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I'm happy to debate or discuss this in good faith but this isn't a good faith argument. "Arms" meant (means) state-of-the-art, military-level hardware. The mus

by pc86 2y ago

I'm happy to debate or discuss this in good faith but this isn't a good faith argument. "Arms" meant (means) state-of-the-art, military-level hardware. The muskets that civilians had in their homes were as good or better than what you'd be issued by the burgeoning American military, to the extent that you were issue anything and weren't just expected to bring your own. Throughout all of American history, perhaps with the exception of nuclear arms and vehicles like tanks and submarines, firearms research and development has occurred in private industry and made its way into the military later.

ceejayoz 2y ago
> The muskets that civilians had in their homes were as good or better than what you'd be issued by the burgeoning American military... Probably not cannons and grapeshot, though.
- pc86 2y ago
  Took me 10 seconds on Google: https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2020/jun/29/joe-biden/joe-bidens-dubious-claim-about-revolutionary-war-c/ https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2020/jun/29/joe-biden/... But the specifics are irrelevant, the spirit is clear. "The Constitution shall never be construed to prevent the people of the United States who are peaceable citizens from keeping their own arms." - Sam Adams, address to Massachusetts Ratifying Convention, 1788
  - ceejayoz 2y ago
    > Took me 10 seconds on Google... Finding an article that says, essentially, ¯\_(ツ)_/¯, and then goes on to talk about government licensed privateers - akin to the modern setup of a security guard licensed to carry in a state that doesn't otherwise permit it. Is there evidence outside of that of personal home ownership of cannons? (Let alone of a widespread nature?) Do we think Sam Adams would advocate personal ownership of nuclear bombs, or do we think he'd perhaps see such things as a category slightly different than the muskets of his time?
    - pc86 2y ago
      We can hem and haw and guess about what we think the founders would think, or we can look at what they said and what the historical context of firearms ownership is. We don't have private ownership of nuclear arms now and pointing there is IMO another explicitly bad faith argument, in part because it's clear you don't particularly care what the founders' intentions were because there are thousands of pages of discussions and arguments showing that regular every-day people were allowed to - encouraged to, in cases required to - own weapons on par or better than military armaments of the day. And despite that, my guess is you have a problem with people owning or carrying AR-15s, or with people carrying handguns on them when they go to a restaurant, etc. I'm happy to be proven wrong though! The start of this little digression was private citizens carrying their personally owned handguns outside of their home as is plainly meant by the word "bear" in 2A. So rather than moving the goalposts to Sam Adams's opinion on private ownership of nuclear weapons or whatever other bad faith things you want to bring up, I'd rather focus on that.
      - ceejayoz 2y ago
        > We can hem and haw and guess about what we think the founders would think, or we can look at what they said and what the historical context of firearms ownership is. "Nothing like machine guns exist, let alone in private hands, let alone widely so" is part of that historical context, yes. > We don't have private ownership of nuclear arms now... As the apocryphal Churchill quote about whores goes, "We've already established that [some arms don't fall under the 2nd]; we're merely haggling over [which]..."
        pc86 2y ago
        Puckle guns existed about 60 years before the revolution and you could absolutely own them privately and they were developed by a private citizen, although they're closer to a Gatling gun than a machine gun. If your argument is that machine guns didn't exist in the late 1700s therefore they're not covered by the second amendment, then surely the internet isn't covered by the first amendment and you should be able to be arrested for any online comments you make, right?
- potato3732842 2y ago
  Cannons and grapeshot were an essential part of marine commerce at the time and tons of them were privately owned. The only control on who could own what back then was wealth.
- ruined 2y ago
  Cannon and grapeshot were legal then and are legal today. Though if it's not specifically a muzzle-loading black powder cannon, you need to pay a $200 tax.

by pc86 2y ago

ceejayoz 2y ago

> The muskets that civilians had in their homes were as good or better than what you'd be issued by the burgeoning American military... Probably not cannons and grapeshot, though.

pc86 2y ago
Took me 10 seconds on Google: https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2020/jun/29/joe-biden/joe-bidens-dubious-claim-about-revolutionary-war-c/ https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2020/jun/29/joe-biden/... But the specifics are irrelevant, the spirit is clear. "The Constitution shall never be construed to prevent the people of the United States who are peaceable citizens from keeping their own arms." - Sam Adams, address to Massachusetts Ratifying Convention, 1788
- ceejayoz 2y ago
  > Took me 10 seconds on Google... Finding an article that says, essentially, ¯\_(ツ)_/¯, and then goes on to talk about government licensed privateers - akin to the modern setup of a security guard licensed to carry in a state that doesn't otherwise permit it. Is there evidence outside of that of personal home ownership of cannons? (Let alone of a widespread nature?) Do we think Sam Adams would advocate personal ownership of nuclear bombs, or do we think he'd perhaps see such things as a category slightly different than the muskets of his time?
  - pc86 2y ago
    We can hem and haw and guess about what we think the founders would think, or we can look at what they said and what the historical context of firearms ownership is. We don't have private ownership of nuclear arms now and pointing there is IMO another explicitly bad faith argument, in part because it's clear you don't particularly care what the founders' intentions were because there are thousands of pages of discussions and arguments showing that regular every-day people were allowed to - encouraged to, in cases required to - own weapons on par or better than military armaments of the day. And despite that, my guess is you have a problem with people owning or carrying AR-15s, or with people carrying handguns on them when they go to a restaurant, etc. I'm happy to be proven wrong though! The start of this little digression was private citizens carrying their personally owned handguns outside of their home as is plainly meant by the word "bear" in 2A. So rather than moving the goalposts to Sam Adams's opinion on private ownership of nuclear weapons or whatever other bad faith things you want to bring up, I'd rather focus on that.
    - ceejayoz 2y ago
      > We can hem and haw and guess about what we think the founders would think, or we can look at what they said and what the historical context of firearms ownership is. "Nothing like machine guns exist, let alone in private hands, let alone widely so" is part of that historical context, yes. > We don't have private ownership of nuclear arms now... As the apocryphal Churchill quote about whores goes, "We've already established that [some arms don't fall under the 2nd]; we're merely haggling over [which]..."
      - pc86 2y ago
        Puckle guns existed about 60 years before the revolution and you could absolutely own them privately and they were developed by a private citizen, although they're closer to a Gatling gun than a machine gun. If your argument is that machine guns didn't exist in the late 1700s therefore they're not covered by the second amendment, then surely the internet isn't covered by the first amendment and you should be able to be arrested for any online comments you make, right?
potato3732842 2y ago
Cannons and grapeshot were an essential part of marine commerce at the time and tons of them were privately owned. The only control on who could own what back then was wealth.
ruined 2y ago
Cannon and grapeshot were legal then and are legal today. Though if it's not specifically a muzzle-loading black powder cannon, you need to pay a $200 tax.