Both sides of the Second Amendment debate claimed victory with this decision. Proponents of the collective-rights theory emphasized the Miller Court’s focus on the militia, claiming it was an indication that the Court saw the Second Amendment as only being concerned with the preservation of state militia. Advocated of individual rights believed the ruling indicated the Court’s saw a clear relationship between the individual right and the maintenance of the militia. Although United States vs. Miller was the Supreme Court’s most extensive exploration of the Second Amendment, it did little to change firearms regulations or the public’s view regarding the right to keep and bear arms.

Handgun Control, on of the largest pro gun-control groups believes that waiting periods and criminal background checks help to decrease the accessibility to the “high-risk” category. In the five and a half years since the passage of the Brady Law, more than 600,000 prohibited purchasers -- felons, juveniles and those convicted of domestic violence -- had been stopped from buying firearms. Unlike the NRA, the pro gun-control organizations believe that the Second Amendment provides for a “militia-of-the-whole. Citing Supreme Court Justice Warren Burger 1991 referral to the Second Amendment as “the subject of one of the greatest pieces of fraud, I repeat the word ‘fraud,’ on the American public by special interest groups that I have ever seen in my lifetime...[the NRA] ha(s) misled the American people and they, I regret to say, they have had far too much influence on the Congress of the United States than as a citizen I would like to see -- and I am a gun man." Burger also wrote, "The very language of the Second Amendment refutes any argument that it was intended to guarantee every citizen an unfettered right to any kind of weapon...[S]urely the Second Amendment does not remotely guarantee every person the constitutional right to have a ‘Saturday Night Special’ or a machine gun without any regulation whatever. There is no support in the Constitution for the argument that federal and state governments are powerless to regulate the purchase of such firearms...", this group believes that gun-control is essential to reducing crime.

to keep and bear such an instrument. Certainly it is not

A major cause of the Revolutionary War was the King’s attempt to disarm the colonists. Experiences of the American Revolution, the Boston Massacre, where British soldiers killed unarmed Boston colonists, and the Massachusetts militias encounter with the British Army all reinforced the belief that a militia-of-the-whole was needed for the security of a free State. This view found its way into the constitutional debates and is key to understanding the Second Amendment.

Some topics in this essay:
Control Act, Constitution Advocates, Night Special’, Rights Madison, Nineteenth Century, American Revolution, Bill Rights, Machiavelli Italian, Americans Soon, Assize Arms, gun control, bear arms, supreme court, national firearms act, meaning amendment, automatic weapons, firearms act, bill rights, national firearms, debate meaning, firearms ammunition, debate meaning amendment, sale firearms ammunition, hundred pounds allowed, gun control act,