Bill Whittle: Your Second Amendment

hjTired of listening to Progressives tell you that the Second Amendment only allows people in militias to keep and bear arms? Or that the Founders would have never intended the Second Amendment to apply to modern weapons? In his latest FIREWALL Bill recounts a remarkable conversation about the precise wording of the Second Amendment, and sums up why the document says what it means and means what it says. See the video and transcript below:

TRANSCRIPT:

YOUR SECOND AMENDMENT

Hi everybody. I’m Bill Whittle and this is the Firewall.

Just as a quick public service announcement in these days of increasing lawlessness, Federal encroachment on constitutional limits, and crybaby Progressive whininess in general, I thought I might take a moment to pass out a little rhetorical ammunition to those hear from those who, if they can no longer pretend the Second Amendment exists, then at least try to misinterpret it to the best of their ability.

The Second Amendment to the Constitution of the United States reads,

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.

Progressives read this and say that only those people in “a well-regulated militia” have the right to keep and bear arms. Let’s find out why this is utter nonsense, shall we?

Over at the Constitution Society, author J. Neil Schulman conducted a remarkable exercise. He sent the text of the Second Amendment not to a lawyer but to an expert on the English Language: Roy Copperud taught Journalism at USC for 17 years and served on the usage panel of the American Heritage Dictionary. Mirriam Webster’s dictionary frequently cites him as an expert on American English usage.

Paraphrasing their remarkable exchange here, Shulman asked Ciopperud the following questions:

“Can the sentence be interpreted to grant the right to keep and bear arms solely to ‘a well-regulated militia’?”

Copperud replied “The sentence does not restrict the right to keep and bear arms, nor does it state or imply possession of the right elsewhere or by others than the people; it simply makes a positive statement with respect to a right of the people.”

Schulman then asked if the right to keep and bear arms was granted by the Constitution, or whether that right preexisted the Constitution.

Copperud: The right is not granted by the amendment; its existence is assumed. The thrust of the sentence is that the right shall be preserved inviolate for the sake of ensuring a militia.”

Shulman: ”Is the right of the people to keep and bear arms conditioned upon whether or not a well regulated militia, is, in fact necessary to the security of a free State, and if that condition is not existing, is the statement ‘the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed’ null and void?”

Copperud: “No such condition is expressed or implied. The right to keep and bear arms is not said by the amendment to depend on the existence of a militia…The right to keep and bear arms is deemed unconditional by the entire sentence.”

Shulman concludes with an example even a Progressive could understand. He sent Mr. Copperud a precisely grammatically identical sentence: “A well-schooled electorate, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and read Books, shall not be infringed.” Does that mean, he asked, that only a well-schooled electorate — high school graduates, say — are the only ones with the right to keep and read books?

To which Mr. Copperud replied, “There is nothing in your sentence that either indicates or implies the possibility of a restricted interpretation.”

So, what does the Second Amendment actually say, according to an expert on the American usage of the English language?

1. A well-regulated militia is one of the nice things that an armed population can provide, but it’s not the only thing, and it’s not the reason to arm the People.
2. The right to keep and bear arms is reserved to the people, not to the militia. This makes sense because a militia is a group of citizens, who, unlike an army, bring their own weapons with them. That’s why it says the people can not only bear arms — they can keep them.  At home. Where they live.
3. The right of the people to be armed is not granted by the Second Amendment. That right is inherent in the People, and the Second Amendment says that the government cannot infringe upon that right.

Finally, you might hear Progressives say, well, that right was written back in the days of flintlock muskets! They never would have approved of such a thing in the days of automatic weapons!

Why not? A flintlock musket was the deadliest weapon available at the time. Why didn’t they limit their definition of “arms” to pointy sticks? They placed no limitations on the numbers of the weapons or their lethality.

And if the second Amendment only applies to flintlock muskets, does that mean your First Amendment right to freedom of speech applies only to what you write on parchment in quill and ink, or as far as the sound of your voice can carry in a town square? Of course not. Why, that would be ridiculous.

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    • tagalog

      What kind of arms does she keep and bear?

  • Patriot077

    I always enjoy hearing Whittle’s viewpoint on any given topic. This was stellar!

