If the early American colonists of 1776 had not exercised their “right to bear arms,” it is very unlikely there would have been a successful American Revolution, which led to American independence and our freedom in the United States of America.
That’s why the authors of the Constitution of the United States wrote the Second Amendment in the Constitution’s Bill of Rights, reading, “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.”
Early Americans’ ownership of guns was vital not only in winning independence but in taming a wilderness inhabited by hostile Indians and wild animals.
But the Second Amendment obviously was never intended to permit American gun owners to engage in aggression against other Americans. That’s why we have many laws on federal, state and local levels prohibiting the wrongful and illegal use of guns.
But some people who would like to disarm Americans have argued that the right to bear arms does not apply to “individuals,” since the first words of the Second Amendment refer to a “well regulated Militia.”
Questions about legal gun ownership have been repeated in many lawsuits. The latest ruling by the Supreme Court of the United States came this week.
The justices ruled 5-4 that Americans have a right to own guns for self-defense.
The majority included Chief Justice John Roberts and Justices Samuel A. Alito Jr., Antonin Scalia, Anthony M. Kennedy and Clarence Thomas.
Dissenting were Justices John Paul Stevens, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Stephen G. Breyer and the newest justice, Sonia Sotomayor.
Justice Alito, who wrote the majority ruling, said, “It is clear that the Framers … counted the right to keep and bear arms among those fundamental rights necessary to our system of ordered liberty.”
He is right, of course. But this ruling surely is not the “last word” on gun rights. There certainly will be future gun-rights cases in which various aspects and circumstances will be debated and ruled upon. There will be questions about some state and local gun laws, and about guns and convicted criminals and the mentally ill, guns in “sensitive places” such as schools and government buildings, etc.
Obviously, there is no desire to invite unlimited “gunslingers” in the streets, as in the old “Wild West.” But the Supreme Court majority recognized that the Constitution does provide for gun possession for self-defense, and does not require a disarmed American populace.