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I believe if you research it you can find quotes from the framers relating to defense against criminal violence as well as against tyrannical government. The Second Amendment, like the First Amendment right to free speech, simply confers a right. What you do with it is up to you. You can use freedom of speech to protest tyrannical government or to produce porn.
The Constitution confers no rights. It merely codifies the ones "endowed by our Creator".
The problem with your question is that the framers would consider it absurd.
If you were to ask them what right is to be divined from the 2nd's words, they would reply with a question asking you to point out where any power was granted to allow government to have any interest whatsoever in the personal arms of the private citizen.
The right does not in any manner depend on what the 2nd Amendment says for its existence; the right to arms exists and is possessed by individuals because of what the body of the Constitution doesn't say.
SCOTUS has been boringly consistent re-affirming this principle for going on 140 years specifically for the right to arms and the 2nd Amendment (two separate, distinct things). Please note that in the very first case deemed to be a "2nd Amendment case", the Court is recognizing the right of bearing arms in public by two ex-slaves (then citizens) for the purpose of self defence from the KKK in 1873 Louisiana, a state that had no official "state militia", it having been disbanded by Congress:
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Supreme Court, 1876: "The right there specified is that of "bearing arms for a lawful purpose." This is not a right granted by the Constitution. Neither is it in any manner dependent upon that instrument for its existence. The second amendment declares that it shall not be infringed, . . ."
Supreme Court, 1886: "the right of the people to keep and bear arms is not a right granted by the Constitution. Neither is it in any manner dependent upon that instrument for its existence. The Second Amendment declares that it shall not be infringed, . . . "
Supreme Court, 2008: "it has always been widely understood that the Second Amendment, like the First and Fourth Amendments, codified a pre-existing right. The very text of the Second Amendment implicitly recognizes the pre-existence of the right and declares only that it “shall not be infringed.” As we said in . . . 1876 , “[t]his is not a right granted by the Constitution. Neither is it in any manner dependent upon that instrument for its existence. The Second amendment declares that it shall not be infringed … .”
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All the 2nd Amendment can be said to "say" or "do" is redundantly forbid the federal government to exercise powers it was never granted.
All this discussion about what the 2nd allows the citizen to do is absurd.
None of this resolves the question of what the right of the People to "bear arms" means, which does matter, because that is the right that Congress shall not infringe. Congress, of course, has the powers to organize, train, and discipline the Militia. Looking at the 2nd Amendment's preamble, Congress' power over the Militia suggests that the People's arms are, in fact, the interest of Congress (especially in combination with the Necessary and Proper Clause). Thus the meaning of "bear" in context becomes crucial (arms, too, but that is something of a digression). Congress also has expansive powers over commerce, which certainly include interests in the purchase and sale of firearms under the last ~80 years of Commerce Clause doctrine.
Congress also has expansive powers over commerce, which certainly include interests in the purchase and sale of firearms under the last ~80 years of Commerce Clause doctrine.
Not true.... Congress was to have powers over interstate commerce, not commerce in general or commerce within the state. However the Supreme Court has pretty much interpreted that clause to give the feds a virtual blank check on power and authority.
Not true.... Congress was to have powers over interstate commerce, not commerce in general or commerce within the state. However the Supreme Court has pretty much interpreted that clause to give the feds a virtual blank check on power and authority.
It is reasonably clear that the Revolutionary Founding Fathers intended an armed citizenry capable of overthrowing an oppressive govermnent
It is also clear that the grand conspiracy that determines what the Constitution means has rejected that intent. The NRA, The Courts, The Congress, The President and the The Public have all decided we are not willing to live with the intent of the founders as established in the Constitution.
So basically we have amended it by a rump procedure. That procedure is effective though.
I would think a liberal court could well further modify the ruling to allow the banning of hand guns or even rifled guns. The great gunnie victory is loaded with long term risk.
None of this resolves the question of what the right of the People to "bear arms" means, which does matter, because that is the right that Congress shall not infringe.
Congress can't infringe on the right because Congress was never granted any powers to act against the right.
Quote:
Originally Posted by TheCityTheBridge
Congress, of course, has the powers to organize, train, and discipline the Militia.
Which, using the interpretive rule of Expressio unius est exclusio alterius ("the express mention of one thing excludes all others") means private citizens that are not enrolled militia members (along with their personal arms), are excluded from any powers granted to Congress over the militia.
Quote:
Originally Posted by TheCityTheBridge
Looking at the 2nd Amendment's preamble, Congress' power over the Militia suggests that the People's arms are, in fact, the interest of Congress (especially in combination with the Necessary and Proper Clause).
The 2nd Amendment has never been inspected to inform or held to inform upon any aspect of militia organization, training or control. The 2nd Amendment was only mentioned one time in the cases decided by SCOTUS to settle conflicts between states and the federal government over militia powers, only to note it offered nothing of substance (Justice Story's dissent in Houston v Moore, 1820)
Quote:
Originally Posted by TheCityTheBridge
Thus the meaning of "bear" in context becomes crucial (arms, too, but that is something of a digression).
Except that SCOTUS has held for nearly 140 years that the right to arms does not in any manner depend on the words of the 2nd Amendment for its existence.
Your argument for inventing powers to injure rights by misconstructing the provisions intended to secure rights, is precisely what the Federalists warned us about and why they vehemently opposed adding a bill of rights to the Constitution:
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"I . . . affirm that bills of rights, in the sense and to the extent in which they are contended for, are not only unnecessary in the proposed Constitution, but would even be dangerous. They would contain various exceptions to powers not granted; and, on this very account, would afford a colorable pretext to claim more than were granted. For why declare that things shall not be done which there is no power to do?
Why, for instance, should it be said that [a fundamental right] shall not be restrained, when no power is given by which restrictions may be imposed? I will not contend that such a provision would confer a regulating power; but it is evident that it would furnish, to men disposed to usurp, a plausible pretense for claiming that power.
They might urge with a semblance of reason, that the Constitution ought not to be charged with the absurdity of providing against the abuse of an authority which was not given, and that the provision against restraining [a fundamental right] afforded a clear implication, that a power to prescribe proper regulations concerning it was intended to be vested in the national government. This may serve as a specimen of the numerous handles which would be given to the doctrine of constructive powers, by the indulgence of an injudicious zeal for bills of rights."
The Federalist 84
(paragraph breaks added)
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Quote:
Originally Posted by TheCityTheBridge
Congress also has expansive powers over commerce, which certainly include interests in the purchase and sale of firearms under the last ~80 years of Commerce Clause doctrine.
Congress claims extraordinary (extra-constitutional) powers under the commerce clause. Interestingly, the expansion of gun control under the commerce clause followed the 1942 insertion of the "militia right" and "state's right" perversions of the 2nd Amendment into the federal courts; Cases v. U.S, 131 F.2d 916 (1 st Cir. 1942) and U.S. v. Tot, 131 F.2d 261 (3 rd Cir. 1942) respectively.
Now, how laws written under the "authority" of the commerce clause came to be defended by claiming Congressional power to regulate the militia, is an exercise in logical and legal gymnastics that only a limber, "disposed to usurp" anti-gunner can explain . . .
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