Regarding the query below, yes (as I indicated in an earlier email), the idea is that the Second Amendment comes into play (that citizens have a right to keep and bear arms) in connection with service in a government organized and regulated militia. Firearms may be privately owned, but again Second-Amendment-applicable only in the context of militia service, remembering that, in the colonial and early federal eras (when the old militia system was still in operation), the government in fact often relied on citizens who were militia-eligible to supply their own weapons (regardless of whether actual weapons ownership was common or scarce). I believe it is a mistake to focus solely on the type of weapon, as the Second Amendment issue links weapons keeping/bearing with militias. As for regulation, there seems to be nearly universal agreement that, whatever the Second Amendment stipulates, it does not foreclose regulation; even the Ashcroft Justice Department has said as much. ! The Second Amendment does not extend to private ownership or use of guns for, say, personal self-defense from criminals (the law covers personal self-defense needs in criminal law and the common law tradition). As for Volokh or Reynolds, you can check with them, or their publications, directly. And as for the many dozens of state court decisions (leaving aside the more pertinent federal court rulings), with a couple of exceptions, they too endorse the militia view (e.g. Aymette, Dunne, Gohl). Regards, Bob Spitzer
Robert J. Spitzer, Ph.D. Distinguished Service Professor Political Science Department SUNY Cortland Box 2000 Cortland, NY 13045 voice: 607-753-4106 FAX: 607-753-5760 [EMAIL PROTECTED] <http://www.cortland.edu/polsci/home.html> -----Original Message----- From: Peter Boucher [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Thursday, October 16, 2003 6:01 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: reinsert eyeballs "I'll leave it to you to decide how any of this conforms to the variations and permutations of the 'standard model.'" I'm just trying to be clear on what your position is. Would you say that Gene Volokh's "Commonplace" papers (http://www1.law.ucla.edu/~volokh/common.htm, http://www1.law.ucla.edu/~volokh/amazing.htm) "adopt the militia view," since they both allow for the following, which you say "describe pretty well the militia view?" a) The type of weapons that the Second Amendment means when it says "arms" can be limited to the type of weapons soldiers ordinarily use. b) The right to keep and bear arms can be regulated without taking it away? How about Glenn Reynolds? Do his papers also "adopt the militia view?" You've said that "In all, 13 prior law journal articles ... were published before 1960, and all of them adopt the militia view." If all you really meant by that was that some connection to the militia was mentioned in each paper, and it doesn't matter if some or all of them also said that the Second Amendment protects an individual right of the people to keep and bear their privately-owned arms, then your assertion is amazingly weak (eye-poppingly, even). Will you please clarify?
