So there are three lies here:
I used to teach the Second Amendment in law school
No, he didn’t. He never taught a single class. (source: New York Post)
From the very beginning, there were limitations
“Everything in that statement is wrong,” said David Kopel, the research director and Second Amendment project director at the Independence Institute. After 1791, “there were no federal laws about the type of gun you could own, and no states limited the kind of gun you could own.” Not until the early 1800s were there any efforts to pass restrictions on carrying concealed weapons, he said. (source: The Washington Post)
You couldn’t own a cannon.
That is false. (source: Politifact) private individuals could, and did:
- form their own military units, usually termed “Legions,” that included artillery units.
- organize and charter private militia units as nonprofit corporations. On 28 October 1801, for example, Thaddeus Rice, John Hastings, James Godfrey, Reuben Rice and others incorporated a private artillery company in St. Albans, Vermont (see pages 120-21 of that state’s annual statutes to verify). On 3 November of the following year, 40 individuals did likewise in Shrewsbury, Rutland County (pps. 44-46). Other examples abound.
- own cannon, individually and as part of mercantile partnerships, for use on their ships, for protection against pirates and for use as privateers, private ships licensed by the U.S. federal government to seize enemy ships for lawful sale, a power granted Congress in the Constitution (Article I, § 8, clause 11). During the War of 1812, more than 200 American privateers seized and sold over 1,000 British ships. See the novels George Washington’s Secret Navy, and Patriot Pirates: The Privateer War for Freedom and Fortune in the American Revolution
- develop, manufacture, stockpile, and sell cannon to meet the demand of private individuals as well as the government. Consider an article in the Congressional Weekly Register on 7 January 1812 (pps. 342-43) complaining “that the least rumour of war” caused the market price of military goods like cannon to increase 50 to 100 percent.
Senile old piece of shit. I just have no, and I mean none, respect for this doddering old fool.


