REUTERS/Kevin LamarqueCivil War reenactors prepare to reenact the Battle of Manassas/Bull Run. In slave states, militias served not only as military forces, but also as slave patrols.
MinnPost
The right to bear arms was not part of the original Constitution. The Constitution did, without mentioning the word “slavery,” build in a number of protections for the institution in the South. Many of the northern framers were anti-slavery, but it was clear that there would be no union unless the slave states felt assured that the new, more powerful national government was not empowered to abolish slavery.
When the draft went to the states for ratification, one of the big battles was in Virginia, where men of towering reputations stood on both sides of the issue. The leader of the pro-ratification forces was James Madison, whose role in the story is so large that he is known as the Father of the Constitution. The noisiest opponent was the fading but famed orator Patrick Henry (whose famous line as a revolutionary was “give me liberty or give me death” and who had been the first post-colonial governor of Virginia). Henry made many, many arguments about the dangers to individual liberty and to the sovereignty of the Commonwealth of Virginia of this powerful new federal government. Bogus emphasizes that many of the arguments dealt with “militia” issues. But Bogus adds a fact that wouldn’t necessarily occur to you. In the slave states, the militias also served the function of slave patrols. The militia was available for military operations, but its biggest function was to police the slaves, intimidate the slaves and make clear to the slaves that any effort at a slave rebellion would be met with overwhelming deadly force — armed force — gun force.
No wonder the fanatics have such an aversion to the first four words of the sacred amendment.
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