David_TheMan
Banned
One of the dumbest articles I've ever read.
You can read the anti-federalist papers to see the reason it was included into the bill of rights.
Mason, Madison, and Militias: A Progressive for a Right to Bear Arms « The Stanford Progressive
Patrick Henry
The Debates in the Several State Conventions on the Adoption of the Federal
Constitution (3 Elliot's Debates 384-7)
Virginia, Saturday, June 14, 1788.
Elliot's Debates Home Page: U.S. Congressional Documents
You can read the anti-federalist papers to see the reason it was included into the bill of rights.
Mason, Madison, and Militias: A Progressive for a Right to Bear Arms « The Stanford Progressive
These Anti-Federalist concerns were not simply theoretical; they were shaped by precedent, both from early England and, more importantly, from recent events. Standing armies, an army supplied by the government during a time of peace, were the main tool monarchs used to impose their will in 17th century England. In order to counter an uprising of armed men, Catholic King Charles II used the Militia Act of 1661 and the Game Act of 1671 to individually disarm his Protestant enemies. After King James II was overthrown in the Glorious Revolution of 1688, the winners reacted to the Militia Act in the English Bill of Rights, specifically by enumerating the right “[t]hat the subjects which are Protestant may have arms for their defense suitable to their conditions and as allowed by law.”
Conservatives tend to overreact to this superficially obvious analogue to the second amendment. In reality, the English Bill of Rights only protected individuals from the crown, not from the Parliament. The American conception of constitutional rights drastically differed from the English conception. For this reason, when Madison introduced the Bill of Rights in Congress, he specifically said the reasoning behind the English Bill of Rights is “inapplicable.”
The founders did not need to look more than a decade back in order to find a much more relevant example of the danger of standing armies. On September 1st, 1774, General Thomas Gage had a secret military detail seize publicly owned gun powder in the Charlestown powder house. By October 19th, 1774, the British had halted all arms transportation through Boston. To put this in perspective, when the Governor of Virginia seized some public powder and had it placed on a British vessel, Patrick Henry lead a historic march to obtain possession or reimbursement. This explains why Massachusetts was the only state at the time whose declaration of rights included “keeping” as well as “bearing” arms. It also explains why Mason chose to borrow specifically from Massachusetts and not other states declarations with “bear arms” language.
Anti-Federalists worried that Article 1, Section 8 gave the Federal government the ability the destroy state militias through lack of funding and disuse. George Mason debated this issue at the Virginia Ratifying Convention on June 14, 1788 and specifically asked that “in case the general government should neglect to arm and discipline the militia, there should be an express declaration that the state governments might arm and discipline them.” Contrary to the arguments of many “collective right” advocates, Mason’s solution for this was not Section 17 of the 1788 Virginia Ratifying Convention proposal. Mason’s militia power amendment found voice in Virginia’s proposed Constitutional Amendment 11, that “each state respectively shall have the power to provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining its own militia, whensoever Congress shall omit or neglect to provide for the same.”
A second worry, which was debated heavily on June 16, was that because the Federal Constitution overruled State Constitutions, the Federal Constitution would also overrule the bill of rights passed by states. This was when Patrick Henry made several of his more famous witticisms, including saying that the Federalists “have a bill of rights [in Virginia] to defend [them] against the state government, which is bereaved of all power, and yet [they] have none against Congress, though in full and exclusive possession of all power.” Henry opened the discussion by reading the eighth to thirteenth articles of Virginia’s declaration of rights which were later incorporated as the first eight amendments of the U.S. Bill of Rights. Recall that the thirteenth article of the Virginia Declaration of Rights is Mason’s writing on a well-regulated militia. While Anti-Federalist coalitions in only three of the ratifying conventions, Virginia, Pennsylvania, and North Carolina, proposed a militia powers amendment, every single ratifying convention contained a proposed right to keep arms.
The Anti-Federalists at the Pennsylvanian Ratifying Convention followed the same reasoning as those at the Virginia convention. Their minority bill of rights, later printed as “Reasons of Dissent,” included “that the people have a right to bear arms for the defense of themselves and their own state, or the United States, or for the purpose of killing game; and no law shall be passed for disarming the people or any of them, unless for crimes committed, or real danger of public injury from individuals.” This immediately dispels the notion that “bear arms” refers only militia related action, a stance held by several amicus briefs in both Heller and its due process-based sequel, McDonald v. City of Chicago.
