| Whenever you set it up so that one group of people are armed and another group is defenseless, the second group exists entirely at the mercy of the first. That's really the problem here - not that government isn't made up of citizens (obviously, it is), but that the act of banning firearms sets up a major inequity in terms of real power. No one is saying "no one should have guns", they're saying "Only these people should have guns". That's a recipe for tyranny. As for the purpose of the 2A, it's not exactly a long amendment. "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." The verbiage was revised multiple times to make it more clear that the purpose was military, and applied to protection against internal threats as well as external. For example, take Tench Coxe's words printed in the Philadelphia Federal Gazette in June 1789: "As civil rulers, not having their duty to the people duly before them, may attempt to tyrannize, and as the military forces which must be occasionally raised to defend our country, might pervert their power to the injury of their fellow-citizens, the people are confirmed by the next article in their right to keep and bear their private arms." Noah Webster argued in support of this stance as well: "Before a standing army can rule the people must be disarmed; as they are in almost every kingdom in Europe. The supreme power in America cannot enforce unjust laws by the sword; because the whole body of the people are armed, and constitute a force superior to any band of regular troops that can be, on any pretence, raised in the United States." While obviously tyranny was not the only concern addressed by the amendment, it was absolutely an integral part of its original purpose. |