2nd Amendment, Scalia and what the Founders meant: Commas, Common Sense and Justice. The question is how to interpret the comma after 'free state.'

[westwall]

Post #8 proves nothing of the sort.

The phrase "the people" identifies who possesses the right. It does not identify the purpose and scope of the right.

The amendment itself tells you the purpose in the first thirteen words: "A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State..."

You are taking the last half of the sentence and pretending the first half doesn't exist.

That's not constitutional analysis. That's selective reading.

If the framers intended an unlimited free-standing personal right unrelated to militia service, they could have written exactly that.

They didn't.

They wrote a militia amendment.

If your claim was true, there woudln't have been a ban on handguns in Washington DC in 1975, and thus Heller would never have been a ruling.

See above. You have proven nothing.

Actually it's you who have proven nothing. "The Right of the PEOPLE" is the only important part of the phrase. The militia part is merely the predicate.

 

[2aguy]

Wow, just wow.

I really don't think I can lower myself to your level. So I'll leave you to wallow in your own poop.

Bye.

You hate the 2nd Amendment, but you have nothing to attack it with other than made up foolishness.

 

[2aguy]

Horseshit, and proof it is horseshit is the militia clause.

The second amendment was written to gaurantee that the militia members had the right to bear arms, and since that was just about all males from 16 - 46 or thereabouts, this constitutes 'the people'. So, what was the purpose of the militia?

3 basic functions

1. Policing / Public Order
Militias were the primary law‑and‑order force in many colonies and early states.
Before professional police forces existed, militias handled:

Riot control

Suppressing local uprisings

Enforcing certain laws

Responding to emergencies

This part is absolutely correct.

2. Slave Patrols (in the South)
In slaveholding states.
Militias were legally required to:

Conduct slave patrols

Capture runaways

Suppress revolts

This wasn’t universal across all states, but in the South it was a central function of the militia system.
Historians like Carl Bogus, Sally Hadden, and others have documented this extensively.

3. Defense (external threats)
This was the most publicly emphasized purpose.
Militias were expected to defend communities from:

Foreign invasion

Native nations (in frontier regions)

Piracy or coastal threats

This was the “respectable,” widely advertised justification.

If that was the case, you dumb shit, they would have worded the Amendment....the right of the militia to keep and bear arms. They did not. They stated the "Right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed."

They state the powers of the Judiciary, Congress, and the President, and the state...and they also specifically use the word the People when it came to Rights.

 

[2aguy]

Post #8 proves nothing of the sort.

The phrase "the people" identifies who possesses the right. It does not identify the purpose and scope of the right.

The amendment itself tells you the purpose in the first thirteen words: "A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State..."

You are taking the last half of the sentence and pretending the first half doesn't exist.

That's not constitutional analysis. That's selective reading.

If the framers intended an unlimited free-standing personal right unrelated to militia service, they could have written exactly that.

They didn't.

They wrote a militia amendment.

If your claim was true, there woudln't have been a ban on handguns in Washington DC in 1975, and thus Heller would never have been a ruling.

See above. You have proven nothing.

Moron.....the scope of the right is specifically stated..."Shall not be infringed."

 

[westwall]

If that was the case, you dumb shit, they would have worded the Amendment....the right of the militia to keep and bear arms. They did not. They stated the "Right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed."

They state the powers of the Judiciary, Congress, and the President, and the state...and they also specifically use the word the People when it came to Rights.

Isn't funny how these "intellectuals" think that GOVERNMENT needs to have rights spelled out?

Governments HAVE no rights, PEOPLE do.

 

[Failzero]

Look at disarmed UK & Iran

 

[M14 Shooter]

Actually it's you who have proven nothing. "The Right of the PEOPLE" is the only important part of the phrase. The militia part is merely the predicate.

As proven in post #8.

 

[frigidweirdo]

You're right -it's an epic fail.

Even if your statement weren't an outright lie, fact remains the amendment they ratified has no such specification.

If you can make your case, you do not need me to answer your questions.
Each state can specify who can and cannot be in its militia, even going so far as to disband it entirely -- thus, there is no right for anyone to be associated with it.

You haven't written anything worth responding to.

 

[frigidweirdo]

Isn't funny how these "intellectuals" think that GOVERNMENT needs to have rights spelled out?

Governments HAVE no rights, PEOPLE do.

******* hell, how stupid are you?

Nobody has said that governments have rights.

The rights in the US Constitution are powers TAKEN AWAY FROM THE US GOVERNMENT.

It's incredible the replies on here, just the complete lack of ability to even understand what people are writing. It's embarrassing.

 

[frigidweirdo]

Moron.....the scope of the right is specifically stated..."Shall not be infringed."

So, nobody shall have their right infringed upon?

Not prisoners in prisons? No executions because if you're executing someone, you're infringing on all their rights? Not children? Not people getting on planes?

No, we don't infringe at all???? EVER

 

[frigidweirdo]

You hate the 2nd Amendment, but you have nothing to attack it with other than made up foolishness.

Except I'm the only one taking a source from the Founding Fathers, pulling out the quotes and posting them on here.

You, M14Shooter, Westwall, you're all too ******* uneducated to even be able to do that simple thing. You just post "no, no, I don't like what you say, it's wrong. I know it's wrong because, because... looking, you're an idiot because... because... you say something I don't like".

