Posted by
BLOGASSAULT on Sunday, January 06, 2008 12:29:01 PM
Here is the brief the attorneys for the District of Columbia filed in the 2nd Amendment case coming to the Supreme Court later this year.
After reading it, I found one obvious hole in the case.
Most states passed detailed laws setting forth re-quirements for membership and discipline, generally requiring men of certain ages to appear periodically for muster and training under the supervision of state-appointed officers.1 The laws called for highly organized bodies, specifying company and regiment size, number and rank of commissioned and non-commissioned officers, and the like. E.g., Georgia Mi-litia Law 4-5. Those men were expected to obtain specified weaponry, normally muskets and rifles, and present them when directed. See Miller, 307 U.S. at 179-82. Failure to appear for training, properly armed, was punishable. E.g., Georgia Militia Law 1; New Hampshire Militia Law 8.
The Second Militia Act, enacted by Congress a year after the Second Amendment’s ratification, shows that the Framers similarly understood a "well regulated Militia" to be an organized and trained military force, led by state-chosen officers. It called for musters and training, and it specified particular weaponry all mili-tia members were required to possess. See Act of May 8, 1792, ch. XXXIII, 1 Stat. 271. It placed special em-phasis on military discipline. See id. §§ 6-7, 10-11.2
Notice the underlined sentence above. If you had to show up properly armed, then you must have had to own a weapon. Of course they will say that since they were members of the militia they could take their weapons home. So, only those that belonged to the militia and had a weapon were allowed defend themselves at home? But if you read the book by
Clayton E. Cramer, Armed America;
The story of how and why guns became as American as apple pie, you would find that early on all states required citizens to bring their own guns. The states later started providing them guns because the citizens couldn't afford to buy what the militia was requiring.
Anyway, it is an interesting read, both the brief and the book. Hopefully our Supreme Court sees it correctly.