  • MattBracken

    This is a great argument to keep handy when arguing with libs. And when they bring out the single-shot flintlocks chestnut, inform them that relative to the available medical care, those flintlocks were actually more dangerous than modern weapons. In the 1800s, any shot to the torso typically resulted in a horrifyingly painful death from infection. Even shots to the limbs resulted in amputations and a 50-50 chance of an equally horrible death.

    • tagalog

      You might also keep handy the FACT that, up until the end of the 19th Century (around the time of the Spanish-American War, if not later), civilian firearms were often more advanced than the weapons of the standing army.

  • tagalog

    The right of the people to keep and bear arms is not as modern as flintlock firearms. It is mentioned almost word for word in Blackstone’s Commentaries On the Common Law (of England), probably during the time of matchlock firearms. And it goes back farther, at least to the time of bows and arrows, if not farther back than that.

  • Otto Maddox

    The Supreme Court has already settled this, in great detail. People still arguing that the 2nd Amendment has a military requirement or only applies to weapons of the era it was written need to get caught up on current law in this country.

  • williamdiamon

    There are no guns mentioned in the 2nd A, because the Second Amendment is not about guns, it’s about the Right to OWN guns.

    There is however, a restriction mentioned, “shall not be infringed” specifically, to the newly created Federal Government.

    There are 4 boxes in America.
    First, the “soap box” where people express their ideas.
    Second, the “ballot box” where people vote for the candidate most likely to turn those ideas into law.
    Third, the “jury box” where we can nullify a bad law.
    Fourth, in case all others fail, is the “ammo box”.

    This is by the Framer’s design.

  • JayWye

    One MAJOR nit; the right is to “keep AND BEAR” arms.
    that means to carry them in public places. the Colonials didn’t just keep their guns at home,they carried arms with them wherever they went,even to church. One never knows when a “highwayman” might decide to rob a traveler,if if the Indians might decide to make a raid.
    Much of the restrictions enacted in present US law is unconstitutional. Such as prohibitions against open carry,or carry at all,especially on government property,which belongs to “the People”.

    then there are militia weapons;
    the Second Amendment of the Constitution is NOT ABOUT hunting or sporting.
    semi-auto,magazine-fed rifles such as the AR-15 and AK-47 are today’s modern MILITIA weapons,and thus should be the most protected of firearms under the Second Amendment.

    Militiamen were expected to appear for muster bearing arms and ammo similar to and compatible with what the Regular military had in use AT THAT TIME.
    Since we “compromised” and restricted ownership of full-auto,true assault rifles,that leaves the semi-auto versions for civilian militia use.

    In US v Miller,SCOTUS asked if a short-barreled shotgun was a weapon that a militia would commonly use,implying that arms protected by the 2nd Amendment were arms a militia would use. AR-15′s,M-16′s and AK-47s would be ordinary militia arms,and “hi-capacity magazines” also would be protected.

  • Pericles

    The main purpose of the 2nd Amendment is to protect us against a tyrannical government by allowing citizens to bear arms. The types or nature of weapons needed to protect us against tyranny is irrelevant. If we could accomplish this objective by planting apple trees, planting apple trees would be the 2nd Amendment right the founders would advocate. But they knew from experience that apple trees don’t protect and defend us from tyrannies; weapons do, whether they are muskets, knives, box cutters or tanks!

  • Douglas Mayfield

    Excellent discussion.

    One thing to keep in mind is that many on the Left hold as a basic belief that rights flow from the government. That is, we do not have rights which should be inviolate by our nature as human beings. Instead, government is the only source of rights and must approve all rights before they are granted.

    The Left answers the question ‘What is the relationship between the individual and the state (or group) by saying ‘The individual is nothing. The state is all.’

    So for those on the Left, the right to bear arms has already been abolished since the government, that is, the Left, does not approve.

  • Phil Ossiferz Stone

    Logic, meet narrative. Real world, meet ideology.

    This is beautiful — and, in an age and a society governed by ideologically-inspired misrule and stupidity, means absolutely nothing. It has no force. Only The Great Idea has force.

    Stockpile.

  • ExNuke

    And LIBERALS desperately need to trash the Second Amendment to keep their voter base disarmed and on the plantation.