It's like speaking to children.

 

[M14 Shooter]

You haven't written anything worth responding to.

I accept your surrender.
Came sooner than expected.

 

[M14 Shooter]

Except I'm the only one taking a source from the Founding Fathers, pulling out the quotes and posting them on here.

And you're too stupid to understand what they -didn't- ratify doesn't mean squat when determining what they -did- ratify.
If they took verbiage out, it's because they did not intend for the effect created by that verbiage.

What -did- they ratify?

"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 right of the people to keep and bear arms.
Not the right of the militia
Not the right of the people in the militia
The right of the people.

As no one - no person, no one among the people- has the right to associate with the militia in any way, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, and the exercise thereof, as protected by the 2nd, MUST exist independent of a person's relationship to the militia.

Thus: The court got it right, and you have no capacity whatsoever to demonstrate otherwise.

You may now lie to us some more.

 

[M14 Shooter]

******* hell, how stupid are you?

^^
Indescribable, unquantifiable irony.

 

[2aguy]

So, nobody shall have their right infringed upon?

Not prisoners in prisons? No executions because if you're executing someone, you're infringing on all their rights? Not children? Not people getting on planes?

No, we don't infringe at all???? EVER

What a stupid argument. Citizens who are not criminals shall not be infringed, you dope. Criminals receive due process and then have their Rights stripped. You are a typical, left wing, dumb ass.

 

[2aguy]

Except I'm the only one taking a source from the Founding Fathers, pulling out the quotes and posting them on here.

You, M14Shooter, Westwall, you're all too ******* uneducated to even be able to do that simple thing. You just post "no, no, I don't like what you say, it's wrong. I know it's wrong because, because... looking, you're an idiot because... because... you say something I don't like".

It's like speaking to children.

We post the 2nd Amendment....clear language, that only began to be questioned when assholes like you decided you wanted to ban guns.

 

[westwall]

Look at disarmed UK & Iran

That's what the demofascists want here.

 

[frigidweirdo]

What a stupid argument. Citizens who are not criminals shall not be infringed, you dope. Criminals receive due process and then have their Rights stripped. You are a typical, left wing, dumb ass.

Ah yes, a stupid argument. To suggest that "shall no be infringed" in the Second Amendment means that it "shall not be infringed" is stupid.

We infringe on people's rights all the time, and then say that it "shall not be infringed".

Can the 2A be infringed upon at any point even with due process?

The answer is yes.

So when the 2A says "shall not be infringed", it DOES NOT MEAN "shall not be infringed."

 

[frigidweirdo]

We post the 2nd Amendment....clear language, that only began to be questioned when assholes like you decided you wanted to ban guns.

Is it clear language?

I posted a website that has the debates of the Founding Fathers that says that "bear arms" is synonymous with "render military service" and "militia duty."

In fact different versions of the future 2A had different wording too.

June 8th 1789

"but no person religiously scrupulous of bearing arms shall be compelled to render military service in person."

August 17th 1789

"but no person religiously scrupulous shall be compelled to bear arms."

August 24th 1789

"but no one religiously scrupulous of bearing arms shall be compelled to render military service in person."

So, they went back and forth with this, using "render military service" and "bear arms" to mean the same thing.

In George Washington's SENTIMENTS ON A PEACE ESTABLISHMENT, 1783 he wrote:

"and consequently that the Citizens of America... from 18 to 50 Years of Age should be borne on the Militia Rolls,"

And:

""by making it universally reputable to bear Arms and disgraceful to decline having a share in the performance of Military duties;"

Clearly Washington also saw "bear arms" as the same thing.

Is that not clear?

And I doubt you even understand what I'm writing here.

I'm saying the right to keep arms is the right to own a weapon. And yet here you are saying my argument is about banning guns. Huh?

The right to bear arms is the right to be in the militia.


It's logical. The first words of the 2A are "A well regulated militia", what's the clause about? It's about protecting the militia.

How do you do this?

You prevent the govt from taking away people's guns. So they can use those guns in the militia, or give them to people to use in the militia. But if the government can ban people from being in the militia, then there could be no militia.

As Mr Gerry said in the House in 1789:

"Now, I am apprehensive, sir, that this clause would give an opportunity to the people in power to destroy the constitution itself. They can declare who are those religiously scrupulous, and prevent them from bearing arms."

Amendment II: House of Representatives, Amendments to the Constitution

He's saying that if they can say people are religiously scrupulous of being in the militia, they can ban whole groups of people, based on their religion, from being in the militia, and therefore destroy the militia as an effective check and balance and therefore destroy the Constitution by having a dictatorship take over.

But you just don't bother to read, or understand, what people post. You've decided already what you think I've said, and you go with that. It's ridiculous.

 

[M14 Shooter]

Can the 2A be infringed upon at any point even with due process?
The answer is yes.

Your ignorance knows no bounds.
Rights can be taken away through due process - the right to vote, the right to keep and bear arms, the right to life.
Once a right has been removed it cannot infringed upon.

So when the 2A says "shall not be infringed", it DOES NOT MEAN "shall not be infringed."

Tell us:
What did the people who wrote debated and ratified the Bill of Rights mean by "shall not be infringed"?
What restrictions on firearms did they intend the 2nd Amendment to allow?
Prove your claims to be true.