please see the attachments

There they would see an entrance flanked by two marble panels 2 Comment by Shawn Walker: This paragraph provides background on the pro-gun words and the NRA’s focus on only one section of the 2nd amendment to the entire amendment. Comment by Al Mashari, Amira Hilal Sulaiman: Comment by Al Mashari, Amira Hilal Sulaiman:

offering language, and language more dignified and traditional than

that customarily associated with the Associations gun-freak constitu-

ency, with its T-shirts reading GUNS, GUTS, AND GLORY ARE

WHAT MADE AMERICA GREAT and its belt buckles proclaiming

I'LL GIVE UP MY GUN WHEN THEY PRY MY COLD DEAD

FINGERS FROM AROUND IT. The marble panel on the right

reads, "The right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be Comment by Shawn Walker: The entire 2nd Amendment: A well-regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.

infringed," which sounds familiar. So familiar that the student

naturally expects the left-hand panel to honor the principle of sym-

metry by presenting the first half of the quotation, namely: "A well-

regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, . .

But looking to the left, the inquirer discovers not that clause at all but

rather this lame list of NRA functions and specializations: "Firearms

Safety Education. Marksmanship Training. Shooting for Recreation."

It's as if in presenting its well-washed, shiny public face the NRA

doesn't want to remind anyone of the crucial dependent clause of the

Second Amendment, whose latter half alone it is so fond of invoking

to urge its prerogatives. (Some legible belt buckles of members

retreat further into a seductive vagueness, reading only, "Our Ameri-

can Heritage: the Second Amendment:') We infer that for the Asso-

ciation, the less emphasis on the clause about the militia, the better.

194 Guns: Can the Second Amendment Survive?

Hence its pretence on the front of its premises that the quoted main clause is not crucially dependent on the now unadvertised subordinate clause — indeed, it's meaningless without it.

Because flying .38- and .45-ca1iber bullets rank close to cancer, heart disease, and AIDS as menaces to public health in this country, the firearm lobby, led by the NRA, comes under liberal attack regularly, and with special vigor immediately after an assault on some conspicuous person like Ronald Reagan or John Lennon. Thus the New Republic, in April 1981, deplored the state of things but offered as a solution only the suggestion that the whole Second Amendment be perceived as obsolete and amended out of the Constitution. This would leave the NRA with not a leg to stand on. Comment by Shawn Walker: Now, he is presenting the anti-gun solution that was present at the time. Remove the 2nd Amendment completely.

But here as elsewhere a better solution would be not to fiddle with the Constitution but to take it seriously, the way we've done with the First Amendment, say, or with the Thirteenth, the one forbidding open and avowed slavery. And by taking the Second Amendment seriously I mean taking it literally. We should "close read" it and thus focus lots of attention on the grammatical reasoning of its two clauses. This might shame the NRA into pulling the dependent clause out of the closet, displaying it on its facade, and accepting its not entirely pleasant implications. These could be particularized in an Act of Congress providing: Comment by Shawn Walker: Here is the key to his argument and his thesis statement. What follows in this paragraph is his explanation of it. Comment by Shawn Walker: What follows are the particulars of his interpretation of the 2nd amendment.

(1) that the Militia shall now, after these many years, be "well- 5 regulated," as the Constitution requires.

(2) that any person who has chosen to possess at home a gun of any 6

kind, and who is not a member of the police or the military or

an appropriate government agency, shall be deemed to have

enrolled automatically in the Militia of the United States. Mem-

bers of the Militia, who will be issued identifying badges, will

be organized in units of battalion, company, or platoon size rep-

resenting counties, towns, or boroughs. If they bear arms while

not proceeding to or from scheduled exercises of the Militia,

they will be punished "as a court martial may direct."

(3) that any gun owner who declines to join the regulated Militia 7 Comment by Shawn Walker: Now he provides for gun-owners who do not want to join a militia. They have to sell their guns to the government for $1000 each.

may opt out by selling his firearms to the federal government

for $1,000 each. He will sign an undertaking that if he ever

again owns firearms he will be considered to have enlisted in the

Militia.

Fussell A Well-Regulated Militia 195

(4) that because the Constitution specifically requires that the Mili- 8 Comment by Shawn Walker: He describes the requirements of participating in a militia and how their military life would be, including a description of typical army food. He also identifies other training exercise requirements besides target practice.

tia shall be "well regulated," a regular training program, of the

sort familiar to all who have belonged to military units charged

with the orderly management of small arms, shall be instituted.

This will require at least eight hours of drill each Saturday at

some convenient field or park, rain or shine or snow or ice.

There will be weekly supervised target practice (separation

from the service, publicly announced, for those who can't hit a

barn door). And there will be ample practice in digging simple

defense works, like foxholes and trenches, as well as necessary

sanitary installations like field latrines and straddle trenches.

