From: usenet@transfer.stratus.com (Mr. Network News)
Newsgroups: ne.politics
Subject: Re: Militia rights (was: Bearing arms)
Date: 28 Aug 92 15:04:16 GMT
Reply-To: Dave_Wetzel@vos.stratus.com
Organization: Dave_Wetzel

In article <5970@transfer.stratus.com> tarl@sw.stratus.com (Tarl 
Neustaedter) writes:

> The extra words added in capitals are the ones I don't see in the text.
> Neither did the people who wrote it - which is made abundantly clear if
> you read their writings, including the debates on this very ammendment.

Come on.  Clearly I'm interpreting.  I stuck those extra words in to make 
the somewhat ambiguous language clearer.  The key to my way of reading 
(since you claim to not understand it) is to keep the whole in context.  

The first full thought expressed in the sentence is "The Militia is vital 
to the security of the state."  The next thought seems a bit disjointed 
but seems to imply that the right of the people to bear arms is important 
to keeping a militia.  The last part is that something is not to be 
infringed upon.  The big question is what.  Since the main thrust of the 
sentence seems to be talking about militia one can infer that the forming 
of militia may not be infringed upon.  Therefore, the right of the people 
to bear arms for the purpose of forming militia may not be infringed upon. 
 Is that clearer?

Add in the concerns (also clear from research) the founders had about what 
was going on in Europe at the time.  Because the peasant militias in 
France had just ousted the government, countries all over Europe started 
disbanding and disarming militia.  That's why I feel secure with my 
interpretation.  It makes sense in a historical context as well as a 
linguistic one.

As for the writings of various members of the congress that wrote the 
ammendment, surely some would support even more open access to firearms 
than the final statement approves.  All of the ammendments were derived by 
the synergy of consession that is the heart of all committee-written 
statements.

And it is open for debate as to weither Jefferson etal would have argued 
for unrestricted access to the type of firearms we have today.  The 
firearms of their day were long, low rate-of-fire, inaccurate (by today's 
standards) rifles.  Not the kinda thing you could use to kill a buch of 
people in a ride-by-shooting ;^)   Now if you want, I'm willing to allow 
free access of firearms appropriate to the time the 2nd ammendment was 
ratified (1796).  So buy all the flintlocks you can.

> Incidentally, my copy of the bill of rights is different than yours:
> 
>    2nd Amendment
>    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.

This is interesting, I actually got the text of mine from a college 
history text (I don't remember which one right now).  The key comma is 
still there in yours though.  It's the comma after arms that keeps the 
sentence from saying clearly "the right of the people to bear arms shall 
not be infringed".

BTW, I was impressed by your mail earlier about the proper attitude to 
guns (to paraphrase: never draw a gun without intending to shoot and shoot 
to kill).  If all gun-owners were as responsible and addopted the same 
philosophy I certainly would be on the gun-owner's side of this issue.  
The problem is there are a *LOT* of gun-owners who, even if they don't 
think of it as a toy, treat it as a toy.  Unless you can legislate the 
attitude (thought police?!?) towards guns and violence, certain guns 
(concealable and high-rate of fire ones) are just too much a menace to the 
people.

Another side note: I have to agree with the person (was it you Tarl?) that 
objected to the phrase "the gun went off".  I wanted to point out though 
that it may not be the fault of the Globe reporters that this inane phrase 
appears.  Yesterday's Globe had a qoute from a police cheif that said the 
"gun went off and struck the boy in the temple".  A very bizzare statement 
(a self-aware, flying gun perhaps?).

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Dave_Wetzel@vos.stratus.com