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The Swiss, which some "2nd Fundies" like to point to, don't own their guns or ammo. In fact, over the years (not sure what is in force now), the ammo was locked up at a local armory. The gun was/is owned by the state. So it's a "national guard", not a Wal-Mart 10,000 round armed local...
Soldiers can keep guns at home but not ammo - SWI swissinfo.ch
"With the exception of a few thousand of the 120,000 soldiers in Switzerland's militia army who keep their cartridges at home, all army ammunition will have to be stored in central arsenals. Army guns can still be kept at home."
So that is the "model" many American 2nd Amendment types point to. Why would they use that as an example? Are they simply ignorant...or do they realize that was the intent?
Every round of ammo, like in the military and national guard, is counted...even when locked up.
You're ignoring an important point of your statement, see bolded.
Army ammunition is locked in the central armory, hiwever there's no restriction in buying ammunition at a range and keeping that at home. 5.6mm Gw Pat 90 (the Swiss designation for 5.56mm NATO) is available at most ranges, and while you're supposed to use said ammunition at that range, there's no restriction from taking your unused ammunition with you when you leave.
So while you can dance with glee at the implication there's no ammunition for issued weapons, that implication is not true. Sorry to disappoint.
Very little
Original
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.
My version
A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the non felon and sound of mind people to keep and bear small arms shall not be infringed.
IE non criminals and crazy and no, you cannot have a cannon.
Note the original amendment was meant to arm state militias as a counterweight against a federal army. I find it funny that many 2nd amendment protagonists just love a large federal army.
Alot of the cannons during the Revolutionary War were privately owned. Many privately owned ships had them.
Very little
Original
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.
My version
A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the non felon and sound of mind people to keep and bear small arms shall not be infringed.
IE non criminals and crazy and no, you cannot have a cannon.
Note the original amendment was meant to arm state militias as a counterweight against a federal army. I find it funny that many 2nd amendment protagonists just love a large federal army.
You are wrong about the cannon Col.Kinney bought a howitzer for his infantry and artillery unit of 27 members called "The Kinney Guards" it still stands in Greenlawn Cemetery Portsmouth Ohio watching over Soldiers lot.From the book Scioto County and the Pioneer Record Southern Ohio page 624 under military affairs at the bottom of the page.
Here is another example of citizen owning their weapons not receiving them from the government.War of 1812 peoples patriotism surprised the government that they could not supply all the men so to meet the emergency the VOLUNTEERS in many cases took their OWN weapons.Pioneers of Scioto County Ohio ...
I would write it exactly as it is......the real question is how you can educate a populace that can't read english to read and comprehend it.....
"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."
Ask a number of English majors that have no dog in the fight to translate that for you.
Ask any English major, and they would tell you that the sentence has faulty syntax. If they had written:
"Because a well regulated Militia is necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms shall not be infringed." that would have been grammatically correct.
I doubt that we're going to amend the Constitution just to correct the grammar. Even if we changed it to the above version, there would still be dispute over the purpose of the "well-regulated" term. Does militia mean a bunch of average citizens grabbing their guns to go fight the enemy, or does "well-regulated" imply that this applies only to a more official, organized force?
To be unambiguous, we could just have, as others have suggested, "The right of the people to keep and bear Arms shall not be infringed." However, if we were to rewrite the 2nd amendment, I would take that opportunity to make it clear that certain arms, such as nuclear weapons and biological weapons, may be outlawed, and that certain people, such as mentally ill or convicted violent criminals, may be prohibited from bearing arms.
"The natural, individual right of the people to keep and bear arms, being a condition of their very existence, shall not be infringed in anyway whatsoever."
And I would rewrite the 9th and 10th Amendments to further clarify just how little the federal government should be doing and how natural individual rights work.
It's fine as it is but if it were to be changed I would remove the second comma and replace it with the word "and" for clarity.
A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state and the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.
Its meaning was clear enough to the people of the times it was written in but our writing and speaking style has changed since then which has led to misinterpretations. Sometimes intentional misinterpretations. The clarity would prove useful.
Personally, I would just eliminate the explanatory clause and make it "The right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed." That explanatory clause has been the excuse of the left over the years for almost all of their efforts at gun control.
Why not, you guys have already whited it out (the explanatory clause) anyway.
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