2nd amendment essay

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Second Amendment

By: History.com Editors

Updated: July 27, 2023 | Original: December 4, 2017

The Second Amendment, often referred to as the right to bear arms, is one of 10 amendments that form the Bill of Rights, ratified in 1791 by the U.S. Congress. Differing interpretations of the amendment have fueled a long-running debate over gun control legislation and the rights of individual citizens to buy, own and carry firearms.

Right to Bear Arms

The text of the Second Amendment reads in full: “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.” The framers of the Bill of Rights adapted the wording of the amendment from nearly identical clauses in some of the original 13 state constitutions.

During the Revolutionary War era, “militia” referred to groups of men who banded together to protect their communities, towns, colonies and eventually states, once the United States declared its independence from Great Britain in 1776.

Many people in America at the time believed governments used soldiers to oppress the people, and thought the federal government should only be allowed to raise armies (with full-time, paid soldiers) when facing foreign adversaries. For all other purposes, they believed, it should turn to part-time militias, or ordinary civilians using their own weapons.

State Militias

But as militias had proved insufficient against the British, the Constitutional Convention gave the new federal government the power to establish a standing army, even in peacetime.

However, opponents of a strong central government (known as Anti-Federalists) argued that this federal army deprived states of their ability to defend themselves against oppression. They feared that Congress might abuse its constitutional power of “organizing, arming and disciplining the Militia” by failing to keep militiamen equipped with adequate arms.

So, shortly after the U.S. Constitution was officially ratified, James Madison proposed the Second Amendment as a way to empower these state militias. While the Second Amendment did not answer the broader Anti-Federalist concern that the federal government had too much power, it did establish the principle (held by both Federalists and their opponents) that the government did not have the authority to disarm citizens.

Well-Regulated Militia

Practically since its ratification, Americans have debated the meaning of the Second Amendment, with vehement arguments being made on both sides.

The crux of the debate is whether the amendment protects the right of private individuals to keep and bear arms, or whether it instead protects a collective right that should be exercised only through formal militia units.

Those who argue it is a collective right point to the “well-regulated Militia” clause in the Second Amendment. They argue that the right to bear arms should be given only to organized groups, like the National Guard, a reserve military force that replaced the state militias after the Civil War .

On the other side are those who argue that the Second Amendment gives all citizens, not just militias, the right to own guns in order to protect themselves. The National Rifle Association (NRA) , founded in 1871, and its supporters have been the most visible proponents of this argument, and have pursued a vigorous campaign against gun control measures at the local, state and federal levels.

Those who support stricter gun control legislation have argued that limits are necessary on gun ownership, including who can own them, where they can be carried and what type of guns should be available for purchase.

Congress passed one of the most high-profile federal gun control efforts, the so-called Brady Bill , in the 1990s, largely thanks to the efforts of former White House Press Secretary James S. Brady, who had been shot in the head during an assassination attempt on President Ronald Reagan in 1981.

District of Columbia v. Heller

Since the passage of the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act, which mandated background checks for gun purchases from licensed dealers, the debate on gun control has changed dramatically.

This is partially due to the actions of the Supreme Court , which departed from its past stance on the Second Amendment with its verdicts in two major cases, District of Columbia v. Heller (2008) and McDonald v. Chicago (2010).

For a long time, the federal judiciary held the opinion that the Second Amendment remained among the few provisions of the Bill of Rights that did not fall under the due process clause of the 14th Amendment , which would thereby apply its limitations to state governments. For example, in the 1886 case Presser v. Illinois , the Court held that the Second Amendment applied only to the federal government, and did not prohibit state governments from regulating an individual’s ownership or use of guns.

But in its 5-4 decision in District of Columbia v. Heller , which invalidated a federal law barring nearly all civilians from possessing guns in the District of Columbia, the Supreme Court extended Second Amendment protection to individuals in federal (non-state) enclaves.

Writing the majority decision in that case, Justice Antonin Scalia lent the Court’s weight to the idea that the Second Amendment protects the right of individual private gun ownership for self-defense purposes.

McDonald v. Chicago

Two years later, in McDonald v. Chicago , the Supreme Court struck down (also in a 5-4 decision) a similar citywide handgun ban, ruling that the Second Amendment applies to the states as well as to the federal government.

In the majority ruling in that case, Justice Samuel Alito wrote: “Self-defense is a basic right, recognized by many legal systems from ancient times to the present day, and in Heller , we held that individual self-defense is ‘the central component’ of the Second Amendment right.”

Gun Control Debate

The Supreme Court’s narrow rulings in the Heller and McDonald cases left open many key issues in the gun control debate.

In the Heller decision, the Court suggested a list of “presumptively lawful” regulations, including bans on possession of firearms by felons and the mentally ill; bans on carrying arms in schools and government buildings; restrictions on gun sales; bans on the concealed carrying of weapons; and generally bans on weapons “not typically possessed by law-abiding citizens for lawful purposes.”

Mass Shootings

Since that verdict, as lower courts battle back and forth on cases involving such restrictions, the public debate over Second Amendment rights and gun control remains very much open, even as mass shootings became an increasingly frequent occurrence in American life.

To take just three examples, the Columbine Shooting , where two teens killed 13 people at Columbine High School, prompted a national gun control debate. The Sandy Hook shooting of 20 children and six staff members at the Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut in 2012 led President Barack Obama and many others to call for tighter background checks and a renewed ban on assault weapons.

And in 2017, the mass shooting at country music concert in Las Vegas in which 60 people died (to date the largest mass shooting in U.S. history, overtaking the 2016 attack on the Pulse nightclub in Orlando, Florida ) inspired calls to restrict sales of “bump stocks,” attachments that enable semiautomatic weapons to fire faster.

On the other side of the ongoing debate of gun control measures are the NRA and other gun rights supporters, powerful and vocal groups that views such restrictions as an unacceptable violation of their Second Amendment rights.

Bill of Rights, The Oxford Guide to the United States Government . Jack Rakove, ed. The Annotated U.S. Constitution and Declaration of Independence. Amendment II, National Constitution Center . The Second Amendment and the Right to Bear Arms, LiveScience . Second Amendment, Legal Information Institute .

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The ‘scope’ of the argument: Why the Second Amendment matters

The U.S. Constitution’s guarantee of the right to bear arms has been a primary conversation topic among Americans in 2020. As uncertainty and fear have plagued the world over the last eight months, there has been a surge in gun sales nationwide — many of them to first-time owners.

Austin and Danielle, one young couple in Utah, had always talked about owning a firearm. Austin grew up in a city where gun ownership was less common, but Danielle grew up in a small town where gun ownership was normal. They both said the events of 2020 lead them to buy a firearm.

