[ExI] Upon pondering your freedoms

[BillK]

On Sat, Jul 5, 2008 at 2:55 PM, spike wrote:
>>...On Behalf Of Damien Broderick
>> I wonder if you could clarify one small point, Spike, for the
>> sake of a visiting outlander. What was meant by that
>> strangely anomalous opening passage "A well regulated
>> militia, being necessary to the security of a free state"? ...
>>
>
> That's the bad news Damien.  That comment means we can be drafted.  Anyone
> who owns weapons or has the right to own weapons is automatically part of
> the militia that is necessary to the security.  Most everyone here would
> agree that Americans are already well regulated, extremely regulated.
> Regulated to the edge of insanity we are.  Every freedom has its price.  The
> possibility of receiving a draft notice is ours.
>


Spike,

Damien is poking a stick in the anthill of the gun control argument.  ;)

He surely knows the interpretation of this phrase is argued both ways
by pro and anti gun control factions.

My reading of this is along similar lines to the interpretation of
Bible phrases. You have to go back in time and understand the social
and political circumstances applying at the time it was written. This
often leads to the conclusion that the saying cannot apply nowadays
because the context doesn't apply nowadays. Bible fundamentalists
rarely do the required study, preferring to choose the interpretation
that conveniently fits the point they wish to fight for. (They even
forget that the English authorised version of the Bible has already
been interpretated into the old English of 1611 by selecting
translations of ancient Hebrew and Greek words and the old English
words themselves no longer have the same meaning and connotations as
when they were written).



When the U.S. Constitution was adopted, each of the states had its own
"militia" - a military force comprised of ordinary citizens serving as
part-time soldiers. The militia was "well-regulated" in the sense that
its members were subject to various requirements such as training,
supplying their own firearms, and engaging in military exercises away
from home. It was a form of compulsory military service intended to
protect the fledgling nation from outside forces and from internal
rebellions.

The U.S. Constitution established a permanent professional army,
controlled by the federal government. With the memory of King George
III's troops fresh in their minds, many of the "anti-Federalists"
feared a standing army as an instrument of oppression. State militias
were viewed as a counterbalance to the federal army and the Second
Amendment was written to prevent the federal government from disarming
the 'amateur' state militias.

The argument that continues today is whether a personal right to bear
arms is necessary for the maintenance of state militias as a
counterbalance to US federal militia. It certainly was at the time it
was written, as the state soldiers used their own weapons in the state
military service.   But is it necessary nowadays????

The debate continues........