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Originally posted by 12clicks
*ALL* of the amendments protect the rights of the individual. Pretending that the second amendment is different from the others just makes you look silly
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No, pretending the 2nd amendment asserts a blanket, individual right to bear arms just because you say it does makes you look silly.
You are doing the same thing you whine about liberals doing.. pretending the 2nd Amendment says what you want it to say rather than what it actually says.
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The original intent of the second amendment was to insure that there would always be "minutemen" available to protect themselves and their nieghbors from attack both foriegn and domestic.[/B]
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Bzzt. Wrong again.
Militias in 1792 consisted of part-time citizen-soldiers organized by individual states. Its members were civilians who kept arms, ammunition and other military equipment in their houses and barns÷there was no other way to muster a militia with sufficient speed.
Over time, however, the state militias failed to develop as originally anticipated. States found it difficult to organize and finance their militias and, by the mid-1800s, they had effectively ceased to exist. Beginning in 1903, Congress began to pass legislation that would eventually transform state militias into what is now the National Guard.
Today, the National Guard÷and Army Reserve÷are scarcely recognizable as descendants of militias of the 1790s. The National Guard and Reserve forces, in fact, do not permit personnel to store military weapons at home. And many of todayâs weapons÷tanks, armored personnel carriers, airplanes and the like÷hardly lend themselves to use by individuals.