Tero wrote:Nothing in there about owning guns to overturn a tyrannical federal government:
That's because that's not what that particular case was about. The protection of the RKBA to protect the capacity of the people to overthrow a tyrant has been addressed elsewhere in case law, and more specifically by the Framers themselves during the drafting and ratification process of the Constitution itself. You may peruse the Federalist (and even the anti-federalist) Papers for said explanations.
...Second Amendment to the United States Constitution applies to federal enclaves and protects an individual's right to possess a firearm for traditionally lawful purposes, such as self-defense within the home....
As it applies to the claims of the plaintiff in this case.
"Although we do not undertake an exhaustive historical analysis today of the full scope of the Second Amendment, nothing in our opinion should be taken to cast doubt on longstanding prohibitions on the possession of firearms by felons and the mentally ill, or laws forbidding the carrying of firearms in sensitive places such as schools and government buildings, or laws imposing conditions and qualifications on the commercial sale of arms."
Did you bother to read the not-exhaustive analysis they did undertake?
Further, it does not define arms or limit banning certain types of arms.
Indeed. The Heller case was mostly about handguns in the home for personal protection, which was the aspect of the general RKBA being denied by the District of Columbia. The Court went on in
McDonald v. City of Chicago to further expand the
Heller ruling.
A prior case,
Presser v. Illinois made it perfectly clear that the 2nd Amendment protects the authority of the Congress to raise armies against STATE infringement of the individual RKBA:
It is undoubtedly true that all citizens capable of bearing arms constitute the reserved military force or reserve militia of the United States as well as of the States, and in view of this prerogative of the general government, as well as of its general powers, the States cannot, even laying the constitutional provision in question out of view, prohibit the people from keeping and bearing arms, so as to deprive the United States of their rightful resource for maintaining the public security, and disable the people from performing their duty to the general government.
This case placed the banning of, quite specifically,
arms of a military nature and utility, beyond the power of the states, thus preserving the power and ability of Congress to raise armies as stated in the Constitution.
Another case,
United States v. Miller The Court said:
In the absence of any evidence tending to show that possession or use of a "shotgun having a barrel of less than eighteen inches in length" at this time has some reasonable relationship to the preservation or efficiency of a well regulated militia, we cannot say that the Second Amendment guarantees the right to keep and bear such an instrument. Certainly it is not within judicial notice that this weapon is any part of the ordinary military equipment, or that its use could contribute to the common defense.
...
The Constitution, as originally adopted, granted to the Congress power --
To provide for calling forth the Militia to execute the Laws of the Union, suppress Insurrections and repel Invasions; To provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining, the Militia, and for governing such Part of them as may be employed in the Service of the United States, reserving to the States respectively, the Appointment of the Officers, and the Authority of training the Militia according to the discipline prescribed by Congress.
With obvious purpose to assure the continuation and render possible the effectiveness of such forces, the declaration and guarantee of the Second Amendment were made. It must be interpreted and applied with that end in view.
The Militia which the States were expected to maintain and train is set in contrast with Troops which they [p179] were forbidden to keep without the consent of Congress. The sentiment of the time strongly disfavored standing armies; the common view was that adequate defense of country and laws could be secured through the Militia -- civilians primarily, soldiers on occasion.
The signification attributed to the term Militia appears from the debates in the Convention, the history and legislation of Colonies and States, and the writings of approved commentators. These show plainly enough that the Militia comprised all males physically capable of acting in concert for the common defense. "A body of citizens enrolled for military discipline." And further, that ordinarily, when called for service these men were expected to appear bearing arms supplied by themselves and of the kind in common use at the time.(emphasis added)
Miller stands for the proposition that because the Court was not presented with evidence (of which there are actually volumes) showing that a sawed-off shotgun is "part of the ordinary military equipment [of a soldier], or that its use could contribute to the common defense", the requirements of the National Firearms Act for registration of such arms are not an unconstitutional trenchment on the 2nd Amendment rights of Miller (who was dead at the time). But the equally important fact of the ruling is the obverse, which is that if "arms" are "ordinary military equipment, or that its use could contribute to the common defense," then possession of such arms is in fact protected by the 2nd Amendment. Had Miller not been a felon, and had he registered his short shotgun in the NFA registry, then his possession and interstate transport of said short shotgun could not have been denied by the federal government.