“We always talked about having a gun,” Austin said. “I thought they were probably important to have for self-defense. Once COVID-19 hit , it made getting one feel like an important purchase to make.”

The couple bought their gun in early April. While they believe in gun ownership, they wanted to keep their last name anonymous to avoid the negative stigma some associate with gun owners.

“I feel like a lot of people have a mental image of gun owners as uneducated or having low IQs,” Danielle said. “I do feel like most gun owners are responsible and only want them for recreation and self-defense purposes, but some people think they are hillbillies.”

The two cited the case of the Orem wildfires in mid-October, which were caused by target practice at a local gun range. They also mentioned a few other reasons they didn’t want to be labeled as “gun owners.”

“We wanted to remain anonymous because we didn’t want to be targeted for our political beliefs or because we choose to own a gun,” Austin said. “Remaining anonymous is a safe choice. That’s the reason I bought a gun — it’s something to protect my family and keep us safe.”

While some Americans have sought to restrict gun ownership, for many others it is a cherished right they work to protect. According to The New York Times , demand for guns has surged since the start of the pandemic in March and hasn’t let up all year. The National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS) recorded an estimated 28 million background checks were requested from January to the end of September.

Jeffrey Denning, a Salt Lake City Police detective, teaches firearm safety classes to private parties. He has seen a dramatic increase in people wanting to exercise their Second Amendment rights.

“One gun store owner I talked to said the day after the Utah earthquake on March 13th, he received the most sales he had ever gotten,” Denning said. “After that, sales started going through the roof. The numbers are off the charts.”

According to the data reported by the NICS, the first spike (3.7 million background checks) in firearm demand happened in March likely because of the pandemic. The second spike (3.9 million background checks) was larger and occurred in June — right after acts of civil unrest began in major American cities.

“ People should be able to protect themselves individually and collectively,” Denning said. “We should be able to preserve our freedoms — this lets us have agency and a land of liberty.”

Denning said that while firearms are certainly good for personal protection, the reason the Second Amendment is considered a right is more complex than that.

“The Second Amendment was included in the Constitution so the government could not take over,” Denning said. “It’s to serve against government encroachments. The amendments were developed because of what the founding fathers saw in other parts of the world.”

Most historians agree that this was the premise of the Second Amendment. But some people have grown increasingly wary of the potential dangers of an armed population. Because of this fear, there has been heated debate in recent years over whether to update or reform the Second Amendment.

Lucy Williams, an assistant professor of political philosophy, said the conflict was most pronounced in the 2008 Supreme Court case D.C. v. Heller. 

“For some time, there was a debate about whether the prefatory clause ‘A well-regulated Militia being necessary to the security of a free State’ was intended to limit the right to bear arms or if it merely explained why the right is important,” Williams said. “The debate is now largely settled.”

Williams said reformers proposed that the Constitution only protects a right to bear arms in relation to military service. People who took the other position argued the right was not connected to military service. The Supreme Court sided with the latter position.

After this Supreme Court decision, it seems that the debate has shifted. Instead of asking whether individuals should be allowed to have firearms, the debate is focused on whether the government has the ability to regulate and restrict specific weapons from entering the public sphere.

This threat of potential regulation has made some Americans nervous, and conservative politicians say the Second Amendment is under attack, or will be eliminated because of their political opponents. Williams said this is not likely.

“Although the scope of (the Second Amendment) may change, it’s hard to imagine that the right could ever be eliminated entirely,” Williams said.

Though reform may happen in the future, more people are making use of their Second Amendment right. Background checks, first-time gun purchases and training classes are increasing in demand. It remains to be seen whether gun sales will trend downward anytime soon.

“If you haven’t had a gun in 70 years, and are only interested in one because you’re scared, there is no reason to buy one now,” Denning said. “You are going to be fine.”

Despite this, Denning said individuals who have considered buying a gun and want to educate themselves should do so. 

“It’s ignorant and foolish not to have a plan for preparation and protection,” Denning said. “You can think all day long that something won’t happen ‘here’ or ‘to you’ but if it does, you’re not going to be prepared.”

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Handout A: How Has the Second Amendment Been Interpreted? (Background Essay)

The Second Amendment is written differently than other amendments in the Bill of Rights. It is unique because it contains an opening phrase, or “preamble.” The preamble of the Second Amendment reads: “A well-regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free State…” The next part of the amendment is known as the “operative clause.” This means it is the part of the sentence with force or effect. The operative clause states that “the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.”

When people disagree about the meaning of the Second Amendment, it is usually because they disagree about the meaning and purpose of the preamble of the Amendment.

How Has the Supreme Court Ruled?

In Presser v. Illinois (1886), the Court held that states could not disarm citizens because that would reduce with the federal government’s ability to raise a militia. But the Court added, “We think it clear that [laws] which…forbid bodies of men to associate together as military organizations, or to drill or parade with arms in cities and towns unless authorized by law, do not infringe the right of the people to keep and bear arms.” The Court also interpreted the word “militia.” They stated that a militia was “all citizens capable of bearing arms.”

In United States v. Miller (1939), the Supreme Court held that the Second Amendment did not protect the right to possess all types of weapons. The Court upheld a federal law that regulated sawed-off shotguns [one type of gun that is easily concealed and often used by criminals].

The Court reasoned that since that type of weapon was not related to keeping up a militia, the Second Amendment did not protect the right to own it. In other words, the Second Amendment protected a right to own weapons. The question was how far that right went.

Why Is District of Columbia v. Heller (2008) Important?

District of Columbia v. Heller (2008) was the first time the Supreme Court interpreted what the Second Amendment meant for an individual’s right to possess weapons for private uses like self defense.

The District of Columbia had one of the strictest gun laws in the country. It included a total ban on handguns. Further, long guns had to be kept unloaded and disassembled or trigger-locked. Heller believed the law made it impossible for him to defend himself in his home. He argued that it violated the Second Amendment.

The District of Columbia argued that the preamble of the Second Amendment, which refers to militia service, secured the “right of the people” to have weapons only in connection with militia service. The city also pointed out that the law did not ban all guns, and that it was a reasonable way to prevent crime.

The Court agreed with Heller and overturned three parts of the District’s law. The Court reasoned that the preamble gave one reason for the amendment, but did not limit the right. The Court also reasoned that elsewhere in the Constitution, like in the First, Fourth, and Ninth Amendments, the phrase “the right of the people” is used only to refer to rights held by people as individuals.

Finally, the Court reasoned that the right to own weapons for self-defense was an “inherent” [natural] right of all people. “It has always been widely understood that the Second Amendment, like the First and Fourth Amendments, codified a preexisting right,” the majority stated.

