Yep. And the National Guard for the most part replaced state militias.
There are some still active, and some which could be reactivated, so that’s effectively the shoulders on which private firearm ownership rests if originalism means anything (which there are different opinions on):
What’s funny about this situation is that right wingers are losing it when it comes to leftists doing open carry or the like. They some how think the 2nd amendment should only apply to them (especially only to white conservatives) and it’s becoming so obvious that this is going to come to a head. Hopefully folks who are pro-gun regs realize it’s a trap and focus more on a universal applicability of such regulations and ensuring the safety of the citizenry over any kind of bad faith legislation right wingers will inevitably throw their way.
I’ve not seen this. What are some examples?
Sorry I don’t have an example in front of me. I’ve seen one notable right winger conflate antifa with some Boog Boys open carrying a week ago on Twitter. It was just odd.
Not much of a fan, but these guys had the boogs shaking in their oversized ammosexual gear…
Leftists and PoC. California Republicans during Reagan’s governorship were gung-ho for the freedom to carry firearms until the Black Panthers started doing it. Then…
A bit off topic, but I remember a quasi-academic study from awhile back that pointed out how The Atlantic had become a site of subdued fear-mongering for middle-class white men. Seems things there haven’t changed much.
Well, the canonical example is that the very first gun regulations were created to disarm the Black Panthers. They had decided 2A could be interpreted to mean they can open carry long guns just to watch the police. So they did. The White Establishment moved very very fast to regulate the heck out of guns, and that’s how it stood for decades until the NRA decided to become political.
No, this is not an argument for looser gun regulation, just because it very briefly benefited Black people. Guns should be extremely highly regulated, in my opinion, but I am not wading into this discussion further. The Boingers on the other side of this issue (many of whom I like) argue disingenuously and intellectually dishonestly every time this one issue comes up.
Yeah, it was just a story about something I had heard literally nothing about in any other news outlet…and it’s about the only article I’ve read on their site in, like ever.
It’s a mixed bag, I think. Ta-Nehesi Coates has had some important work published there, but a lot of the pieces amount to hyperventilating clickbait.
Well, yes. I was thinking this is a more recent thing.
Edit: It’s long been said that the fastest way to get conservatives onboard with meaningful gun control would be for every young black man in America to apply for a concealed carry permit. After all, just a small number of black folks practicing open-carry in the 60’s led to new rules regulating that, and even the NRA supported that.
I do think this is the new normal with newspapers and news magazines, now… drawing in readers via that kind of clickbait hat confirms fears/worldview. It does nothing for actually understanding the world…
I wish this were not true, but I cannot but come to the conclusion that this is correct in terms of the intention and meaning of the 2nd Amendment (though it is always hard to tell, as the Founding Fathers were not monolithic in terms of what they thought). But, as you say, there is nothing there that precludes the regulation of arms, as infringement is not well-defined and the meaning of “arms” has always been limited in practice (although I suppose some people will argue for the right of all people to bear howitzers or even nuclear weapons if they want).
I do think this is the new normal with newspapers and news magazines, now… drawing in readers via that kind of clickbait hat confirms fears/worldview.
It is the new normal, of course, but I meant to point out that the revered Atlantic has been doing that for decades now, and for a pretty particular audience.
Maybe they were one of the papers that led the way in the modern era then? Of course, that kind of if it bleeds, it leads is not too new, but goes back at least to the era of yellow journalism…
My impression of The Atlantic is that they still do really good journalism when it comes to foreign affairs and foreign policy. For domestic stuff, not so much.
Note: I haven’t been reading them so much since they erected a paywall, though.
Even if we accept this NRA-supported interpretation (which asserts this one usage of “regulated” carries an entirely different meaning than the dozen-or-so other times that word appears in the Constitution), that’s clearly not what we have today.
The Second Amendment is the only part of the Bill of Rights that the Founders felt necessary to explain the justification for. The Constitution doesn’t explain why it’s important to protect freedom of speech or a right against self-incrimination or why we shouldn’t be forced to quarter soldiers because the justification for those rights is self-evident.
The right to bear arms is unique in that sense. Why should the citizenry have weapons—To defend their families and property? To hunt for food? To fight the new government itself if it ever turned evil?
No. To form a well-regulated militia that would fight on behalf of the state in the absence of a standing army. A role that hasn’t existed for most of our nation’s history now.
You can try to argue an armed citizenry is important for other reasons, but please don’t use tortured interpretations of the original text to pretend those reasons have fuck-all to do with the Founders’ original intent.
Sorry if I haven’t been clear. It took me a minute to find the piece I referred to. It’s even older than I thought: “Polite Reactionaries,” in a 1996 issue of the journal Transitions.
As I said, it’s about how the magazine’s sensationalism tended to appeal to a particular audience, despite its august reputation for functioning above the fray:
In the final analysis, this is what The Atlantic Monthly has been offering its readers for the past several years: the chance to be just as backward as a bible-thumper on issues like race, immigration, the environment, and “family values,” while maintaining an aura of reasonableness-- even genteel boredom. The articles give an appearance of careful deliberation, weighing objections and making exceptions, but the graphics and the headlines flatten nuances with a steamroller, stirring up anxiety, fear, and apocalyptic paranoia.
As I also said, that editorial tendency seems to still guide many of their publishing decisions.
I agree, we as men should talk to other men. And address the core reason for violence in America.
Many men feel that power is only derived from having power over others.
This is a lie.
There is power in community, and cooperation. The reason America has so many guns is to disrupt community power.
