Militia M'lady?*

"The great object is, that every man be armed."

— Patrick Henry, 1788


Former Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens caused a stir a few months ago when he proposed "fixing" the Second Amendment by adding the words "when serving in the militia" to its text.

These five words — "when serving in the militia" — are apparently necessary to clarify the true intent of the amendment when it was written.

Would Justice Stevens also prefer to see state militias as they were truly intended? 

State militia laws typically identified all able-bodied males between the ages of about 16 and 60 as members of the militia, and required that these individuals keep a gun at home and in good working order.

These were the people who turned out by the thousands during the American Revolution to mercilessly harass British columns and supply lines — carrying their own "military-style" firearms and ammunition, from their own homes.

That example so profoundly influenced early American statesmen...that they apparently insisted on an Amendment to the Constitution articulating a free people's right to keep and bear arms only when serving in the militia...and with a passion equal only to their desire to protect the right of states to have a militia — apparently.**

Let us be true to "original intent" — both of them!

We have a right to keep and bear arms...while in the militia? States have a right...to their militia?

Get on with it then. Swiss model, anyone?


*I stole this title from Tracey Ullman, one of the funniest women ever. My wife and I were absolutely addicted to her show Tracey Takes On... This particular skit, if I recall, was about a line of products marketed to female members of the Militia Movement, which was often in the news in the mid-nineties.

**See J. Norman Heath, "Exposing the Second Amendment: Federal Preemption of State Militia Legislation".