Four of the nine Supreme Court Justices disagreed with the Court’s ruling. The dissenters agreed that the Second Amendment protected an individual right. However, they argued that an individual’s right to bear arms was limited by the amendment’s preamble. One dissenting Justice argued that the Second Amendment’s preamble showed the Founders’ “single-minded focus” on protecting “military uses of firearms, which they viewed in the context of service in state militias.”

One thing is certain. Like all other rights in the Bill of Rights (such as freedom of speech and press), the right to keep and bear arms is not an absolute right. Working out the limits of the Second Amendment’s protection continues to challenge society.

Comprehension Questions:

• In Presser v. Illinois (1886), what did the Supreme Court decide about militias?
• What are the possible results from the Court’s ruling in United States v. Miller (1939)?
• What did the Supreme Court rule in District of Columbia v. Heller (2008)? How did this change or confirm the interpretation of the Second Amendment?

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The first amendment, interpretation & debate, the second amendment, matters of debate, common interpretation, the reasonable right to bear arms, not a second class right: the second amendment today.

by Nelson Lund

University Professor at George Mason University University Antonin Scalia School of Law

by Adam Winkler

Professor of Law at University of California Los Angeles Law School

Modern debates about the Second Amendment have focused on whether it protects a private right of individuals to keep and bear arms, or a right that can be exercised only through militia organizations like the National Guard. This question, however, was not even raised until long after the Bill of Rights was adopted.

Many in the Founding generation believed that governments are prone to use soldiers to oppress the people. English history suggested that this risk could be controlled by permitting the government to raise armies (consisting of full-time paid troops) only when needed to fight foreign adversaries. For other purposes, such as responding to sudden invasions or other emergencies, the government could rely on a militia that consisted of ordinary civilians who supplied their own weapons and received some part-time, unpaid military training.

The onset of war does not always allow time to raise and train an army, and the Revolutionary War showed that militia forces could not be relied on for national defense. The Constitutional Convention therefore decided that the federal government should have almost unfettered authority to establish peacetime standing armies and to regulate the militia.

This massive shift of power from the states to the federal government generated one of the chief objections to the proposed Constitution. Anti-Federalists argued that the proposed Constitution would take from the states their principal means of defense against federal usurpation. The Federalists responded that fears of federal oppression were overblown, in part because the American people were armed and would be almost impossible to subdue through military force.

Implicit in the debate between Federalists and Anti-Federalists were two shared assumptions. First, that the proposed new Constitution gave the federal government almost total legal authority over the army and militia. Second, that the federal government should not have any authority at all to disarm the citizenry. They disagreed only about whether an armed populace could adequately deter federal oppression.

The Second Amendment conceded nothing to the Anti-Federalists’ desire to sharply curtail the military power of the federal government, which would have required substantial changes in the original Constitution. Yet the Amendment was easily accepted because of widespread agreement that the federal government should not have the power to infringe the right of the people to keep and bear arms, any more than it should have the power to abridge the freedom of speech or prohibit the free exercise of religion.

Much has changed since 1791. The traditional militia fell into desuetude, and state-based militia organizations were eventually incorporated into the federal military structure. The nation’s military establishment has become enormously more powerful than eighteenth century armies. We still hear political rhetoric about federal tyranny, but most Americans do not fear the nation’s armed forces and virtually no one thinks that an armed populace could defeat those forces in battle. Furthermore, eighteenth century civilians routinely kept at home the very same weapons they would need if called to serve in the militia, while modern soldiers are equipped with weapons that differ significantly from those generally thought appropriate for civilian uses. Civilians no longer expect to use their household weapons for militia duty, although they still keep and bear arms to defend against common criminals (as well as for hunting and other forms of recreation).

The law has also changed. While states in the Founding era regulated guns—blacks were often prohibited from possessing firearms and militia weapons were frequently registered on government rolls—gun laws today are more extensive and controversial. Another important legal development was the adoption of the Fourteenth Amendment. The Second Amendment originally applied only to the federal government, leaving the states to regulate weapons as they saw fit. Although there is substantial evidence that the Privileges or Immunities Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment was meant to protect the right of individuals to keep and bear arms from infringement by the states, the Supreme Court rejected this interpretation in United States v. Cruikshank (1876).

Until recently, the judiciary treated the Second Amendment almost as a dead letter. In District of Columbia v. Heller (2008), however, the Supreme Court invalidated a federal law that forbade nearly all civilians from possessing handguns in the nation’s capital. A 5–4 majority ruled that the language and history of the Second Amendment showed that it protects a private right of individuals to have arms for their own defense, not a right of the states to maintain a militia.

The dissenters disagreed. They concluded that the Second Amendment protects a nominally individual right, though one that protects only “the right of the people of each of the several States to maintain a well-regulated militia.” They also argued that even if the Second Amendment did protect an individual right to have arms for self-defense, it should be interpreted to allow the government to ban handguns in high-crime urban areas.

Two years later, in McDonald v. City of Chicago (2010), the Court struck down a similar handgun ban at the state level, again by a 5–4 vote. Four Justices relied on judicial precedents under the Fourteenth Amendment’s Due Process Clause. Justice Thomas rejected those precedents in favor of reliance on the Privileges or Immunities Clause, but all five members of the majority concluded that the Fourteenth Amendment protects against state infringement of the same individual right that is protected from federal infringement by the Second Amendment.

Notwithstanding the lengthy opinions in Heller and McDonald , they technically ruled only that government may not ban the possession of handguns by civilians in their homes. Heller tentatively suggested a list of “presumptively lawful” regulations, including bans on the possession of firearms by felons and the mentally ill, bans on carrying firearms in “sensitive places” such as schools and government buildings, laws restricting the commercial sale of arms, bans on the concealed carry of firearms, and bans on weapons “not typically possessed by law-abiding citizens for lawful purposes.” Many issues remain open, and the lower courts have disagreed with one another about some of them, including important questions involving restrictions on carrying weapons in public.

Gun control is as much a part of the Second Amendment as the right to keep and bear arms. The text of the amendment, which refers to a “well regulated Militia,” suggests as much. As the Supreme Court correctly noted in District of Columbia v. Heller (2008), the militia of the founding era was the body of ordinary citizens capable of taking up arms to defend the nation. While the Founders sought to protect the citizenry from being disarmed entirely, they did not wish to prevent government from adopting reasonable regulations of guns and gun owners.

Although Americans today often think that gun control is a modern invention, the Founding era had laws regulating the armed citizenry. There were laws designed to ensure an effective militia, such as laws requiring armed citizens to appear at mandatory musters where their guns would be inspected. Governments also compiled registries of civilian-owned guns appropriate for militia service, sometimes conducting door-to-door surveys. The Founders had broad bans on gun possession by people deemed untrustworthy, including slaves and loyalists. The Founders even had laws requiring people to have guns appropriate for militia service.

