As you all may be aware on June 26, 2008 the highest court in the land, the US Supreme Court handed down a landmark decision. In a 5-4 vote, the supreme beings in Washington struck down the decades old DC Gun Ban, hailed by gun opponents as one of the most restrictive gun bans in the country and a model for all of America. Justices Antonin Scalia, Clarence Thomas, Anthony Kennedy, Samuel Alito and Chief Justice John Roberts authored the majority opinion in favor of Heller (District of Columbia v. Heller) reaffirming the right (which most of us already know) that the Second Amendment guarantees an individual right of all Americans to “keep and bear arms” and is not limited to the militia and National Guard. The opinion continues “The Second Amendment protects an individual right to possess a firearm unconnected with service in a militia, and to use that arm for traditionally lawful purposes, such as self-defense within the home.” While I do not consider myself scholarly by any means, I find the context of the Second Amendment to be simplistic and unambiguous. It simply states that “A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the rights of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.”

A right of the people, simply stated. Consider the vessel in which it is contained, the “Bill of Rights.” When the first US Congress convened on March 4, 1791, 103 proposed amendments had been submitted by the states to be considered for inclusion in a bill of rights. After much dissension and agonizing by the states a unified Union approved Congress to reduce that number to twelve and these were again sent back to the states for ratification. Two amendments failed to be ratified, and the remaining ten, now called the “Bill of Rights”, were ratified on December 15, 1791. Every state insisted on inclusion of a “Right of the People to Keep and Bear Arms”. The “Bill of Rights” was designed and implemented to protect the rights of individual citizens. Every right enumerated in the “Bill of Rights” extols an individual right, or an individual right as guaranteed by an independent state. Article 1, Section 8 of the US Constitution implements the Powers of Congress. It specifies congress, “To provide for calling forth the Militia to execute the Laws of the Union, suppress Insurrections and repel Invasions”.
Obviously, provisions are already secured in Article 1, Section 8, should the need arise for calling forth the militia. If the Second Amendment were not declaring an individual right, why would it be included? It is hard for one to believe (me anyway) that the original framers, while specifying our individual rights in this document, made a glaring mistake (which everyone missed).

What astounds me is that, this argument denying the Second Amendment to be an individual right, has persisted for decades, and so blatantly fly’s in the face of simple common sense. “THE RIGHT OF THE PEOPLE TO KEEP AND BEAR ARMS”, spelled out in plain English. Unfortunately, the only reason this argument has endured this long is because of factions in this country who continue to pervert, and contort the true meaning, in an effort to manipulate our bedrock document. Maybe they can’t read English (push 1 for a translation of the Constitution). The truly terrifying part is that there are still four Supreme Court Justices, who just don’t get it.