The Right To Bear Arms

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.

The Second Amendment

Just beneath the headlines of the Oklahoma City tragedy, there is an escalating conflict between two visions of America, and at its heart is the Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. The Right side fears that an urban, liberal elite valuing government controls more than individual liberties is conspiring to strip Americans of their right to keep and bear arms. The Left believes that unrestricted gun ownership is an obsolete concept in an increasingly urbanized and chaotic society; here, guns are no longer necessary for day-to-day survival and entirely too useful in post office massacres, drive-by shootings, and playground murders.

We argue in favor of the former perspective. The Second Amendment protects an individual’s right to keep and bear arms, which contributes to political freedom and to the public good. Infringements on our Second Amendment right, via gun restrictions, are a potential threat to the general welfare of the American people. If there are to be any restrictions, they must be minimal. They are justified only when it is undeniably clear that the measure is in the public good.

The Only Sure Defense….

For America’s gun owners, law-abiding citizens and wild-eyed anarchists alike, and even for some who do not own guns, the Second Amendment is not merely an inviolable guarantee of an individual’s unfettered right to own a gun. It is also “the one amendment that maintains the viability of all others in the Bill of Rights,” says Aaron Zelman of Jews for the Preservation of Firearms Ownership.1 Lexington and Concord, Berlin, Tiananmen Square, and Waco, should underscore and clearly validate that our faith in an armed citizenry is the only sure defense against not only common criminals, but the potential for tyranny in any government. Says the National Rifle Association’s Wayne LaPierre, the battle over the Second Amendment is a “battle to retake the most precious, most sacred ground on earth, it is a battle for freedom.”2

In the court of public opinion, advocates of the individual’s right to bear arms clearly dominate. A 1995 U.S. News & World Report poll shows that 75 percent of all American voters believe the Constitution guarantees them the right to own a gun. Furthermore, the poll discovered that voters are less willing to accept restrictions on their constitutional rights in the name of greater security than they were before the Oklahoma City Bombing. Prior to the bombing, 44 percent of those surveyed said they were willing to give up some rights to make gains on crime, and 38 percent said they were not. Following the bombing, only 38 percent said they would concede some of their rights, while 47 percent would not.3 The results of the poll illustrate that people believe the government does not protect them from criminal attack well enough, and therefore, believe gun ownership is a necessary defense against senseless acts of brutality. Although many home owners are concerned about protection from the crime their government is unable to shield them from, what is most striking about the poll is their concern about protection from the crime their own government may inflict on them. The Second Amendment provides the people security by checking the government’s power to hurt the very people it is supposed to protect and serve.

The Second Amendment

To understand the Second Amendment, one must examine the era of its birth within Colonial America. As early as 1624, a survey in Jamestown, Va., counted one firearm for every colonist.4 Hence, the gun was viewed as an essential part of colonial life. Its protective role was enhanced as the tension grew between the overtaxed and under-represented colonists, and the elite standing armies. Standing armies were military forces composed solely of professional soldiers and controlled by the King’s central government in England. This distrust of “professional” armies was due in part to King George Ill’s oppressive use of British troops to compel obedience to the taxes and laws. The American Revolution followed as a result and the colonists gradually formed part-time citizen armies, or militias, which required the common man to keep and bear arms for the defense of his freedom, the individual’s freedom.

As each of the thirteen colonies began to adopt constitutions in the 1770s and 1780s, it naturally incorporated provisions dealing with militias and the right to bear arms. Virginia’s Declaration of Rights, drafted by George Mason and adopted in June 1776, stated that a “well regulated militia, composed of the body of people, trained to arms, is the proper, natural and safe defense of a free state.”5 This philosophy quickly spread beyond Virginia and was embraced by the remaining thirteen colonies. Two months later, Pennsylvania declared that “the people have a right to bear arms for the defense of themselves and the state.”6

The original U.S. Constitution, drafted in Philadelphia in 1787, did not include a Bill of Rights, but it quickly became apparent that one would be needed to win ratification by the states. In 1789, James Madison, the most influential advocate of the Constitution, introduced a version of the Bill of Rights. In Federalist Paper 46, he contrasted the type of federal government the Constitution would create to the despotism of European governments he contemptuously described as “afraid to trust the people with arms.” Madison’s Bill of Rights assured his fellow countrymen that “the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed; a well-armed, and well-regulated militia being the best security of a free country.” A House committee changed the phrasing to read: “a well-regulated militia, composed of the body of the people, being the best security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.” The Senate then defeated a proposed amendment that would have inserted “for the common defense” next to the words “bear arms.” A conference committee approved the final version, and the full House and Senate voted their approval in September 1789. By 1791, the states had ratified it. There was little public debate. At the time, the Second Amendment was simply not controversial, but so clearly necessary.7

The Dispute

The Second Amendment should be the beginning and end of any discussion of the legal merits of gun control. Yet both political perspectives claim it as evidence in their case. Analysis of each side starts with the semantics of this seemingly straightforward provision and dates back to the legislative intent of the drafters of the Amendment when they proposed it in 1789. Gun-control advocates espouse that there is no substantial historical evidence for the claim that the Amendment was to guarantee an individual the right to have arms for any purpose other than participation in a state-regulated militia. These proponents claim that the Second Amendment clearly refers to the “free state” needing protection and specifies that a “well-regulated militia” is to give that protection. At the time of the Amendment’s drafting, almost every citizen of this young and struggling nation was considered a front-line soldier, a member of the militia. Therefore, it was natural for the writers to assign the right to bear arms to “the people,” meaning “the people of a well-qualified militia.” Gun-control advocates argue that the Second Amendment does not guarantee the right of any individual against the confiscation of arms. Rather, it guarantees an exclusive right of the states, which only the states have standing to invoke. They argue that such measures are not necessary in today’s world when any value the Second Amendment might presently have for them is satisfied by their federally provided National Guard structure.