The wide range of Founding-era laws suggests that the Founders understood gun rights quite differently from many people today. The right to keep and bear arms was not a libertarian license for anyone to have any kind of ordinary firearm, anywhere they wanted. Nor did the Second Amendment protect a right to revolt against a tyrannical government. The Second Amendment was about ensuring public safety, and nothing in its language was thought to prevent what would be seen today as quite burdensome forms of regulation.   

The Founding-era laws indicate why the First Amendment is not a good analogy to the Second. While there have always been laws restricting perjury and fraud by the spoken word, such speech was not thought to be part of the freedom of speech. The Second Amendment, by contrast, unambiguously recognizes that the armed citizenry must be regulated—and regulated “well.” This language most closely aligns with the Fourth Amendment, which protects a right to privacy but also recognizes the authority of the government to conduct reasonable searches and seizures. 

The principle that reasonable regulations are consistent with the Second Amendment has been affirmed throughout American history. Ever since the first cases challenging gun controls for violating the Second Amendment or similar provisions in state constitutions, courts have repeatedly held that “reasonable” gun laws—those that don’t completely deny access to guns by law-abiding people—are constitutionally permissible. For 150 years, this was the settled law of the land—until Heller .

Heller , however, rejected the principle of reasonableness only in name, not in practice. The decision insisted that many types of gun control laws are presumptively lawful, including bans on possession of firearms by felons and the mentally ill, bans on concealed carry, bans on dangerous and unusual weapons, restrictions on guns in sensitive places like schools and government buildings, and commercial sale restrictions. Nearly all gun control laws today fit within these exceptions. Importantly, these exceptions for modern-day gun laws unheard of in the Founding era also show that lawmakers are not limited to the types of gun control in place at the time of the Second Amendment’s ratification.

In the years since Heller , the federal courts have upheld the overwhelming majority of gun control laws challenged under the Second Amendment. Bans on assault weapons have been consistently upheld, as have restrictions on gun magazines that hold more than a minimum number of rounds of ammunition. Bans on guns in national parks, post offices, bars, and college campuses also survived. These decisions make clear that lawmakers have wide leeway to restrict guns to promote public safety so long as the basic right of law-abiding people to have a gun for self-defense is preserved.

Perhaps the biggest open question after Heller is whether the Second Amendment protects a right to carry guns in public. While every state allows public carry, some states restrict that right to people who can show a special reason to have a gun on the street. To the extent these laws give local law enforcement unfettered discretion over who can carry, they are problematic. At the same time, however, many constitutional rights are far more limited in public than in the home. Parades can be required to have a permit, the police have broader powers to search pedestrians and motorists than private homes, and sexual intimacy in public places can be completely prohibited. 

The Supreme Court may yet decide that more stringent limits on gun control are required under the Second Amendment. Such a decision, however, would be contrary to the text, history, and tradition of the right to keep and bear arms.

The right to keep and bear arms is a lot like the right to freedom of speech. In each case, the Constitution expressly protects a liberty that needs to be insulated from the ordinary political process. Neither right, however, is absolute. The First Amendment, for example, has never protected perjury, fraud, or countless other crimes that are committed through the use of speech. Similarly, no reasonable person could believe that violent criminals should have unrestricted access to guns, or that any individual should possess a nuclear weapon.

Inevitably, courts must draw lines, allowing government to carry out its duty to preserve an orderly society, without unduly infringing the legitimate interests of individuals in expressing their thoughts and protecting themselves from criminal violence. This is not a precise science or one that will ever be free from controversy.

One judicial approach, however, should be unequivocally rejected. During the nineteenth century, courts routinely refused to invalidate restrictions on free speech that struck the judges as reasonable. This meant that speech got virtually no judicial protection. Government suppression of speech can usually be thought to serve some reasonable purpose, such as reducing social discord or promoting healthy morals. Similarly, most gun control laws can be viewed as efforts to save lives and prevent crime, which are perfectly reasonable goals. If that’s enough to justify infringements on individual liberty, neither constitutional guarantee means much of anything.

During the twentieth century, the Supreme Court finally started taking the First Amendment seriously. Today, individual freedom is generally protected unless the government can make a strong case that it has a real need to suppress speech or expressive conduct, and that its regulations are tailored to that need. The legal doctrines have become quite complex, and there is room for disagreement about many of the Court’s specific decisions. Taken as a whole, however, this body of case law shows what the Court can do when it appreciates the value of an individual right enshrined in the Constitution.

The Second Amendment also raises issues about which reasonable people can disagree. But if the Supreme Court takes this provision of the Constitution as seriously as it now takes the First Amendment, which it should do, there will be some easy issues as well.

•           District of Columbia v. Heller (2008) is one example. The “right of the people” protected by the Second Amendment is an individual right, just like the “right[s] of the people” protected by the First and Fourth Amendments. The Constitution does not say that the Second Amendment protects a right of the states or a right of the militia, and nobody offered such an interpretation during the Founding era. Abundant historical evidence indicates that the Second Amendment was meant to leave citizens with the ability to defend themselves against unlawful violence. Such threats might come from usurpers of governmental power, but they might also come from criminals whom the government is unwilling or unable to control.

•           McDonald v. City of Chicago (2010) was also an easy case under the Court’s precedents. Most other provisions of the Bill of Rights had already been applied to the states because they are “deeply rooted in this Nation’s history and tradition.” The right to keep and bear arms clearly meets this test.

•           The text of the Constitution expressly guarantees the right to bear arms, not just the right to keep them. The courts should invalidate regulations that prevent law-abiding citizens from carrying weapons in public, where the vast majority of violent crimes occur. First Amendment rights are not confined to the home, and neither are those protected by the Second Amendment.

•           Nor should the government be allowed to create burdensome bureaucratic obstacles designed to frustrate the exercise of Second Amendment rights. The courts are vigilant in preventing government from evading the First Amendment through regulations that indirectly abridge free speech rights by making them difficult to exercise. Courts should exercise the same vigilance in protecting Second Amendment rights.

•           Some other regulations that may appear innocuous should be struck down because they are little more than political stunts. Popular bans on so-called “assault rifles,” for example, define this class of guns in terms of cosmetic features, leaving functionally identical semi-automatic rifles to circulate freely. This is unconstitutional for the same reason that it would violate the First Amendment to ban words that have a French etymology, or to require that French fries be called “freedom fries.”

In most American states, including many with large urban population centers, responsible adults have easy access to ordinary firearms, and they are permitted to carry them in public. Experience has shown that these policies do not lead to increased levels of violence. Criminals pay no more attention to gun control regulations than they do to laws against murder, rape, and robbery. Armed citizens, however, prevent countless crimes and have saved many lives. What’s more, the most vulnerable people—including women, the elderly, and those who live in high crime neighborhoods—are among the greatest beneficiaries of the Second Amendment. If the courts require the remaining jurisdictions to stop infringing on the constitutional right to keep and bear arms, their citizens will be more free and probably safer as well.

