Let's not forget Justice William O. Douglas’s dissent in Adams v. Williams, 407 U.S 143, 150 -51 (1972). Don't forget that Douglas was actually on the court at the time of US v. Miller (you did actually read the decision--didn't you?).
Douglas' successor on the Court, Justice John Paul Stevens:
For more than 200 years following the adoption of that amendment, federal judges uniformly understood that the right protected by that text was limited in two ways: First, it applied only to keeping and bearing arms for military purposes, and second, while it limited the power of the federal government, it did not impose any limit whatsoever on the power of states or local governments to regulate the ownership or use of firearms. Thus, in United States v. Miller, decided in 1939, the court unanimously held that Congress could prohibit the possession of a sawed-off shotgun because that sort of weapon had no reasonable relation to the preservation or efficiency of a “well regulated Militia.”
When I joined the court in 1975, that holding was generally understood as limiting the scope of the Second Amendment to uses of arms that were related to military activities. During the years when Warren Burger was chief justice, from 1969 to 1986, no judge or justice expressed any doubt about the limited coverage of the amendment, and I cannot recall any judge suggesting that the amendment might place any limit on state authority to do anything.Sorry, but saying the Second Amendment is not related to the militia is not only textually incorrect, it is historically and legally incorrect.
As I said in another post, if you want to exercise your Second Amendment right, you can get all the gear paid if you join the national guard, which is the Article I, Section 8, Clause 16 militia. That also points out the silliness of asserting that the Second Amendment right is not related to the preservation or efficiency of a “well regulated Militia.”
You've got to pay for one (and go through the legal procedures) to be able to own a firearm if it is not related to the preservation or efficiency of a “well regulated Militia.”
That clause in the US Constitution is what makes a militia "constitutional", not quotes from the founding fathers.
OK, even though I think the Heller and McDonald "decisions" are complete bullshit--I should at least quote them as well:
Scalia from Heller:
Like most rights, the right secured by the Second Amendment is not unlimited. From Blackstone through the 19th-century cases, commentators and courts routinely explained that the right was not a right to keep and carry any weapon whatsoever in any manner whatsoever and for whatever purpose. See, e.g., Sheldon, in 5 Blume 346; Rawle 123; Pomeroy 152–153; Abbott 333. For example, the majority of the 19th-century courts to consider the question held that prohibitions on carrying concealed weapons were lawful under the Second Amendment or state analogues. See, e.g., State v. Chandler, 5 La. Ann., at 489–490; Nunn v. State, 1 Ga., at 251; see generally 2 Kent *340, n. 2; The American Students’ Blackstone 84, n. 11 (G. Chase ed. 1884). Although we do not undertake an exhaustive historical analysis today of the full scope of the Second Amendment, nothing in our opinion should be taken to cast doubt on longstanding prohibitions on the possession of firearms by felons and the mentally ill, or laws forbidding the carrying of firearms in sensitive places such as schools and government buildings, or laws imposing conditions and qualifications on the commercial sale of arms.Alito from McDonald:
It is important to keep in mind that Heller, while striking down a law that prohibited the possession of handguns in the home, recognized that the right to keep and bear arms is not “a right to keep and carry any weapon whatsoever in any manner whatsoever and for whatever purpose.” 554 U. S., at ___ (slip op., at 54). We made it clear in Heller that our holding did not cast doubt on such longstanding regulatory measures as “prohibitions on the possession of firearms by felons and the mentally ill,” “laws forbidding the carrying of firearms in sensitive places such as schools and government buildings, or laws imposing conditions and qualifications on the commercial sale of arms.” Id., at ___–___ (slip op., at 54–55). We repeat those assurances here. Despite municipal respondents’ doomsday proclamations, incorporation does not imperil every law regulating firearms.I know that Heller held that registration and background checks were A-OK.
No matter how you look at it--an unfettered right to personal arms is a fantasy.
It will be even more of a fantasy as Heller and McDonald are dissected in law journals and found to be composed of horseshit.