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Originally Posted by ubertuber
I'm curious about exploring how the right to bear arms is related to a militia. Josh made some good points, including a seldom-head argument that the arms necessary to the maintanence of a militia include items much deadlier than guns.
From the Consititution itself, I don't see any indication that the Framers intended to limit these arms to guns. Of course, military technology was a narrower field 225 years ago, but I don't see anything that would indicate that the people who wrote this document would think that citizens couldn't have canons and artillery items.
Can anyone provide information on whether private citizens owned these items? I'll look around a little.
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from a historical perspective, the 'militia' as it was known back then did not own cannons, but they did know how to make small explosive devices with the gun powder that they had. Of course, the 'guerilla' type warfare that the militia ended up using against the british showed that a properly armed militia could repel enemy invaders as well as fight a tyrannical government.
As george washington had said, "A free people ought not only to be armed and disciplined, but they should have sufficient arms and ammunition to maintain a status of independence from any who might attempt to abuse them, which would include their own government."
Back then, if a civilian had the equipment and money available to build a cannon, there would have been no law against it nor would he have received any flack about it from the government.