The Second Amendment, in its Historical Context

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.

That single sentence, which makes up the entirety of the U.S. Constitution' s Second Amendment, is at the heart of America's newly reinvigorated debate on gun control. On Wednesday, President Obama announced that as a result of the massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary in Newtown, Connecticut, he was forming a gun task force that will look for ways to curb gun violence across the country. The task force, which will be led by Vice President Biden, is expected to urge Congress to re-introduce the Federal Assault Weapons Ban that expired in 2004. The committee is also expected to recommend that mandatory background checks be implemented on any person seeking to purchase a firearm.

The typically outspoken National Rifle Association (NRA) is currently preparing to "push back" against the surging gun control movement. At a press conference on Friday, NRA Vice President Wayne LaPierre said that the right to bear arms should be protected, and that video games and movies play a bigger role in fostering a violent culture. So it seems like a Constitutional confrontation is quickly approaching. The NRA and its backers are adamant in insisting that the Constitution unequivocally supports the right of gun ownership for all law abiding American citizens.

But does it really?

Up until 2008, the strongest and most common argument against the defined rights outlined in the Second Amendment pertained to its reference of a “well regulated militia". Militias, which are paramilitary forces comprised of and operated by average citizens, were the only real line of defense for Americans after the Revolutionary War. The only national standing army, the Continental Army, was disbanded after the revolution ended in 1783. And a strong, centralized army wouldn't be re-created until the Legion of the United States was established in 1791, after the Constitution had been ratified and put into place.

Nowadays, the United States has a vastly powerful military with several branches, so militias aren't needed to defend the country anymore. American militias in the 21st century are small, cloistered groups of right-wing pseudo patriots that stockpile weapons in the backwoods because they fear a United Nations and/or lizard people takeover of the Federal government.

In other words, they're a collection of nut jobs.

So since "well regulated militias" are a thing of the past, it would seem logical to reexamine the wording of the Second Amendment, right? Well, not according to the United States Supreme Court. In the 2008 District of Columbia v. Heller case, the Supreme Court ruled in a 5-4 decision that the Second Amendment allows for individuals to legally possess firearms, even if they aren't members of a militia. Furthermore, in the 2010 McDonald v. Chicago case, the court ruled in another 5-4 decision that the ruling made in District of Columbia v. Heller applied to all state and local governments, and not just federal enclaves like Washington D.C. So the "well regulated militia" argument is essentially dead, even though a lot of people (myself included) disagree with the Court's interpretation of that phrase.

However, there is another historical element to the Second Amendment that is never discussed in the gun control debate: the nature of “arms” in the 18th century. When the Constitution was written, there were only three different kinds of “arms”: muskets, pistols, and rifles. Muskets, the weapon of choice for the colonists and the British during the American Revolution, were single shot, muzzle loaded weapons that were very inaccurate and had a slow rate of fire. The pistols of this era were also single shot weapons with spotty accuracy and a slow rate of fire. Rifles, while more accurate than the former two weapons, had an even slower rate of fire and were typically relegated to hunting expeditions.

All three of these weapons were used to perform feasible tasks in their day and age. Cities and towns were sparsely protected by any official army or police force, so they were a good tool for self defense. Grocery stores weren’t around yet, so hunting was a necessity for many people if they wanted to eat. However, none of the aforementioned weapons could turn any single, unstable individual into a killing machine. They couldn’t fire off dozens of highly accurate rounds in a span of a few seconds. They couldn’t be reloaded in seconds. They couldn’t be tweaked and remolded in ways that made them even more deadly.

Our 21st century weaponry was inconceivable to the Founding Fathers. Their concept of guns and a full-fledged national military were vastly different from the concepts that we now recognize. Therefore, it’s unwise to accept the current wording of the Second Amendment as applicable in 2012.

This isn’t a shocking or unpatriotic thing to say. Contrary to the common position touted by many Conservative pundits, the U.S. Constitution is not an untouchable, insoluble document. The Founding Fathers designed the Constitution so that new amendments could be added on and older ones could be repealed, and they did this for a reason. They, unlike their pseudo contemporaries, recognized that as times change, it’s occasionally necessary to alter the Constitution to reflect new universal standards. Remember, this document once endorsed the concept of slavery, barred women from voting, and forbid the commercial distribution of alcohol. All of those unsavory elements of the Constitution were eventually nullified.

Now, it’s time to recognize that average American citizens shouldn’t be able to easily amass military- grade arsenals. It’s a dangerous concept that has led to too many gun-related disasters in recent years.

Am I calling for an all-out ban on the sale of guns? No. I believe that, if a person wants to, they should be able to own a handgun for self defense purposes. But before they can purchase one, they should have to complete a comprehensive background check to ensure that they don’t have a criminal record and that they are mentally and emotionally stable.

However, I am absolutely in favor of reinstating the Federal Assault Weapons Ban. These weapons should only be in the hands of trained police and military officials. The average citizen has no business carrying these types of guns. And to the wannabe freedom fighters out there who claim that assault weapons are the last line of defense against tyranny, you should know that an assault rifle would be useless against a hypothetical tyrant’s vast arsenal of tanks, planes, missiles, and drones. That’s just the truth.

It’s time to find bold and definitive solutions to the nation’s gun violence epidemic. And in order to do that, we need to recognize that some of the values and ideas from the past have no merit in the present.