> The Founders wrote it into the Constitution; the Supreme Court decided that their (extremely dubious) wording means what the NRA wants it to mean. A 2000 law

> The Founders wrote it into the Constitution; the Supreme Court decided that their (extremely dubious) wording means what the NRA wants it to mean. A 2000 law review article on the topic found that between 1887 (when things were first indexed) until 1960, all references were towards a collective right (i.e., in a militia, akin to the current National Guard): * https://scholarship.kentlaw.iit.edu/cklawreview/vol76/iss1/2/ https://scholarship.kentlaw.iit.edu/cklawreview/vol76/iss1/2... The 1960 article that first mentions it states: > The majority of the jurisdictions have concluded that both the United States Constitution and the various state constitutions, having a similar provision relating to the right to bear arms, refer to the militia as a whole composed and regulated by the state as it desires. The individual does not have the right to own or bear individual arms, such being a privilege not a right. * https://scholarship.law.wm.edu/wmlr/vol2/iss2/6/ https://scholarship.law.wm.edu/wmlr/vol2/iss2/6/ So the first mention of an individual right states that that is not how it is interpreted (the author argues for a dual-right, collective and individual). In 1992: > Former Chief Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court Warren Burger argues that the sale, purchase, and use of guns should be regulated just as automobiles and boats are regulated; such regulations would not violate the Second Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. * https://www.ojp.gov/ncjrs/virtual-library/abstracts/second-amendment-does-not-guarantee-right-own-gun-gun-control-p-99 https://www.ojp.gov/ncjrs/virtual-library/abstracts/second-a... Burger in a 1991 PBS interview: > This has been the subject of one of the greatest pieces of fraud – I repeat the word ‘fraud’ – on the American public by special interest groups that I have ever seen in my lifetime. If the militia, which was going to be the state army, was going to be well-regulated, why shouldn't 16 and 17 and 18, or any other age, persons be regulated in the use of arms the way an automobile is regulated? * https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hKfQpGk7KKw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hKfQpGk7KKw * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warren_E._Burger https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warren_E._Burger (Burger was nominated by Nixon.)