fossten
Dedicated LVC Member
Your already-thin mask of objectivity is slipping when you use phrases like "in the name of public safety." I read you to say that allowing citizens to own and carry guns presents a threat to public safety. Is this what you're saying?
Here's Madison's original proposal to the House:
Because the semicolon after "shall not be infringed" is grammatically equal to a period, the individual right is not even theoretically conditional upon the rest of the sentence. The Congress later altered the syntax to:
Even though contemporaries of the First Congress (such as St. George Tucker and William Rawle), along with the populace at large correctly viewed the 2nd Amendment as an individual right, the germ of ambiguous syntax was set for eternity.
That change of sentence structure was crucial. No longer was the right "to keep and bear arms" listed first and independent. By vaguely couching the right within the duty of a common militia, the 2nd Amendment can be theoretically read to mean that people may keep and bear arms for militia purposes only and no others. The Congress of 1789 likely knew that the 2nd amendment was slightly ambiguous, giving future courts an excuse to sanctify federal infringement of that right.
The courts have done precisely that, as evidence by the Miller case of 1939.
Here's a sabotage-proof Amendment:
In short, it's likely that due to the Federalists' desire and plan for a supreme, unchallengeable central government - vs. an armed citizenry's opposition to such future government - the 2nd Amendment was intentionally watered down to make possible the gradual whittling away our right of private arms.
Has this not happened exactly?
Here's Madison's original proposal to the House:
Because the semicolon after "shall not be infringed" is grammatically equal to a period, the individual right is not even theoretically conditional upon the rest of the sentence. The Congress later altered the syntax to:
Even though contemporaries of the First Congress (such as St. George Tucker and William Rawle), along with the populace at large correctly viewed the 2nd Amendment as an individual right, the germ of ambiguous syntax was set for eternity.
That change of sentence structure was crucial. No longer was the right "to keep and bear arms" listed first and independent. By vaguely couching the right within the duty of a common militia, the 2nd Amendment can be theoretically read to mean that people may keep and bear arms for militia purposes only and no others. The Congress of 1789 likely knew that the 2nd amendment was slightly ambiguous, giving future courts an excuse to sanctify federal infringement of that right.
The courts have done precisely that, as evidence by the Miller case of 1939.
Here's a sabotage-proof Amendment:
In short, it's likely that due to the Federalists' desire and plan for a supreme, unchallengeable central government - vs. an armed citizenry's opposition to such future government - the 2nd Amendment was intentionally watered down to make possible the gradual whittling away our right of private arms.
Has this not happened exactly?