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2nd Amendment Arguments

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2nd Amendment Arguments
A topic for debate is, whether the 2nd Amendment protects individual rights to own a firearm. For the past century, political scientist and private citizens have compelling arguments about the exact meaning of the 2nd Amendment. For example, citizens that want to protect the individual’s right to possess a firearm concentration on the “right to bear arms” portion. While those concerned with communal responsibilities put emphasis on the “well-regulated militia” phrase to further implement restrictive gun laws. Although, both sides have a numerous amount of countless reasons for why they believe the 2nd Amendment exist, there is always a better argument. So, after reviewing what each side says, a final verdict will discuss about which article …show more content…
It is easy to understand that the leaders of the American Revolution held a different interpretation of the 2nd Amendment. At that time, Americans were fighting for independence from Great Britain. However, regardless of the view of the militia’s weak performance during the Revolutionary War, Americans still trusted that without a “well-regulated militia” the republican government would fail. For example, the battle of Yorktown was a major turning point of the war that was led by Washington’s militia and without that victory the war would’ve continued. Also, this lesson continues to echo throughout history, when citizens organize into local militias they will be able to stop a tyrannical government from developing and defeat foreign invaders from taking their land. Additionally, a well-regulated militia can help deter civil disorders. Again, which history has also shown that republican governments with armed citizens are profoundly vulnerable to internal uproar. For instance, in Massachusetts, Daniel Shay’s Rebellion displays the threat that can occur when private citizens feel they have the right to own firearms. When a group begins to feel disenfranchised they will exercise the right to bear arms in an illegal fashion, which can cause the republic to …show more content…
Within today’s society, Americans are no longer trying to free themselves from tyranny and attempting to construct a republic. Instead, American’s are taking advantage of the conservative view of the right to bear arms and using it on each other. There is no reason for people to armed with a gun unless they are going hunting or they’re trained and serving a purpose such as fighting a war. The 2nd Amendment is open ended to be interpreted as both to the “right to bear arms” and “well-regulated militia” due to the fact it isn’t up to the government to decide to take guns away. Instead, it is up to the citizens to recognize when these interpretations should be used. For instance, a numerous amount the founding fathers agreed that a standing army during a time of peace can be dangerous. Consequently, this can be easily seen with how people are acting today with the access to firearms. For example, America is known to lead the world in having the most guns and along with that carries the title of having the most gun homicides. In a recent a study written by Politifact said, “24 Americans have been killed by foreign terrorism in the last decade, while 280,024 Americans were killed by guns” (Qiu). In other words, this shows that the major threat to America is not foreign invasion, instead it is at home with private

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