard says that if a law appears to have meaning on its face you may not scrounge through legislative history or other “parol evidence” (outside evidence) to try to read the minds of the enactors – its item #3 says that “Every word within a statute is there for a purpose and should be given its due significance.” With respect to the Second Amendment, this means that interpretations that don’t apply the language concerning “A well-regulated Militia” are facially invalid. Take that, Clarence Thomas! And if you really want to see what the Framers thought about that, we have James Madison’s notes: Mr. MADISON. The primary object is to secure an effectual discipline of the Militia. This will no more be done if left to the States separately than the requisitions have been hitherto paid by them. The States neglect their Militia now, and the more they are consolidated into one nation, the less each will rely on its own interior provisions for its safety & the less prepare its Militia for that purpose; in like manner as the militia of a State would have been still more neglected than it has been if each County had been independently charged with the care of its Militia. The Discipline of the Militia is evidently a National concern, and ought to be provided for in the National Constitution. [Emphasis added.] The national experience with militia in the recently concluded war for independence had been grossly unsatisfactory, with the state militias being ill-armed, ill-disciplined, and unable to stand in the line of battle. Washington lost most of his battles (though he won the war), but most of those lost battles were lost because the militia was bloody useless. In those days, a “well-regulated militia” needed to show up when called, carry a standard weapon which standard ammunition would fit, and be able to engage in volley fire with their fellow militiamen. This means that they had to use and “keep” a weapon that conformed to an Army standard. And in most states every able-bodied male between 16 and 60 was considered to be in the militia, which meant in turn that when the Second Amendment refers to the “right to keep and bear arms” it confides that right to “the People”, not to “persons”. That’s another key word in the 2nd Amendment that is defined by context in the Constitution but tends to mean something else today: “people”. Every time the word “people” appears in the Constitution, it is used as a collective noun meaning the population corporately, and in this specific context, the population incorporated as a “well-regulated militia”, which is to say under discipline and subject to such other regulations as the leadership of the militia and the political leadership above them might prescribe. “People” as used in the Constitution never means a plural noun synonymous with an unassorted number of individual persons. Where the latter is meant, the Constitution uses the word “persons” or “citizens” or “the accused”. You might try as an exercise to find every reference to “people” in the Constitution. It’s always used as a collective noun. Yet another phrase that meant something specific in the 18th C. that it seems not to mean today is to “bear arms”. That was not synonymous in the 18th C. with “to pack heat”. Again, it meant bearing arms in a military context for a military purpose. I’m okay with finding, per the 9th Amendment, an implied right to keep, and perhaps under some circumstances carry, a firearm for purposes of self defense. Self defense is a common law right of great antiquity, not specifically stated in the Constitution but certainly as implicit as a person’s right to bodily autonomy. It’s not an unlimited right, nor is it free from regulation, but it exists, has not been explicitly abrogated, and falls within the ambit of the 9th Amendment reserving unenumerated rights to . . . “the people”. The 2nd Amendment, though, simply was not intended to address in any way the individual right of self defense, or any other individual right. Of course, if we’re going to start talking about “implied rights”, that’s a matter of substantive due process, like individual bodily autonomy and a right to privacy. Hmmm. As I’ve written before, it’s not practical to confiscate the hundreds of millions of weapons Americans already own — almost all of them, responsibly. No one is proposing that. It is practical to sensibly regulate future sales of both guns and ammunition. And to empower local communities to impose the same kind of safety measures that Wyatt Earp , et al, imposed in the wild West. What could be more red-blooded American than that? Sing it with me! HOUSKEEPING: You may notice this page looks a little different, except for my picture, which never changes, now decades out of date. Thanks to my trusty web mistress for conforming to the new WordPress requirements. As I was playing with it, I noticed that the amateur videos from 1978-1987 don’t load. We’ve grayed those links while I try to figure out some way to reinstate them without having to pay NBC, et al. I also saw the much improved archives tab and, just for fun, went back to the very first post, back when I was paid to do them. An Ode to ATMs. (I found a typo and corrected it, lo these 27 years later.) It was harmless enough so — not planning to read through all 6,815 of them, but maybe one or two more — I went on to #2, an Ode to ALMs. “Automatic Loan Machines are the future,” I asserted, “just as Automatic Teller Machines were the future 20 years ago.” Oops. Then again, you get what you pay for on this site. Thanks for your readership!