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Second Amendment - List of Free Essay Examples And Topic Ideas

An essay on the Second Amendment of the United States Constitution can analyze the historical context, legal interpretations, and contemporary debates surrounding the right to bear arms. It can delve into the arguments for and against gun control, the role of firearms in American culture, and the impact of gun violence on society. We’ve gathered an extensive assortment of free essay samples on the topic of Second Amendment you can find in Papersowl database. You can use our samples for inspiration to write your own essay, research paper, or just to explore a new topic for yourself.

The Second Amendment – Firearm Legislation

Americans are being murdered at unprecedented rates and little action has been attempted to prevent similar events from reoccurring. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, ninety-six Americans die by firearms every day (The Editorial Board). Ninety-six lives end because of a bullet. It is unethical and immoral for that many people to perish, and for there to be little change made. Unfortunately, legislators can not just simply change firearm laws due to the long-standing and well-respected second […]

Gun Violence and the Second Amendment

According the Cornell Law Studies Institute, the second amendment states, "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." The Second Amendment of the constitution is one of the most misunderstood and confusing sentences in the history of America. The 27-word sentence has a partial collectivist ora while still maintaining the individualistic right to keep and bear arms. Before discussing the reasons behind […]

Rights and Responsibilities of U.S. Citizens

United States citizens are some of the richest in the world when it comes to the rights that they are afforded. Along with those rights come responsibilities. The U.S. Constitution and the Declaration of Independence are the foundation upon which these rights and responsibilities were carved. A right is a freedom or privilege that is granted to U.S. citizens by the constitution. A responsibility is a duty or obligation to be able to enjoy those rights. Rights and responsibilities go […]

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Negative Consequences of Second Amendment

In late pasts guns were the only means of survival. The gun was what kept the home front safe from unwanted intruders from invading your land. It was also used to hunt for food to be put on the dinner table. However, today guns, as of late, are being used in the mass killings of innocent lives. Many of those who are caught in the crosshairs of a mass shooters were children and young adults. No amount of blood and […]

Second Amendment in the Bill of Rights

Imagine waiting on the line at the cafeteria on campus and you notice there are people running because there is a gunman firing not too far from where you are located. As a concealed carry license holder, do you reach for you gun realizing it is not there because it is not allowed on campus, or do you run for safety like everyone else? The founding fathers of America gave the right to bear arms for self-defense with the passing […]

The Gun Problem in America

Introduction As stated in the Social Problems textbook, “Social problems: Continuity and change”, “A social problem is any condition or behavior that has negative consequences for large numbers of people and that is generally recognized as a condition or behavior that needs to be addressed” (2015). As a result, I decided to discuss the social problem of the second amendment. Since the founding of the United States of America, the right to bear arms has always been a hot button […]

Supreme Court and the Second Amendment

Heller was a special police officer in Washington D.C. He was allowed to carry a Handgun as part of his job. Wanting to keep a handgun at his home, he applied for a license with the District of Columbia. They denied the request making heller sue the District For violating his second amendment rights. Based on what the second amendment said the District Court Found that the second amendment does not create an individual right to gun ownership Unrelated to […]

Second Amendment Gun Control: Urgent Need for Stricter Laws and Licensing

The 2007 Virginia Tech shooting killed 32. The Orlando nightclub shooting last year killed 49. The 2012 massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary School killed 27 first graders, all younger than six years old. Since the Columbine High School massacre in 1999, not a year has passed without a mass shooting. Yet little has been done to restrict the sale of the very weapons used for these senseless murders. Understanding Gun Control Laws in America Gun Control, at least in America, […]

3d Printed Guns It is Constitutional

Even though this is an incredibly new technology, politicians and even presidents around the globe makers have recognized 3D printed guns and what’s behind it. Regardless of what their actual thoughts are on the topic, the laws that they have tried to put into place that obstructs the progress of the technology has risen the number of questions that deal with it. Questions such as whether or not it is constitutional to make them, distribute them or even use them. […]

Gun Control in the United States

Over the past few decades, the United States has witnessed various high- profile mass shootings in towns including Las Vegas, San Bernardino, Orlando, and Newtown. Even though most homicides receive little public attention, incidents of mass shooting are extremely salient. Gun violence is the primary cause of mass shootings in the US. Victor Hayes attributes increased gun violence to how easily an individual can access a gun in the US and further argues that such ease of accessibility acts as […]

Problems with Gun Control

When a problem arises, people are most likely to asses the situation, find what is causing the complication, and then take actions to exterminate the cause of the problem. In recent years problems with gun control have risen and politicians, in addition to the general public, seem to lack an understanding of the true problem. However, it is undeniable that the rate of gun violence has risen, and many debates have taken place on whether guns should be take away […]

The Second Amendment: the Essence of ‘Well-Regulated Militia

Let's talk about a phrase that's been batted around more than a ball at a baseball game: "well-regulated militia." It's one of those terms that feels like it's been pulled straight out of a history textbook, yet here we are, still debating its meaning in coffee shops, courtrooms, and online forums. The Second Amendment of the United States Constitution is its home, a place where it sits snugly between discussions of individual rights and collective security. But what's it really […]

DC V. Heller: a Landmark Decision in American Second Amendment Rights

In the annals of American jurisprudence, few cases have sparked as much debate and legal scrutiny as District of Columbia v. Heller. Decided in 2008, this landmark Supreme Court decision unequivocally altered the landscape of Second Amendment rights, marking a significant shift in the interpretation of the Constitution's provision on the right to bear arms. At its heart, the case revolved around Dick Heller, a licensed special police officer in Washington D.C., who challenged the district's handgun ban as unconstitutional […]

Deciphering the Core of the 2nd Amendment: Unveiling its Complex Layers

Embarking on an odyssey through the annals of American constitutional jurisprudence, the Second Amendment emerges as a captivating enigma, a succinct phrase laden with profound implications. Nestled within the hallowed precincts of the Bill of Rights, this venerable clause has ignited a veritable tempest of discourse, provoking an array of divergent perspectives and interpretations. Let's embark on an expedition into the heart of this constitutional labyrinth to unravel the true essence of what the Second Amendment proclaims. The Second Amendment, […]

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What the Second Amendment really meant to the Founders

Their arguments had far less to do with today's debates than partisans think.

Love it or hate it, the Second Amendment provides the constitutional framework for American gun laws. As with all things constitutional, Americans are adapting 18th-century laws to fit 21st-century lives. But in reality, the concerns of the Founding Fathers had little to do with either side’s position in the modern gun-control debate. None of the issues animating that debate — from “stand your ground” laws to assault weapons bans — entered into the Founders’ thinking.

