Even people on the supposed gun rights side of things tend to read the Constitution to say what they wished it said, rather than what it plainly says.
Yet the Constitution plainly allows for letters of Marque. When a letter of Marque was issued, called a commission, it would describe the vessel that it had been issued to and its master. The ship was described by the guns mounted. Here is an example:
In other words, the commission didn’t authorize the master and his vessel to mount guns- they were already there. All it did was authorize the master to use the guns already mounted on that vessel to act as a privateer.
So, we know from the historical record that the founders placed no limit on the lethality or number of weapons. Trying to spin it into “well, weapons that can destroy a city aren’t useful for defending a state, so they can be banned” is no different than claiming the 2A only applies to muskets. It’s simply faulty logic.
I would point out that biological weapons have been a thing since about 1500 BC, and would have been known to the founders, yet they didn’t see fit to prohibit them. In fact, the British used biological weapons against the colonies as far back as 1763. They didn’t know how the weapons worked or anything at all about germs, but they knew giving blankets that had been used by smallpox victims to people would cause the recipients to get smallpox.
If only the founders had seen a way for the Constitution to be modified as technology changed. I mean, there is the part in there about amending it. I’m sure the issue here is that you couldn’t get the requisite 2/3 vote of Congress and 3/4 of the states to sign on, especially if Trump were the one pushing for it. After all, the left hates Trump so much that even a proposal to restrict the protection of the Second Amendment to not include nukes would fail to clear the bar for Congress.
That’s the proper way to amend our supreme laws, not by simply declaring that it means something else because we don’t happen to like the result or implications.
12 Comments
Joe Blow · June 16, 2026 at 6:11 am
I disagree, I think the founders did consider updates to time and technology when writing the Constitution, and 2nd Amendment in particular. They didn’t describe armaments nor types of arms (soldier portable, repeating, cartridge, etc.), they chose instead to use one of the broadest, all encompassing terms possible. Not blades and other weapons, Arms. Arms can include canons, warships, and… any number of things not even yet invented nor thought of. Very smart them old white dudes. That class of person is exceedingly rare… and none of them get into politics these days.
Divemedic · June 16, 2026 at 7:17 am
Just to be clear, are you disagreeing with the reading that 2A only applies to individual weapons, and agreeing with my position that it applies to all arms?
ghostsniper · June 16, 2026 at 6:31 am
sigh
Doesn’t anybody know how to read and/or think any more?
The 2nd amendment has nothing to do with me.
It has to do with the gov’t.
My rights are inherent, nothing can change that except criminal behavior.
The 2nd specifically creates limitations on the gov’t’s ability to try to infringe on my rights.
Note the wording.
“The right of the people….”
What right is being addressed?
The ALREADY existing right that existed BEFORE the writing of the constitution.
The 2nd didn’t create a right.
It created a limitation on the gov’t.
There is no such thing as “2nd amendment right”.
Divemedic · June 16, 2026 at 7:20 am
Yes, and we have discussed that numerous times. The term “Second Amendment right” is used here when brevity and clarity requires it, so the posts don’t read like a brief being submitted to the Supreme Court.
Also note that in this post, there was no mention of that exact term.
oldvet50 · June 16, 2026 at 7:38 am
The 2nd isn’t the only issue with poor application of common sense. “The right of the people…” which people? Liberals would have you believe it’s a select few, vetted by those in power, then turn around and say everyone has the right to ‘due process’ when it comes to repelling invaders to our land. The sad,stark truth is you only have the rights you can afford or are able to attain by force. The Constitution and the whole body of enacted law are merely suggestions as to how society should behave. Different people, different rules. The only truth I have witnessed in my 76 years is: “You can’t fight city hall”
Jonesy · June 16, 2026 at 10:54 am
Aside from the lack of common sense and modern interpretation of our founding docs (which is directly tied to civics not being taught in school), the government has grown exponentially and there haven’t been any physical threats to our borders since the war of 1812. Rather than fearing the government, the people have come to rely on it. Layers and layers of services, safety nets and social programs means the beast is self sustaining with support from the people. No one is willing to do without.
