The Founding Father warned against standing armies (the military) and instead supported trained volunteer citizen militias, which was the first right they sought to protect with the 2nd Amendment, even BEFORE the right to bear arms: "A well [trained]* MILITIA being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed." *(j.mp/18sK79p) "Keep within the requisite limits a standing military force, always remembering that an armed and trained militia is the firmest bulwark of republics - that without standing armies their liberty can never be in danger, nor with large ones safe." ~ James Madison "A standing military force, with an overgrown Executive will not long be safe companions to liberty." ~ James Madison "A standing army is one of the greatest mischief that can possibly happen." ~ James Madison "None but an armed nation can dispense with a standing army." ~ Thomas Jefferson "A private central bank issuing the public currency is a greater menace to the liberties of the people than a standing army." ~ Thomas Jefferson " ... but if circumstances should at any time oblige the government to form an army of any magnitude, that army can never be formidable to the liberties of the people, while there is a large body of citizens, little if at all inferior to them in discipline and use of arms, who stand ready to defend their rights ..." ~ Alexander Hamilton speaking of standing armies in Federalist 29 "What, Sir, is the use of a militia? It is to prevent the establishment of a standing army, the bane of liberty .... Whenever Governments mean to invade the rights and liberties of the people, they always attempt to destroy the militia, in order to raise an army upon their ruins." ~ Rep. Elbridge Gerry of Massachusetts, spoken during floor debate over the Second Amendment, First Annals of Congress at 750, August 17, 1789 "Before a standing army can rule, the people must be disarmed; as they are in almost every kingdom of Europe. The supreme power in America cannot enforce unjust laws by the sword; because the whole body of people are armed, and constitute a force superior to any body of regular troops that can be, on any pretense, raised in the United States." ~ Noah Webster "To raise and support armies, but no approriation of money to that use shall be for a longer term than TWO YEARS." ~ The United States Constitution, Article I, Section 8 "I ask, Sir, what is the militia? It is the whole people ... To disarm the people is the best and most effectual way to enslave them." ~ George Mason, Co-author of the Second Amendment, in Debates in Virginia Convention on Ratification of the Constitution, Elliot, Vol. 3, June 16, 1788 "The right of the people to keep and bear ... arms shall not be infringed. A militia, composed of the body of the people, trained to arms, is the best and most natural defense of a free country ..." ~ James Madison, I Annals of Congress 434, June 8, 1789 "Who are the militia? Are they not ourselves? Is it feared, then, that we shall turn our arms each man against his own bosom. Congress have no power to disarm the militia. Their swords, and every other terrible implement of the soldier, are the birthright of an American...[T]he unlimited power of the sword is not in the hands of either the federal or state governments, but, where I trust in God it will ever remain, in the hands of the people." ~ Tenche Coxe, The Pennsylvania Gazette, Feb. 20, 1788. "The militia is the natural defense of a free country against sudden foreign invasions, domestic insurrections, and domestic usurpation of power by rulers. The right of the citizens to keep and bear arms has justly been considered, as the palladium of the liberties of the republic; since it offers a strong moral check against the usurpation and arbitrary power of rulers; and will generally ... enable the people to resist and triumph over them." ~ Joseph Story, Supreme Court Justice, Commentaries on the Constitution of the United States, p. 3:746-7, 1833
Posted on: Sat, 06 Jul 2013 15:40:49 +0000