Yet because both sides in debates about the Second Amendment invoke what the Founders would have thought, it’s important to look at what they actually intended.

1. The Founding Fathers were devoted to the militia.

Read the debates about the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, and the militia’s importance leaps off the page. Alexander Hamilton, writing in the Federalist Papers, called a well-regulated militia “the most natural defense of a free country.” His anti-Federalist critics agreed with the need for a citizens’ militia, writing that “a well regulated militia, composed of the Yeomanry of the country, have ever been considered as the bulwark of a free people.”

Their disagreement was over how best to ensure that the militia was maintained, as well as how to divide up the roles of the national government vs. state governments. But both sides were devoted to the idea that all citizens should be part-time soldiers, because both sides believed a standing army was an existential threat to the ideas of the revolution.

2. The amendment’s primary justification was to prevent the United States from needing a standing army.

Preventing the United States from starting a professional army, in fact, was the single most important goal of the Second Amendment. It is hard to recapture this fear today, but during the 18th century few boogeymen were as scary as the standing army — an army made up of professional, full-time soldiers.

By the logic of the 18th century, any society with a professional army could never be truly free. The men in charge of that army could order it to attack the citizens themselves, who, unarmed and unorganized, would be unable to fight back. This was why a well-regulated militia was necessary to the security of a free state: To be secure, a society needed to be able to defend itself; to be free, it could not exist merely at the whim of a standing army and its generals.

The only way to be both free and secure was for citizens to be armed, organized and ready to defend their society. The choice was a stark one: a standing army or a free nation.

3. The authors of the Bill of Rights were not concerned with an “individual” or “personal” right to bear arms. 

Before the landmark 2008 Supreme Court case  District of Columbia v. Heller , courts had ruled that the right of individual citizens to bear arms existed only within the context of participation in the militia. In Heller, the Supreme Court overturned that precedent, delivering gun rights advocates their biggest legal victory.

This was not, however, a return to an “original understanding” of the Second Amendment, as Justice Antonin Scalia claimed for the majority. It’s not that the Founding Fathers were against the idea of an individual right to bear arms. It just was not an issue that concerned them.

Again, the militia was all important: The men writing the Bill of Rights wanted every citizen to be in the militia, and they wanted everyone in the militia to be armed. If someone was prohibited from participating in the militia, the leaders of the Founders’ generation would  not  have wanted them to have access to weapons. In fact, the 18th-century regulations that required citizens to participate in the militia also prohibited blacks and Indians from participating as arms-bearing members.

4. The Founding Fathers were very concerned about who should, or should not, be armed.

These restrictions on militia membership are critically important to understand. Because despite the words of the Second Amendment, 18th-century laws did infringe on Americans’ right to bear arms.

Laws rarely allowed free blacks to have weapons. It was even rarer for African Americans living in slavery to be allowed them. In slave states, militias inspected slave quarters and confiscated weapons they found. (There were also laws against selling firearms to Native Americans, although these were more ambiguous.)

These restrictions were no mere footnote to the gun politics of 18th-century America. White Americans were armed so that they could maintain control over nonwhites. Nonwhites were disarmed so that they would not pose a threat to white control of American society.

The restrictions underscore a key point about militias: They were more effective as domestic police forces than they were on the battlefield against enemy nations; and they were most effective when they were policing the African American population.

5. Eighteenth-century Americans tolerated a certain amount of violence and instability, as long as it came from other white Americans.

During the 18th century, insurrectionary groups such as the Carolina Regulators and vigilante groups such as Pennsylvania’s Paxton Boys showed that Colonial governments could not simply issue laws and count on the people to obey them. (As did, one might add, the American Revolution.) Shay’s Rebellion in 1787 and the Whiskey Rebellion in 1791 showed that those problems would not go away with the arrival of the new republic. Including all citizens in the militia and relying on that militia to enforce the laws meant that issues which divided the citizenry also divided the militia. When disagreements over political issues turned violent, the government would not necessarily enjoy the balance of power over citizens who, as militia members, were trained and armed.

Those events also showed a pattern that emerged during the 18th century: Americans were willing to tolerate a significant degree of instability and violence on the part of white Americans. The Paxton Boys, for instance, murdered 20 Conestoga Indians who had been living peacefully with their Pennsylvanian neighbors for some time. Though the governor issued warrants for their arrest, and Benjamin Franklin called the killers a “disgrace of their country and their colour,” no Paxton Boys were ever prosecuted.

The Whiskey Rebellion was an armed uprising against the national government. In its aftermath, only two rebels were convicted of treason, and President George Washington pardoned them both. Indians who attacked whites, and enslaved peoples who resisted, however, received no such indulgence.

Today’s Second Amendment

Anyone wishing for a return to an original meaning of the Second Amendment — where no one was a professional soldier, but everyone would be required to participate in the militia — would find themselves far from the political mainstream.

America’s standing army is now the most powerful fighting force in world history. The National Guard still exists as a citizens’ militia, but participation is a far cry from the Founders’ vision of participation by all citizens. Meanwhile, the Army and the militia have diversified in ways which no one in the 18th century could have imagined.

What remains, though, is the pattern of what Americans will and will not tolerate. In the centuries since the Bill of Rights became law, the strictest gun-control laws have been aimed — sometimes explicitly, sometimes not — at keeping African Americans from arming themselves. Americans have been eager to disarm blacks, but hesitant to disarm whites.

California’s gun-control laws, for instance, began as a reaction to the Black Panthers’ armed patrols and open carry. Yet, when self-proclaimed militiamen engaged in armed resistance to law enforcement at the Bundy ranch in 2014, there was no similar call for new gun laws, and a significant portion of the American political establishment initially expressed support for their actions.

Meanwhile, the nation continues to tolerate a level of gun violence from its citizens unparalleled in other wealthy nations. Eighteenth-century militias were unstable and unpredictable; American gun violence in the 21st century has been every bit as unstable and unpredictable and, given the improvements in weaponry, far more fatal. In three of the most recent mass shootings — the high school in Parkland, Fla., the church in Sutherland Springs, Tex., and Las Vegas — three men killed a total of 101 people and injured hundreds more, a level of carnage that would have been impossible with the weapons available during the 18th century.

Despite these body counts, and despite the seeming inevitability of future tragedies like these, there have been no new national laws to limit citizens’ access to high-powered weapons. Some states have enacted such restrictions, but other states have moved in the opposite direction, loosening limits on citizens’ access to firearms.

