It should be noted that what we today call "gun control" laws were rare, and almost all directed at disarming disfavored minorities, like Catholics (in England), or Blacks or Native Americans (in the colonies and early republic). About the first U.S. laws to restrict white males were the restrictions on concealed carry in the 1830s. After the War of Secession gun control laws appeared that seemed to apply to everyone but with the understanding among law enforcement professionals and almost everyone that they were only actually to be applied to disfavored minorities, which began to include union organizers and certain immigrant groups. I recall that in the 1950s when I was young they were just not enforced against white native-born citizens who were not union organizers or civil rights activists, and everyone understood that. It was when they began to be enforced against non-activist native-born whites that the gun rights movement emerged as we know it today.
-- Jon ---------------------------------------------------------------- Constitution Society 7793 Burnet Road #37, Austin, TX 78757 512/299-5001 www.constitution.org [EMAIL PROTECTED] ---------------------------------------------------------------- _______________________________________________ To post, send message to Firearmsregprof@lists.ucla.edu To subscribe, unsubscribe, change options, or get password, see http://lists.ucla.edu/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/firearmsregprof Please note that messages sent to this large list cannot be viewed as private. Anyone can subscribe to the list and read messages that are posted; people can read the Web archives; and list members can (rightly or wrongly) forward the messages to others.