There are tens of thousands of properly NFA-registered, civilian-owned short-barreled shotguns in private hands in the U.S. today, as well as short-barreled rifles, hand grenades, artillery field pieces and ammunition, machine guns, suppressors and other NFA items that are regulated,
but not banned by the National Firearms Act.
You see, the NFA does not ban ANY firearms, it is a tax law that imposes a transfer tax of $200 on the transfer of specific types and classes of "arms" and which requires that they be registered with the federal government, and in some cases, that the owner must notify the government if they intend to move such items interstate.
The reason the NFA was written as a tax measure that requires registration
as an artifact of the articles being taxed, like alcohol and tobacco is because the federal government
cannot ban individual "arms" that have either military utility (as all arms do) or are suitable for the common defense (as most arms are) or are effective for individual self defense (as most arms are), and that includes all "arms" as defined by common understandings of the extremely broad word "arms."
In
Heller the Court held, "(a) The Amendment’s prefatory clause announces a purpose, but does not limit or expand the scope of the second part, the operative clause. The operative clause’s text and history demonstrate that it connotes an individual right to keep and bear arms. Pp. 2–22.
(b) The prefatory clause comports with the Court’s interpretation of the operative clause. The “militia” comprised all males physically capable of acting in concert for the common defense.
The Antifederalists feared that the Federal Government would disarm the people in order to disable this citizens’ militia, enabling a politicized standing army or a select militia to rule. The response was to deny Congress power to abridge the ancient right of individuals to keep and bear arms, so that the ideal of a citizens’ militia would be preserved. (emphasis added)"
So, what we end up with today is the following:
The 2nd Amendment was enacted to protect an individual right to keep and bear arms of a military nature, ie: "ordinary military equipment" and/or military arms that "could contribute to the common defense that are in "common use" by the citizenry (
Presser, Miller), which today includes the most popular "military-style" semi-automatic, magazine-fed sporting rifles in in the U.S., the AR-15 style rifle as well as other rifles, shotguns and handguns suitable for contributing to the common defense, which means every single rifle, pistol and shotgun, including sawed-off shotguns, short-barreled rifles and short-barreled shotguns, in existence today, because ALL such arms meet one of the two requisite qualifications; "ordinary military equipment" or capable of "contribut[ing] to the common defense, which as a matter of obvious fact applies to all firearms available today.
Further, the 2nd Amendment was ALSO enacted to protect the individual right to keep and bear arms for personal, non-militia-associated self defense, specifically INCLUDING the keeping and bearing of handguns (
Heller, McDonald), and no state may enact laws which effectively prohibit such keeping and bearing of arms (
Heller, McDonald) at least in one's home, and elsewhere according to state laws which do not violate the fundamental protections of the 2nd Amendment.
To summarize, the 2nd Amendment protects the right of the individual to keep and bear arms (not just firearms) of a military nature and utility and arms of utility for personal defense in the home (and elsewhere as allowed by state law), and that right, being incorporated and applicable to the several states by the 14th Amendment, prohibits the states from regulating the keeping and bearing of arms in ways that would infringe upon either the Congress' ability to raise a pre-armed army or an individuals ability to defend himself, which happens to include defending himself against all enemies, foreign and domestic, of the United States of America, both as an individual and as an active member of the Organized Militia, keeping and bearing his own arms for those purposes.
And yes, the 2nd Amendment says all of that in just twenty-seven words, "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."
It's a marvel of concise, precise verbiage that demonstrates the brilliance of the Framers in saying exactly what they mean in just a few words.
And yes, it means exactly that the government, state and federal, cannot ban "certain types of arms" so long as those arms have military or personal defense utility, which is pretty much true of all "arms" other than "weapons of mass destruction" and certainly includes every handgun, rifle and shotgun ever made or to be made.
"Seth is Grandmaster Zen Troll who trains his victims to troll themselves every time they think of him" Robert_S
"All that is required for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing." Edmund Burke
"Those who support denying anyone the right to keep and bear arms for personal defense are fully complicit in every crime that might have been prevented had the victim been effectively armed." Seth
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