Gun controllers highlight the rejection of the term “for the common good” because they believe that notion is implied in the language of the Second Amendment. They maintain that it was rejected for a technical reason; the phrase would have been redundant. However, the clause was rejected because it would have the effect of restricting the right to bear arms. The Amendment already meant the right of the people of a well-regulated militia to bear arms for the security of a free state.

Advocates of gun restraint maintain that James Madison’s statement that the U.S. should “trust the people with arms” is taken out of the context of Madison’s argument. They claim that Madison’s thrust was that the citizens of the U.S. would be free from tyranny by the federal government because the people could unite through their strong, elected, local governments. Further, the citizens of the U.S. could unite with the armed people of the militia, either of which Europeans did not have, and oppose the tyranny of a despotic federal government and its standing army.

Yet the Second Amendment’s language lends itself to a clear interpretation. The natural reading of the Amendment’s phrase “right of the people” is not that it creates a state’s right, but one which individuals can assert. When we encounter “the people” in the Second Amendment, it is synonymous with “the people” in the First Amendment, “the right of the people peaceably to assemble and to petition the government for a redress of grievances,” and the Fourth Amendment, “the right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures,” and the Ninth Amendment’s right of privacy to be “retained by the people,” and of the Tenth Amendment’s powers not delegated nor prohibited are reserved to the states or “to the people.”8

A “well-regulated militia” includes everyone, or at least all able-bodied men. History demonstrates that colonial leaders were in favor of the individual’s right to bear arms. James Madison, in Federalist 46, wrote that unlike the governments of Europe, which were “afraid to trust the people with arms,” the American people under their new Constitution would continue to possess “the advantage of being armed.”9 Samuel Adams, arguing for a Bill of Rights at the Massachusetts ratifying convention, urged that the “Constitution never be construed to authorize Congress to….prevent the people of the United States, who are peaceable citizens, from keeping their own arms.” In short, the Founding Fathers supported the individual’s right to bear arms, which was founded on the belief that the right of the citizen to arm himself is crucial to the security of society as a whole.

The Second Amendment’s language and historical background demonstrate that it was designed to guarantee individuals the possession of certain kinds of arms for self-defense, national defense, and the preservation of individual liberty and popular institutions against domestic despotism. The states’ rights interpretation suggests that each of these purposes is obsolete and, therefore, that the Amendment itself is obsolete. Yet evidence can be offered to dispute this claim. As to the case of personal self-defense, it is regrettably the case that enormous increases in police budgets and personnel have not prevented the per capita incidence of reported robbery, rape, and aggravated assault from increasing by 300%, 400%, and 500% respectively since 1960.”10 Increasingly police are concluding that they cannot protect the law-abiding citizen, and that it is not only rational for him to protect himself with firearms, but also an effective deterrent to violent crime. As for national defense and preserving personal liberty, the lessons of history, Lexington and Concord, Tiananmen Square, and Waco, have shown that an armed citizenry is an essential defense against both common criminals and the tyrannical potential of government.

The Founding Fathers intended the Second Amendment to guarantee an individual’s right to possess firearms. Now does this apply to everyone under all circumstances? Certainly there must be exceptions. The precise details of that guarantee remain significantly unclear. But surely individuals with criminal records, and histories of violent behavior, young children naive to power and the potential for disaster inherent in firearms, or anyone with clear intention to harm and violate one’s right cannot be extended the Second Amendment guarantee. The issue is protection, protection from harm and defense of our liberty. To weaken or limit the guarantee of our Second Amendment right to bear arms is to threaten the very fabric of our nation, the integrity of our government, and the future of our people.

1. Duffy, Brian, “The Fight to Bear Arms,” U.S. News and World Report, May 22, 1995, 29-36.

2. ibid., 29.

3. ibid., 294.

4. Finkelman, Paul, Gun Control and the Constitution, 6.

5. ibid., 150.

6. ibid., 153.

7. ibid.

8. The United States Constitution.

9. ibid.

10. Dudley, William, Crime and Criminals: Opposing Viewpoints, 149.

References

Davidson, Osha G., Under Fire: The NRA and the Battle for Gun Control, New York: H. Holt, 1993.

Dudley, William, Crime and Criminals: Opposing Viewpoints, San Diego, 1995.

Duffy, Brian, “The Fight to Bear Arms.” U.S. News & World Report (5-22-95): 29-36.

Finkelman, Paul, Gun Control and the Constitution: Sources and Explorations on the Second Amendment, New York, 1993-Francis, Diane, “A Case Against Rock’s Gun Controls,” Maclean’s (6-5-95), 13-15.

Kates, Don B. Firearms and Violence: Issues of Public Policy, San Francisco, Ca.: Pacific Institute for Public Policy Research, 1984.