THE SECOND AMENDMENT

The belief that the second Amendment to the constitution prohibits any and all gun control is the most famous falsehood that the NRA spreads and it is the basis for most of the other lies the NRA tells.

The second amendment says "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."

What this says to most people is "A well regulated militia shall not be infringed". It also gives 2 reasons for a well regulated militia:
1) the security of a free state, and
2) the right of the people to keep and bear arms.

Now before anyone begins foaming at the mouth and calling me a "gungrabber", understand that I do believe that the American people SHOULD have the right to bear arms, but like any other right, there has to be some common sense restrictions. And I am saying that the 2nd amendment does not guarantee the right to bear arms and it certainly does not prohibit most gun control laws proposed in this country.

There are a few things you need to consider:

The Supreme Court has ruled several times that the 2nd amendment does not prohibit gun control. Most notably, in 1939, in "United States vs Miller", a man was arrested for transporting a sawed off shotgun across state lines without registering the weapon or paying the $200 tax required by the National Firearms Act of 1934. He argued that this was a violation of his 2nd amendment rights. The supreme court stated that: "In the absence of any evidence tending to show that possession or use of a shotgun having a barrel of less than eighteen inches in length at this time has some reasonable relationship to the preservation or efficiency of a well regulated militia, we cannot say that the Second Amendment guarantees the right to keep and bear such an instrument."

More recently, former Chief Justice Warren Burger, a staunch conservative and gun owner, called the NRA's position on the 2nd amendment an outright fraud.

Even the American Bar Association has taken the official position that the 2nd amendment does not prohibit gun control.

I think its amusing how some people like to mention that the Brady bill has been seriously challenged in court on constitutional grounds. Yet what they fail to mention is that it is NOT being challenged on the basis of the 2nd Amendment. Instead, it is being challenged on the basis of the 10th amendment. Why? Because even the NRA lawyers know that the 2nd amendment does not prohibit gun control.

Also, consider this; the NRA likes to say that there are twenty thousand gun control laws on the books in this country. If all these gun laws are unconstitutional why haven't the NRA lawyers seen this as twenty thousand opportunities to use the 2nd amendment to repeal these laws? The obvious answer is again that the NRA knows that the second amendment does not support their position.

One of the main arguments of gun extremists is that the word "Militia" in the second amendment refers to the people collectively who own guns. There may be some truth to this claim, but what does the 2nd amendment say about the Militia? Well, first and foremost it says it should be "well regulated". Obviously, the founding fathers did not consider this to be an infringement on the rights of gun owners. The gun extremists often claim that "well regulated" means well trained, but here on Earth, well regulated still means well regulated - like the way the use and ownership of cars is well regulated.

Yes, Americans should have the right to own a gun for hunting, target practice, and even self defense. But the 2nd amendment does not prohibit the kind of common sense restrictions that the American people are demanding.

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