Why millions of Americans — including me — own the AR-15

[chknltl]

80. Perhaps not so fast

I heard a historian interviewed by Thom Hartmann make the case that the 'well regulated militia'(s) refered to in the 2nd amendment were actually slave patrols. That would indeed make them mostly, if not specifically white males.

The historian's basic premise: 'Prior to the ratification of the Constitution there were two reasons the Southern slave states wanted the inclusion of the 2nd amendment.

The first was they wanted to continue on with their slave militias. Slaves were critical to their economy but periodically they revolted, sometimes individually but sometimes they did so on a much larger scale. For this reason there were both local and state run militias used to keep the slaves in check.

The second reason stemmed from the ongoing disagreement between the slave states and the non-slave states. According to the historian the way the 2nd amendment was deliberately worded, it could legally be interpreted to mean that the 'rights of the states to operate slave militias could not be infringed'. By doing this, the slave states now in essence had a written Constitutional guarantee to continue on with slave militias, which, according to the historian, enhanced their willingness to ratify the Constitution.'

I am not sure I have the interview fully accurate but i think it is close enough. If memory serves, the historian's name was Bogus, (yeah i know...), it was a most fascinating interview imho. He was discussing his book on that topic if you care to research the name.