Patrick Henry
The Debates in the Several State Conventions on the Adoption of the Federal
Constitution (3 Elliot's Debates 384-7)
Virginia, Saturday, June 14, 1788.
Elliot's Debates Home Page: U.S. Congressional Documents
Mr. HENRY. Mr. Chairman, in my judgment the friends of the opposition have to act cautiously. We must make a firm stand before we decide. I was heard to say, a few days ago, that the sword and purse were the two great instruments of government; and I professed great repugnance at parting with the purse, without any control, to the proposed system of government. And now, when we proceed in this formidable compact, and come to the national defence, the sword, I am persuaded we ought to be still more cautious and circumspect; for I feel still more reluctance to surrender this most valuable of rights.
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As my worthy friend said, there is a positive partition of power between the two governments. To Congress is given the power of "arming, organizing, and disciplining the militia, and governing such part of them as may be employed in the service of the United States." To the state legislatures is given the power of "appointing the officers, and training the militia according to the discipline prescribed by Congress." I observed before, that, if the power be concurrent as to arming them, it is concurrent in other respects. If the states have the right of arming them, &c., concurrently, Congress has a concurrent power of appointing the officers, and training the militia. If Congress have that power, it is absurd. To admit this mutual concurrence of powers will carry you into endless absurdity— that Congress has nothing exclusive on the one hand, nor the states on the other. The rational explanation is, that Congress shall have exclusive power of arming them, &c., and that the state governments shall have exclusive power of appointing the officers, &c. Let me put it in another light.
May we not discipline and arm them, as well as Congress, if the power be concurrent? so that our militia shall have two sets of arms, double sets of regimentals, &c.; and thus, at a very great cost, we shall be doubly armed. The great object is, that every man be armed. But can the people afford to pay for double sets of arms &c.? Every one who is able may have a gun. But we have learned, by experience, that necessary as it is to have arms, and though our Assembly has, by a succession of laws for many years, endeavored to have the militia completely armed, it is still far from being the case. When this power is given up to Congress without limitation or bounds, how will your militia be armed? You trust to chance; for sure I am that nation which shall trust its liberties in other hands cannot long exist. If gentlemen are serious when they suppose a concurrent power, where can be the impolicy to amend it? Or, in other words, to say that Congress shall not arm or discipline them, till the states shall have refused or neglected to do it? This is my object. I only wish to bring it to what they themselves say is implied. Implication is to be the foundation of our civil liberties, and when you speak of arming the militia by a
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concurrence of power, you use implication. But implication will not save you, when a strong army of veterans comes upon you. You would be laughed at by the whole world for trusting your safety implicitly to implication.
The argument of my honorable friend was, that rulers might tyrannize. The answer he received was, that they will not. In saying that they would not, he admitted they might. In this great, this essential part of the Constitution, if you are safe, it is not from the Constitution, but from the virtues of the men in government. If gentlemen are willing to trust themselves and posterity to so slender and improbable a chance, they have greater strength of nerves than I have.
The honorable gentleman, in endeavoring to answer the question why the militia were to be called forth to execute the laws, said that the civil power would probably do it. He is driven to say, that the civil power may do it instead of the militia. Sir, the military power ought not to interpose till the civil power refuse. If this be the spirit of your new Constitution, that the laws are to be enforced by military coercion, we may easily divine the happy consequences which will result from it. The civil power is not to be employed at all. If it be, show me it. I read it attentively, and could see nothing to warrant a belief that the civil power can be called for. I shall be glad to see the power that authorizes Congress to do so. The sheriff will be aided by military force. The most wanton excesses may be committed under color of this; for every man in office, in the states, is to take an oath to support it in all its operations. The honorable gentleman said, in answer to the objection that the militia might be marched from New Hampshire to Georgia, that the members of the government would not attempt to excite the indignation of the people. Here, again, we have the general unsatisfactory answer, that they will be virtuous, and that there is no danger.