The United States still seems willing to tolerate a significant degree of instability and violence on the part of white American men, the demographic group responsible for the majority of mass shootings. The United States also seems willing to tolerate daily rates of gun violence that surpass all but the worst mass shootings, in large part because most homicide victims are people of color.

Again, this level of carnage could not have been foreseen by the men who wrote the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. As Americans, though, we still live our lives and write our laws within the framework that those men left us, including the Second Amendment. At its best, the Second Amendment was a commitment to citizen participation in public life and a way to keep military power under civil control. At its worst, it was a way for whites to maintain their social domination.

In today’s America, the echoes of 18th-century racial politics still weigh down our society, while the new republic’s commitment to citizen participation is nowhere to be found.

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The Legal Evolution: How the Second Amendment Became an Individual Right

I n a landmark shift that redefined the American legal landscape concerning firearms, the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in District of Columbia v. Heller in 2008 entrenched the notion that the Second Amendment guarantees an individual right to possess firearms. This seismic change followed years of public discourse, political activism, and scholarly debate that gradually moved the needle from a collective to an individual rights interpretation of gun ownership.

The case originated when security officer Dick Heller challenged Washington D.C.’s stringent gun law that barred individuals from keeping a loaded handgun at home without a trigger lock. After a series of legal battles, the case ascended to the Supreme Court, which, in a tight 5-4 ruling, sided with Heller. The Court’s opinion, delivered by Justice Antonin Scalia, established that 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.”

Justice Scalia’s interpretation drew from English common law and the English Bill of Rights of 1689, suggesting that the framers of the American Constitution, as Englishmen, had enjoyed the right to bear arms for protection through English common law—a right that was also guaranteed in the American Bill of Rights for self-defense.

Despite being a victory for individual gun rights, the decision also emphasized that this right is not unlimited. Scalia acknowledged, “The Second Amendment right is not unlimited. It is not a right to keep and carry any weapon whatsoever, in any manner whatsoever, and for whatever purpose.”

The path to Heller’s decision was paved by a concerted effort led by the National Rifle Association (NRA) and other gun rights activists who sought to redefine the Second Amendment through a combination of public persuasion and strategic litigation.

Even individuals previously known for liberal views, such as law professors Sanford Levinson, Akhil Reed Amar, and Laurence Tribe, contributed to the debate, suggesting that the individual right to bear arms deserved serious consideration, thus giving the movement bipartisan intellectual credibility.

Relevant articles:

– How a SCOTUS Decision Led to an Unprecedented Gun Sales Boom , The Trace

– District of Columbia v. Heller | Summary, Ruling, & Facts , Britannica

– The ‘Gun Dude’ and a Supreme Court case that changed who can own firearms in the U.S. , NPR

– How the NRA Rewrote the Second Amendment , Brennan Center for Justice

Second Amendment :

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.

Historical surveys of the Second Amendment often trace its roots, at least in part, through the English Bill of Rights of 1689, 1 Footnote See William Rawle , A View of the Constitution of the United States of America 126 (1829) ( “In England, a country which boasts so much of its freedom, the right was secured to protestant subjects only, on the revolution of 1688; and it is cautiously described to be that of bearing arms for their defence, ‘suitable to their conditions, and as allowed by law.’” ). which declared that “subjects, which are protestants, may have arms for their defence suitable to their condition, and as allowed by law.” 2 Footnote 3 Joseph Story , Commentaries on the Constitution of the United States § 1891 (1833) . That provision grew out of friction over the English Crown’s efforts to use loyal militias to control and disarm dissidents and enhance the Crown’s standing army, among other things, prior to the Glorious Revolution that supplanted King James II in favor of William and Mary. 3 Footnote Joyce Lee Malcolm , To Keep and Bear Arms: The Origins of an Anglo-American Right 115–16 (1994) .

The early American experience with militias and military authority would inform what would become the Second Amendment as well. In Founding-era America, citizen militias drawn from the local community existed to provide for the common defense, and standing armies of professional soldiers were viewed by some with suspicion. 4 Footnote See The Federalist No. 29 (Alexander Hamilton) (referencing proposition that “standing armies are dangerous to liberty” and militias are “the most natural defense of a free country” ). The Declaration of Independence listed as greivances against King George III that he had “affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil power” and had “kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.” 5 Footnote The Declaration of Independence paras. 13–14 (U.S. 1776) . Following the Revolutionary War, several states codified constitutional arms-bearing rights in contexts that echoed these concerns—for instance, Article XIII of the Pennsylvania Declaration of Rights of 1776 read:

That the people have a right to bear arms for the defence of themselves and the state; and as standing armies in the time of peace are dangerous to liberty, they ought not to be kept up; And that the military should be kept under strict subordination to, and governed by, the civil power. 6 Footnote Pa. Declaration of Rights § XIII (1776) , in 5 The Federal and State Constitutions, Colonial Charters, and Other Organic Laws 3083 (Francis N. Thorpe ed., 1909) .

Similarly, as another example, Massachusetts’s Declaration of Rights from 1780 provided:

The people have a right to keep and to bear arms for the common defence. And as, in time of peace, armies are dangerous to liberty, they ought not to be maintained without the consent of the legislature; and the military power shall always be held in an exact subordination to the civil authority, and be governed by it. 7 Footnote Ma. Declaration of Rights § XVII (1780) , in 3 id. at 1892.

Mistrust of standing armies, like the one employed by the English Crown to control the colonies, and anti-Federalist concerns with centralized military power colored the debate surrounding ratification of the federal Constitution and the need for a Bill of Rights. 8 Footnote See, e.g. , 3 The Debates in the Several State Conventions, on the Adoption of the Federal Constitution, As Recommended by the General Convention at Philadelphia in 1787 , at 401 (Jonathan Elliot ed., 1836) (statement of Gov. Edmund Randolph) ( “With respect to a standing army, I believe there was not a member in the federal Convention, who did not feel indignation at such an institution.” ). Provisions in the Constitution gave Congress power to establish and fund an Army, 9 Footnote U.S. Const. art. II, § 8, cl. 12 . as well as authority to organize, arm, discipline, and call forth the militia in certain circumstances (while reserving to the states authority over appointment of militia officers and training). 10 Footnote Id. art. II, § 8, cl. 15–16 . The motivation for these provisions appears to have been “recognition of the danger of relying on inadequately trained soldiers as the primary means of providing for the common defense.” 11 Footnote Perpich v. Dep’t of Def., 496 U.S. 334, 340 (1990) . However, despite structural limitations such as a two-year limit on Army appropriations and certain militia reservations to the states, fears remained during the ratification debates that these provisions of the Constitution gave too much power to the federal government and were dangerous to liberty. 12 Footnote See Steven J. Heyman , Natural Rights and the Second Amendment , in The Second Amendment in Law and History: Historians and Constitutional Scholars on the Right to Bear Arms 200–01 (Carl T. Bogus ed., 2000) (collecting anti-federalist objections regarding power over militia and “to raise a standing army that could be used to destroy public liberty and erect a military despotism” ).

