In response to:
"I ask, Sir, what is the militia? It is the whole people. To disarm the people is the best and most effectual way to enslave them."
- George Mason, co-author of the Second Amendment during Virginia's Convention to Ratify the Constitution, 1788
"A militia, when properly formed, are in fact the people themselves …"
- Richard Henry Lee, writing in Letters from the Federal Farmer to the Republic, Letter XVIII, May, 1788.
"The people are not to be disarmed of their weapons. They are left in full possession of them."
- Zachariah Johnson, Elliot's Debates, vol. 3 "The Debates in the Several State Conventions on the Adoption of the Federal Constitution."
Wendy60 wrote: The neoconservatives are the reason why Boehner is not putting up a fight. The neocons do the thinking for the Republican leadership on all matters of strategy and morality in politics. Boehner wouldn't take a dump if the neocons told him not to, and if they told him to do so, he would strain for hours. Neocons want tax increases, because paying higher taxes is a sacrifice. Neocons believe that the little people have to be forced into sacrificing for the "collective self," i.e., the state, because that is the only way to preserve the social order. What they...
- Philadelphia Federal Gazette, June 18, 1789, Pg. 2, Col. 2 Article on the Bill of Rights
"And that the said Constitution be never construed to authorize Congress to infringe the just liberty of the Press, or the rights of Conscience; or to prevent the people of the United States, who are peaceable citizens, from keeping their own arms; …"
- Samuel Adams, Philadelphia Independent Gazetteer, August 20, 1789, "Propositions submitted to the Convention of this State"
"Firearms stand next in importance to the constitution itself. They are the American people's liberty teeth and keystone under independence … from the hour the Pilgrims landed
- George Washington, First President of the United States
"To preserve liberty, it is essential that the whole body of the people always possess arms and be taught alike, especially when young, how to use them."
- Richard Henry Lee, American Statesman, 1788
- George Washington, First President of the United States
"To preserve liberty, it is essential that the whole body of the people always possess arms and be taught alike, especially when young, how to use them."
- Richard Henry Lee, American Statesman, 1788
- Patrick Henry
"Are we at last brought to such humiliating and debasing degradation, that we cannot be trusted with arms for our defense? Where is the difference between having our arms in possession and under our direction and having them under the management of Congress? If our defense be the real object of having those arms, in whose hands can they be trusted with more propriety, or equal safety to us, as in our own hands?"
- Patrick Henry
"Those who hammer their guns into plowshares will plow for those who do not."
- Thomas Jefferson
- Thomas Jefferson, letter to Justice John Cartwright, June 5, 1824. ME 16:45.
"The best we can help for concerning the people at large is that they be properly armed."
- Alexander Hamilton, The Federalist Papers at 184-8
"We established however some, although not all its [self-government] important principles . The constitutions of most of our States assert, that all power is inherent in the people; that they may exercise it by themselves, in all cases to which they think themselves competent, (as in electing their functionaries executive and legislative, and deciding by a jury of
- Thomas Jefferson to John Cartwright, 1824
"No freeman shall ever be debarred the use of arms."
- Thomas Jefferson: Draft Virginia Constitution, 1776.
- Philadelphia Federal Gazette, June 18, 1789, Pg. 2, Col. 2 Article on the Bill of Rights
"And that the said Constitution be never construed to authorize Congress to infringe the just liberty of the Press, or the rights of Conscience; or to prevent the people of the United States, who are peaceable citizens, from keeping their own arms; …"
- Samuel Adams, Philadelphia Independent Gazetteer, August 20, 1789, "Propositions submitted to the Convention of this State"
"Firearms stand next in importance to the constitution itself. They are the American people's liberty teeth and keystone under independence … from the hour the Pilgrims landed