The Second Amendment does not Protect Against Oppressive Government

It is clear that from pretty much the establishment of Jamestown the British were intent on colonising the west. The Manifest Destiny was chiefly aimed at the Mexican territories, as well as the remnants of Native American resistance in the far west. The intentions were also known by the French, who took possession of pretty much all the land between the Thirteen Colonies and the Colorado River, hence all the French-sounding places in the midwest and Canada, such as Detroit, Michigan, Illnois, Fort Duquesne (Pittsburgh), Louisiana, Quebec, etc. http://en.wikipedia.org... This was chiefly to constrict British expansion west, as a Britain with the resources of the modern USA behind it would seriously upset the balance of power in Europe; so much in fact that it was British expansionism in North America that was one of the main proponents of the Seven Years' War. or as it is known in America, the French and Indian War. Roughly two thirds of what is now the USA was already under Europe's hegemony at the time of the American War of Independence. The French behaved rather leniently towards the Indians, and rather than taking all of their land under direct control, they maintained more of a trading monopoly with them, which explains the prevalence of Native American volunteers in the French Army during the French and Indian War, and the fact that in the British Army, there were only a few conscripted Native Americans. When the British acquired the French lands, they had no such reservations, and began giving huge swathes of land west of the colonies to chiefly Hessian officers from the French and Indian War. But there was a problem. Whenever they sent a colonial expedition west, or the landowners arrived to claim their land, they were repelled by the natives. They lacked the resources to outfit a large-scale military expedition to pacify the tribes, and before they applied a solution, they were distracted by the War of American Independence. Once it was over, the newly formed US government had accumulated huge amounts of debt from loans taken from France that needed repaying, as well as financing the repairing of the devastated landscape, so they decided to sell off land west of the frontier in the former French lands. They remembered what the now-disappointed Hessian officers, skulking in Europe waiting for the next major war to kick off, had encountered on the way, and had the idea that if the colonists and new landowners were armed to the teeth, they did not need to outfit a military expedition to claim the lands, and could sell on a lot of the old military equipment they did not need anymore. This is evidenced by the War of 1812 in which the US Army, despite the fact that the French Crown donated enough arms to give three muskets to every soldier, only had enough weapons for a few regiments because they had sold all of their arms to private gun owners, who formed 'well-regulated militias' with their fellow colonists to defend (a term I use very loosely) the land they had been sold by the Govt. The Louisiana Purchase was made in 1804 with the proceeds from selling arms and land, when France needed the money for Napoleon's wars with the rest of Europe. Most of the other points in the Bill of Rights and the Constitution were put in as part of Jefferson, Franklin and Paine's genuinely liberal views, but the Second Amendment was there to aid colonisation of the west and to get rid of those pesky natives that didn't want to be exploited by capitalism. This worked, and military expeditions were only used for especially stubborn tribes such as the Sioux, and the genocide against the Native Americans, such as the Trail of Tears and most of the massacres were mostly perpetrated by either the colonists or the 'Well Regulated Militia'. I shall now argue that an armed populace would be unable to carry out a revolution on its own. There is not a single example of a revolution carried out by an armed population against the government. In Russia, the outcome was governed by a mixture of factions within the army - the officers supported the Tsar, since they were mostly aristocrats, while the rank-and-file supported the Bolsheviks; whichever side had the best transport links; and which side could most effectively employ guerrilla tactics. The Russian peasantry were largely unarmed, save the Cossacks, who actually backed the Tsar instead of the Bolsheviks. The Russian Revolution is an example of a revolution that not only went on irrespective of the fact that most of the people were unarmed, it continued regardless of the fact that the population that were armed were counter-revolutionaries. Therefore, a population without weapons is just as effective in a revolution as one that has them, and the armed ones can support oppressive government. In France, there was a similar outcome in 1789, when the crowd that attacked the Bastille was largely composed