Now, and into the future, the government no longer needs to be restrained by the Constitution and the BOR. As long as politicians keep getting elected that are willing to ignore the restraints, they will continue to erode.
So no surprise that even 2A supporters think that there are limits on rights. What are there, some 20K gun control laws across local, state, and federal in the US? We’ve accepted quite a bit of infringement to date.
Divemedic · June 16, 2026 at 11:33 am
TRX · June 16, 2026 at 11:31 am
In 1789, the most powerful weapon in human history was an armed warship. And the US Navy had depended heavily on leased civilian warships in its early days, and every signatory of the Constitution would have been aware of that, since private warships were still a thing then. Privately-owned cannon were also a thing; they didn’t have to be mounted on a ship. The Revolutionary and Confederation armies were run on a shoestring; it was cheaper to rent private cannons than to buy their own.
For that matter, “private militias” (i.e. mercenaries) were also a thing back then. The US government hired those, too.
Every word of the Constitution was debated and argued over. They said “arms” without limits. If they had meant “flintlock muskets” they would certainly have said so.
hh475 · June 16, 2026 at 6:36 pm
Colonial Americans were quite aware of biological weapons. The British used smallpox as a weapon against Indians a few times. The most famous was Captain Simeon Ecuyer and Colonel Henry Bouquet giving smallpox blankets to representatives of the Delaware Nation. George Washington is recognized as forward-thinking by ordering inoculation of Continental Army troops; one of many reasons he did so was fear of British biological efforts, according to some authors. What a lot of people don’t realize is that the Indians did it first. During Queen Anne’s War, the Iroquois intentionally contaminated the water of a British garrison. As Elizabeth Fenn writes in her article Biological Warfare in Eighteenth-Century North America: Beyond Jeffery Amherst:
It may well have been Indians, not whites, who used the strategy first. In his volu-
minous History and Description of New France, Pierre-Francois-Xavier de Charlevoix
recounts an Iroquois act of biological sabotage against the English during Queen
Anne’s War in the early 1700s. The English army, Charlevoix writes, “was encamped
on the banks of a little river; the Iroquois, who spent almost all the time hunting,
threw into it, just above the camp, all the skins of the animals they flayed, and the
water was thus soon all corrupted.” The army, Charlevoix continued, suspected
nothing. Soldiers “continued to drink this water, and it carried off so many, that
Father de Mareuil, and two officers … observing the graves where the dead were
buried, estimated the number at over a thousand.”
As an aside, during the War Between the States, a Confederate physician tried to spread Yellow Fever to the Federals with blankets and such, but it didn’t work.
Jester · June 17, 2026 at 7:02 pm
I mean we really all know what they mean when they try to say individuals have the right to be armed, that select individuals can be. The ones that agree with them. The .gov of course. While I’m not really interested in stockpiling NBC stuff, lots of chemical irritants on up to WMDs can be fabricated on a small local scale anyway. At least to small scales.
Bush in Oz · June 17, 2026 at 7:07 pm
Long-time lurker, first time posting, I think.
Am Australian, and I just wanted to say thanks for the photo of the Letter of Marque. I had read about those, but had never seen one. Seeing actual historical documents is always interesting.
Your blog is always a great read, and Happy Birthday for your 250th.
Gryphon · June 18, 2026 at 5:21 pm
The phrase “…well-regulated Militia..” means well-trained and equipped. And Organized. Crew-Served Weapons such as Cannon and Warships with Cannon were commonly in Private Hands at the Time, and thus fall under ‘Constitutional Protection’. Today’s libtards who wail about how “Weapons of War” don’t fall under the Second Amendment are just Pig-Ignorant (apology to Pigs, they’re pretty smart) and anyone using the argument that certain Weapons must be Prohibited is just a dirty little communist who needs to be “Extirpated”.
Comments are closed.