In The Federalist , James Madison argued that “the State governments, with the people on their side,” would be more than adequate to counterbalance a federally controlled “regular army,” even one “fully equal to the resources of the country.” 13 Footnote The Federalist No. 46 (James Madison) . In Madison’s view, “the advantage of being armed,” together with “the existence of subordinate governments, to which the people are attached, and by which the militia officers are appointed, forms a barrier against the enterprises of ambition, more insurmountable than any which a simple government of any form can admit of.” 14 Footnote Id. Nevertheless, several states considered or proposed to the First Congress constitutional amendments that would explicitly protect arms-bearing rights, in various formulations. 15 Footnote E.g. , Amendments Proposed by the Virginia Convention June 27, 1788 , in Creating the Bill of Rights: the Documentary Record from the First Federal Congress 19 (Helen E. Veit et al. eds., 1991) (proposing among other things, “[t]hat the people have a right to keep and bear arms; that a well regulated Militia composed of the body of the people trained to arms is the proper, natural and safe defence of a free State[,]” and “[t]hat any person religiously scrupulous of bearing arms ought to be exempted upon payment of an equivalent to employ another to bear arms in his stead” ); Amendments Proposed by the New York Convention July 26, 1788 , in id. at 22 (proposing similar language but omitting religious-objector provision); Amendments Proposed by the New Hampshire Convention June 21, 1788 , in id. at 17 (proposing that “Congress shall never disarm any Citizen unless such as are or have been in Actual Rebellion” ).

Tasked with “digesting the many proposals for amendments made by the various state ratification conventions and stewarding them through the First Federal Congress,” 16 Footnote Saul Cornell , A Well-Regulated Militia: The Founding Fathers and the Origins of Gun Control in America 59 (2006) . James Madison produced an initial draft of the Second Amendment as follows:

The right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed; a well armed and well regulated militia being the best security of a free country: but no person religiously scrupulous of bearing arms shall be compelled to render military service in person. 17 Footnote 1 Annals of Cong. 451 (1789) (Joseph Gales ed., 1834) .

The committee of the House of Representatives that considered Madison’s formulation altered the order of the clauses such that the militia clause now came first, with a new specification of the militia as “composed of the body of the people,” and made several other wording and punctuation changes. 18 Footnote The Complete Bill of Rights: The Drafts, Debates, Sources, & Origins 264 (Neil H. Cogan ed., 2015) (House Committee of Eleven Report, July 28, 1789) [hereinafter, Complete Bill of Rights ].

Debate in the House largely centered on the proposed Amendment’s religious-objector clause, with Elbridge Gerry, for instance, arguing that the clause would give “the people in power” the ability to “declare who are those religiously scrupulous, and prevent them from bearing arms.” 19 Footnote 1 Annals of Cong. 778 (1789) (Joseph Gales ed., 1834) . Gerry proposed that the provision “be confined to persons belonging to a religious sect scrupulous of bearing arms,” but his proposed addition was not accepted. 20 Footnote Id. at 779 . Other proposals not accepted included striking out the entire clause, making it subject to “paying an equivalent,” which Roger Sherman found problematic given religious objectors would be “equally scrupulous of getting substitutes or paying an equivalent,” 21 Footnote Id. and adding after “a well regulated militia” the phrase “trained to arms,” which Elbridge Gerry believed would make clear that it was “the duty of the Government” to provide the referenced security of a free State. 22 Footnote Id. at 780 .

As resolved by the House of Representatives on August 24, 1789, the version of the Second Amendment sent to the Senate remained similar to the version initially drafted by James Madison, with one of the largest changes being the re-ordering of the first two clauses. 23 Footnote Complete Bill of Rights , supra 18, at 267 (House Resolution, August 24, 1789). The provision at that time read:

A well regulated militia, composed of the body of the People, being the best security of a free State, the right of the People to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed, but no one religiously scrupulous of bearing arms, shall be compelled to render military service in person. 24 Footnote Complete Bill of Rights , supra 18, at 267 (House Resolution, August 24, 1789).

The Amendment would take what would become its final form in the Senate, where the religious-objector clause was finally removed and several other phrases were modified. 25 Footnote Any Senate debate of what would become the Second Amendment does not survive in recorded form. See James H. Hutson , The Creation of the Constitution: The Integrity of the Documentary Record , 65 Tex. L. Rev. 1 , 36 (1986) ( “The documentary record of debates on the Bill of Rights consists . . . of deliberations in the House of Representatives.” ). For instance, the phrase referencing the militia as “composed of the body of the People” was struck, and the descriptor of the militia as “the best security of a free State” was modified to “necessary to the security of a free State.” 26 Footnote Complete Bill of Rights , supra 18, at 270 . Several other changes were proposed and rejected, including adding limitations on a standing army “in time of peace” and adding next to the words “bear arms” the phrase “for the common defence.” 27 Footnote Complete Bill of Rights , supra 18, at 268–69 . The final language of the Second Amendment was agreed to and transmitted to the states in late September of 1789. 28 Footnote Complete Bill of Rights , supra 18, at 274 .

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Essays on 2nd Amendment

Writing an essay on the 2nd Amendment can be both interesting and thought-provoking. This topic allows you to delve into the history, politics, and ethical considerations surrounding the right to bear arms in the United States.

When choosing a topic for your 2nd Amendment essay, consider issues such as gun control, the historical context of the amendment, the impact of the 2nd Amendment on society, and the debate over individual rights versus public safety. Argumentative essays on the 2nd Amendment should focus on presenting a clear stance on the issue and supporting it with evidence. Cause and effect essays can explore the consequences of the 2nd Amendment on gun violence, crime rates, and public safety. Opinion essays allow you to express your personal views and beliefs about the 2nd Amendment, while informative essays provide factual information and analysis of the amendment's implications.

For an example of a 2nd Amendment essay, you can explore topics such as the impact of the 2nd Amendment on modern society, the historical context of the amendment, and the debate over gun control. A thesis statement for a 2nd Amendment essay could be, "The 2nd Amendment plays a crucial role in preserving individual liberties and protecting citizens from government overreach." When crafting an , consider providing background information on the 2nd Amendment, its historical significance, and its relevance in today's society. In the , you can summarize your main points and restate your thesis, leaving the reader with a thought-provoking message.

By writing an essay on the 2nd Amendment, you can explore a complex and controversial issue that has significant implications for society. It allows you to develop critical thinking skills and articulate your views on a topic that is important to many Americans. So, grab your pen and start exploring the world of the 2nd Amendment through your writing!

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