• jordanlund@lemmy.world
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    9 months ago

    Back in the day “well regulated” meant “well armed and equipped”.

    So, in order to form a proper defense of the country, any able bodied man could be called up (the militia), and it was necessary this body of men be well armed and equipped.

    Well, that’s the TEXTUAL reason. There’s a SUB-TEXTUAL reason as well:

    https://www.npr.org/2021/06/02/1002107670/historian-uncovers-the-racist-roots-of-the-2nd-amendment

    “It was in response to the concerns coming out of the Virginia ratification convention for the Constitution, led by Patrick Henry and George Mason, that a militia that was controlled solely by the federal government would not be there to protect the slave owners from an enslaved uprising. And … James Madison crafted that language in order to mollify the concerns coming out of Virginia and the anti-Federalists, that they would still have full control over their state militias — and those militias were used in order to quell slave revolts. … The Second Amendment really provided the cover, the assurances that Patrick Henry and George Mason needed, that the militias would not be controlled by the federal government, but that they would be controlled by the states and at the beck and call of the states to be able to put down these uprisings.”

      • jordanlund@lemmy.world
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        9 months ago

        Federalist 46 as well:

        https://avalon.law.yale.edu/18th_century/fed46.asp

        “a standing army can be carried in any country, does not exceed one hundredth part of the whole number of souls; or one twenty-fifth part of the number able to bear arms. This proportion would not yield, in the United States, an army of more than twenty-five or thirty thousand men. To these would be opposed a militia amounting to near half a million of citizens with arms in their hands, officered by men chosen from among themselves, fighting for their common liberties, and united and conducted by governments possessing their affections and confidence.”