It wasn’t about specific types of arms but about people’s right to defend themselves, largely from improper actions by the government. Aside from the fact that they had just fought off their previous government, like much of our early law, it comes from English common law.
The English had a bill of rights from the 1600s when Protestants and Catholics were fighting which was to redress the situation wherein the government “By causing severall good Subjects being Protestants to be disarmed at the same time when Papists were both Armed and Imployed contrary to Law.” (One could interpret that as perhaps being a time when well-armed police were exceeding their authority, getting away with breaking the law, and disproportionately targeting minorities.)
If read that it was intended to allow people to arm so as to defend themselves against a hostile government, then there’s no way that they would have intended to limit it to muskets. They would see it as whatever armaments the average government police/soldier would use, at least. And in fact, legal terminology which has been used before in multiple cases explicitly states that it applies to “ordinary military equipment; [but] the legislature have the power to prohibit the keeping or wearing weapons dangerous to the peace and safety of the citizens, and which are not usual in civilized warfare.”
Our police and soldiers on average use semiautomatic weapons, with some allowed to use automatics. However, we all see a need for a limit, we don’t let random people bear nukes. So the devil’s in the details. Licensing (requiring training/testing) and registration, even for ‘ordinary military equipment’ sound good. But the strong opposition to them is because they result in giving a list to the government of people to persecute and weapons to confiscate, in the event that a bad government comes into power.
I’m sure we can all imagine a government where someone might get elected who would say “get the list of all registered people with muslim-sounding names and confiscate their weapons” or something like that. The people against it fear just that scenario (except turned against them of course).
So how do you reconcile giving a government that list in such a way that they can’t abuse it?
Or do we just say it’s a flawed premise and people can’t defend themselves against a bad government? (If they could, why do they fear the government having that list anyway?) The U.S. comes from a line that has fought multiple wars over that exact thing, and it’s deep in our idealism.
I’m in favor of stronger licensing and registration, but I have no idea how to solve those points.
The 14th amendment (which extended the bill of rights to apply at lower levels after the civil war) was partially to address that. Specifically to prevent states or municipalities from enacting gun control laws that might be prejudiced. Then the article gives a prime example from 100 years later:
The Panthers responded to racial violence by patrolling black neighborhoods brandishing guns — in an effort to police the police.
[…] The Panthers sought to protect themselves and other law-abiding citizens against indiscriminate violence perpetrated by police forces.
That sounds like a situation being faced today, 50 years later. And in fact, within this decade the Supreme Court has dealt with the 14th amendment bit at least a couple of times (to uphold that state/local gun control cannot override the 2nd amendment). How do you safely remove that right without endangering minorities?
We’re facing the same problems again and again. Given that the problems of the 1600s, 1700s, 1800s, and 1900s that all led to this all involved police/government abuse of authority (often against minorities), and that’s why people demand the right to arm, that may be a problem that needs to be addressed before gun control will become acceptable enough to pass.
