G
Guest
·Hi all,
I am trying out the concealed carry forum. I have a loaned handgun and a concealed carry permit that I carry frequently. I am a USU masters student in political science. My thesis is guns-related: I am doing research on the 2nd amendment, but not what you usually hear in gun articles and books. . .
As an undergraduate at the University of Utah, I read extensively to find out what the Founders' understanding of whether the militia was. I had grown up hearing two extreme opposites: the "gun people" said the constitutionally protected militia was all the citizens, anyone who wanted to keep a gun, in an unorganized body. The anti-gun people said it was the National Guard, the state's militias -- restricted to soldiers only, and they are the only ones who should be allowed to have guns. When I researched, I found out that both extreme positions had some truth: the militias protected under the Constitution were a form of universal military training; all males of age were part-time soldiers required to show up for muster days and to learn how to shoot, and often required to maintain a firearm that the state had given them. Guns were usually privately kept and maintained, but armories were also common. They saw their role as not only protecting against a military government (threat of "standing armies") or a dictatorship, but just as much they were about protecting legitimate government from anarchy, mobs, crime, and invasions.
Now, I am getting ready to do a masters thesis that will hopefully involve testing principles that the founders held about the militia and the way it should work by seeing how they work in the world today.
What do you all think?
--Paulito
I am trying out the concealed carry forum. I have a loaned handgun and a concealed carry permit that I carry frequently. I am a USU masters student in political science. My thesis is guns-related: I am doing research on the 2nd amendment, but not what you usually hear in gun articles and books. . .
As an undergraduate at the University of Utah, I read extensively to find out what the Founders' understanding of whether the militia was. I had grown up hearing two extreme opposites: the "gun people" said the constitutionally protected militia was all the citizens, anyone who wanted to keep a gun, in an unorganized body. The anti-gun people said it was the National Guard, the state's militias -- restricted to soldiers only, and they are the only ones who should be allowed to have guns. When I researched, I found out that both extreme positions had some truth: the militias protected under the Constitution were a form of universal military training; all males of age were part-time soldiers required to show up for muster days and to learn how to shoot, and often required to maintain a firearm that the state had given them. Guns were usually privately kept and maintained, but armories were also common. They saw their role as not only protecting against a military government (threat of "standing armies") or a dictatorship, but just as much they were about protecting legitimate government from anarchy, mobs, crime, and invasions.
Now, I am getting ready to do a masters thesis that will hopefully involve testing principles that the founders held about the militia and the way it should work by seeing how they work in the world today.
What do you all think?
--Paulito
