Let’s talk about the most outdated phrase contained in the U.S. Constitution. Let’s talk about the Second Amendment. The U.S. Supreme Court today took up a case challenging the District of Columbia’s handgun ban. Let me tell you why both the ban’s defenders and opponents are missing the point.
The Second Amendment was written at a time when the U.S. military consisted of men with muskets, swords, and some cannons. That was it. That was the military industrial complex of the late eighteenth century. It was adopted by a country that had just used the muskets, swords, and horses of private citizens to throw off what they perceived as an oppressive government. It was adopted to preserve the ability of those same citizens to throw off the newly forming government in case it became oppressive. The “right to bear arms” is a product of its times. Its time has long since passed.
Say the U.S. government became oppressive. I’m not going to argue about whether it already is, this is a hypothetical. Assume that every firearm-owning private citizen were in agreement about this and thought it a good idea to form the “well-regulated militia” against the government. Say they took their pistols, rifles, semi-automatic weapons, and the occasional decommissioned machine gun or artillery piece and tried to overthrow the government.
Line them all up against the U.S. military and you know what would happen? They would get massacred. Cutting through all the rhetoric on both sides, that is why the Second Amendment is outdated and irrelevant. The Second Amendment wasn’t about allowing citizens to go hunting, protect their homes, or fight off street hoods. The Second Amendment was about allowing the citizenry enough firepower to overthrow their government if it became oppressive. As the modern military has evolved that has become a laughable proposition.
Modern first-world governments are not and cannot be overthrown by citizens bearing small arms. Modern governments are overthrown through non-violent political and social action. The Second Amendment’s purpose has long since faded into the history books. It’s time to let the “right to bear arms” do the same.
March 19th, 2008 at 1:50 pm
Or change the 2nd amendment to include smart bombs and grendades.
March 29th, 2008 at 3:29 pm
But the Constitutional Framers were genius enough to think that the country might survive far, far into the future - hundreds of years beyond the world they knew and understood - and that’s why our Constitution is a living document. Its brilliance is its elasticity.
I don’t think it’s wise to start tossing out - or adding - amendments. See: Prohibition. Then see: The Amendment Repealing Prohibition.
Taking arms out of the hands of law-abiding Americans isn’t going to lessen any crime rates and frankly, neither would forking over a gun to all Americans as “personal defense.” But as an American, I appreciate having the right to choose - for myself - whether I’d like to take the ultimate personal responsibility of owning a firearm and deciding when, how and where to use it, knowing full well that my choices affect my own life and the lives of others. I don’t want the government taking rights away from me. It starts with one right and then, it’s something else - and something else…