of mutinying soldiers who brought artillery troops from the arsenal at Les Invalides with them. The population was mostly too poor to own guns, and cannons were completely out of the question. Mutinying soldiers turned on the government and stormed the Bastille. Versailles was stormed by a group of women that were armed with pikes and household utensils. There was a 'well-regulated militia' formed in the immediate aftermath of it - the Garde Nationale, which was composed of citizens. In the anarchy that followed, weapons were distributed to the population, and most people in urban centres owned weapons. The 'well-regulated militia' actually defended the King, firing on protesters at the Champs de Mars massacre, and tried to smuggle the King across the border to Austria where there were armies poised to restore him. Once the King had been dealt with and put on trial (In a manner in which I hope they do with Bush), there was the 'Great Terror', in which the armed citizens murdered priests and aristocrats who the new government, which was just as oppressive as the previous one, had branded as 'traitors to the revolution'. Also, the 'well-regulated militia' toured France, massacring royalists, priests and anyone else the state branded as enemies. So the reforms were going well until the people got their hands on guns, at which point the people supported an even more oppressive government. Also, all subsequent revolutions and coups in France were carried out by small factions in the army or by the King abdicating due to pressure from his advisers and foreign powers - 1795, 1799, 1804, 1830, 1848, 1852 and 1870. Not one of these changes in power was brought about by an armed populace, and in many cases, factions of the citizenry with guns supported the government and not the revolutionaries. In Cuba, the revolution was carried out by a revolutionary army that was kitted out by the USSR, not an armed population. They were mostly peasants without the money to buy enough food and medicine, let alone weapons to defend themselves against a US-backed government. Only once the revolt had started had the USSR sent military aid to the rebels - firearms, ammunition, artillery, vehicles; as well as military advisers, recruiters and trainers. This resulted in not a 'well-regulated militia', but a powerful standing army, which could overwhelm the poorly-trained, demoralised government forces. There were no weapons distributed among the populace, nor were there any local militia groups formed. This was exclusively conducted by a revolutionary army equipped by a foreign power. The people had nothing to do with the overthrow of the Batista Regime; it was a faction. Admittedly this was a popular faction with a long flow of volunteers, but the second amendment would not provide for the training, artillery, vehicles and tactical expertise that the USSR gave to Castro. The final example I will use of a revolution that was not dependent upon the right to keep and bear arms and maintain a well-regulated militia is your own war of independence. An argument often used by advocates of the Second Amendment is that if the Patriots lacked the weapons they had stored, the USA would still be a British colony. this is not true as if you look at the battles carried out pre-Valley Forge such as Bunker Hill, Brandywine and Germantown, they were all British victories. The victories were carried out because the Continental Army was nothing more than a poorly-trained, poorly-disciplined rabble of peasants with hunting muskets, a few horses and a handful of makeshift cannons they had made themselves (not a feat to be scoffed at since Britain had banned steel production in the colonies); while the British Army was well-trained, well-disciplined, well-equipped and reinforced by Hessian mercenaries, who were incredible soldiers. During Valley Forge, the French arrived, giving them military-grade weapons, proper artillery (still inscribed with Ultima Ratio Regum, which became the motto of a battalion of the US marines), the support of 6,000 soldiers under the Comte de Rochambeau, and military training under the Baron von Steuben and the Marquis de Lafayette, who was incidentally the man who gave the order to fire on the Champs de Mars protesters in France. After Valley Forge, they had the quasi-victory at Monmouth, and the firm victories at King's Mountain, Cowpens and Yorktown, the latter of which was only possible because of the French Navy under admirals de Grasse and de Barras, who won the battle of Chesapeake Capes against the Royal Navy, cutting Cornwallis' escape off. The American War of Independence was not won by valiant colonists mounting a brave resistance in the towns and cities under British rule; it was won by an efficient fighting force with the equipment, training and support of the French Army that won pitched battles against the British, who were under increasing military and financial strain towards the end of the conflict.