The main lie of the NRA and other Gun Fetish Clowns is that the Second Amendment to the US Constitution grants citizens unlimited rights to gun ownership. When confronted with the clear language of the Second Amendment about “a well regulated Militia,” their reply is that the Founding Fathers wanted a citizen militia as a bulwark against government tyranny. This is pure revisionist history. The fact is that the Second Amendment established “a well regulated Militia” for exactly the opposite purpose.
Read the Militia Act of 1792, passed by Congress and signed by President George Washington less than three years after the Second Amendment, and notice what it says in Section 1. The Act provides for the authority of the president to call out the militia in the event of foreign invasion or “in case of an insurrection in any state against the government” and to mobilize as many troops “as he may judge sufficient to suppress such insurrection.” Section 2 goes on to give the president the right to call forth the militia if any state opposes or obstructs the laws of the United States to suppress the opposition and impose federal law. Section 3 allows for military force to be used against insurgents is “in the judgment of the President.” The Act goes on to set into law that members of the militia are in the service of and paid by the United States government and are required, under threat of court-martial, “to obey the orders of the President of the United States.” A second part of the Militia Act, passed six days later, provides that “each and every free able-bodied white male citizen” between 18 and 45 years be enrolled in his state’s militia and sets down regulations for these “well regulated Militias.”
The Militia Act was debated and approved by the same Founding Fathers who debated and approved the Second Amendment. There is little doubt that this Act is in keeping with the intent of the Second Amendment. There is also no question that any argument that the Second Amendment established a right of a citizen to take up arms against the United States government is pure fantasy. One need only look up the Whiskey Rebellion of 1794 to see the intent of President George Washington and the other Founding Fathers regarding the type of “rise up against government tyranny” insurrection of Tea Party bumper stickers.
Note: It is also good to keep in mind that the establishment of state militias was instead of a standing Federal army. This was for several political reasons, none of which meant they were construed as not being commanded and controlled by the Federal government.
July 31, 2014 6:28 AM
