(July 24, 2015 at 10:10 pm)AFTT47 Wrote:(July 24, 2015 at 9:57 pm)tjakey Wrote: As it stands the current interpretations of the 2ed Amendment are in stark contrast to the intent of those who wrote the Constitution. But what else to expect from a government that, long ago, sold itself to the highest bidder. And there are no higher bidders than those who profit from violence, war, and death.[/color][/size][/font]
I don't think that is correct. As far as I know, all the founders were against the government having the power to disarm the citizens.
Be careful here because this is exactly the same game the religious right plays with the First Amendment and the establishment clause - claiming the founders didn't really want to keep the church out of government. Most of us are familiar with the founder's writings on the subject of church-state separation which make clear their intentions. I'm too lazy to go searching for it but I believe it's the same with the 2nd Amendment. Whether they would have felt the same way in today's world is another matter. That's what amendments are for.
The problem that fundies have is that they fail to comprehend that the courts have interpreted the First Amendment's "Establishment Clause" on the basis of subsequent cases.
Feel free to look through this if you like.
http://law2.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ft...abinto.htm
The purpose of the militia crack in the 2d amendment has, sadly, to do with slavery.
http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/13890...ve-slavery
Quote:the people of Virginia in jeopardy, and their peace and tranquility gone."
So Madison, who had (at Jefferson's insistence) already begun to prepare proposed amendments to the Constitution, changed his first draft of one that addressed the militia issue to make sure it was unambiguous that the southern states could maintain their slave patrol militias.
His first draft for what became the Second Amendment had said: "The right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed; a well armed, and well regulated militia being the best security of a free country [emphasis mine]: but no person religiously scrupulous of bearing arms, shall be compelled to render military service in person."
But Henry, Mason and others wanted southern states to preserve their slave-patrol militias independent of the federal government. So Madison changed the word "country" to the word "state," and redrafted the Second Amendment into today's form:
Quote:"A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State [emphasis mine], the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed."
Little did Madison realize that one day in the future weapons-manufacturing corporations, newly defined as "persons" by a Supreme Court some have called dysfunctional, would use his slave patrol militia amendment to protect their "right" to manufacture and sell assault weapons used to murder schoolchildren.