Each summer there will be a six-week bivouac (without

spouses), and this, like all the other exercises, will be under the

close supervision of long-service noncommissioned officers of

the United States Army and the Marine Corps. On bivouac,

liquor will be forbidden under extreme penalty, but there will

be an issue every Friday night of two cans of 3.2 beer, and feed-

ing will follow traditional military lines, the cuisine consisting

largely of shit-on-a-shingle, sandwiches made of bull dick (balo-

ney) and choke-ass (cheese), beans, and fatty pork. On Sundays

and holidays, powdered eggs for breakfast. Chlorinated water

will often be available, in Lister Bags. Further obligatory exer-

cises designed to toughen up the Militia will include twenty-

five-mile hikes and the negotiation of obstacle courses. In

addition, there will be instruction of the sort appropriate to

other lightly armed, well-regulated military units: in map-

reading, the erection of double-apron barbed-wire fences, and

the rudiments of military courtesy and the traditions of the

Militia, beginning with the Minute Men. Per diem payments

will be made to those participating in these exercises.

(5) that since the purpose of the Militia is, as the Constitution 9 says, to safeguard "the security of a free state," at times when invasion threatens (perhaps now the threat will come from Nicaragua, national security no longer being menaced by North Vietnam) all units of the Militia will be trucked to the Comment by Shawn Walker: Now he specifies how the militia will be used for “the security of a free state.” They may be called upon at any time to protect the country and/or respond to natural disasters and other states of emergency.

borders for the duration of the emergency, there to remain in field conditions (here's where the practice in latrine-digging pays off) until Congress declares that the emergency has passed. Congress may also order the Militia to perform other

196 Guns: Can the Second Amendment Survive?

duties consistent with its constitutional identity as a regulated volunteer force: for example, flood and emergency and disaster service (digging, sandbag filling, rescuing old people); patrolling angry or incinerated cities; or controlling crowds at large public events like patriotic parades, motor races, and professional football games.

(6) that failure to appear for these scheduled drills, practices, biv 10 ouacs, and mobilizations shall result in the Militiaperson's dismissal from the service and forfeiture of badge, pay, and Comment by Shawn Walker: He describes that failure to serve in the Militia trainings and exercises means the person will be thrown out of the militia and be required to give up their guns.

firearm.

Why did the Framers of the Constitution add the word bear to the phrase "keep and bear arms?" Because they conceived that keeping arms at home implied the public obligation to bear them in a regulated way for "the security of" not a private household but "a free state." If interstate bus fares can be regulated, it is hard to see why the Militia can't be, especially since the Constitution says it must be. The New Republic has recognized that "the Second Amendment to the Constitution clearly connects the right to bear arms to the eighteenth-century national need to raise a militia." But it goes on: "That need is now obsolete, and so is the amendment." And it concludes: "lithe only way this country can get control of firearms is to amend the Constitution, then it's time for Congress to get the process under way." Comment by Shawn Walker: He comments on the phrase “keep and bear arms” and surmises that those who wrote the constitution believed that it also required a public responsibility. Comment by Shawn Walker: Once again, he presents the anti-gun or pro-gun control argument, only this time as a counter-argument.

I think not. Rather, it's time not to amend Article II of the Bill of 12 Rights (and Obligations) but to read it, publicize it, embrace it, and enforce it. That the Second Amendment stems from concerns that can be stigmatized as "eighteenth-century" cuts little ice. The First Amendment stems precisely from such concerns, and no one but Yahoos wants to amend it. Also "eighteenth-century" is that lovely bit in Section 9 of Article I forbidding any "Title of Nobility" to be granted by the United States. That's why we've been spared Lord Annenberg and Sir Leonard Bernstein, Knight.' Thank God for the eighteenth century, I say. It understood not just what a firearm is and what a Militia is. It Comment by Shawn Walker: This is a restatement of his thesis, followed by once again mentioning another amendment that no one wants to change. Comment by Shawn Walker: Final comments about the wisdom of the writers of the constitution.

Lord Annenberg . . Knight: Walter H. Annenberg (1908-2002) was a controversial billionaire publisher, known both for his philanthropy and for using his publication for direct personal or political ends; Leonard H. Bernstein (1919-1990) was a massively influential composer whose many works include the score for West Side Story.

Fussell • A Well-Regulated Militia 197

also understood what "well regulated" means. It knew how to compose a constitutional article and it knew how to read it. And it assumed that everyone, gun lobbyists and touring students alike, would understand and correctly quote it. Both halves of it.

BACKGROUND AND CONTEXT

1. Why does Fussell mention that at the National Rifle Association's entrance, the panels cite only one part of the Second Amendment? What part is that? How does the complete sentence alter the way someone, like Fussell, may interpret the Amendment?

2. Much of what Fussell writes about the duties of a "militia" can be found in the National Guard—regular training periods, disaster service, etc. But does Fussell equate the National Guard with a militia? Why would the National Guard—given Fussell's point of view— not be equivalent to the militia Fussell calls for? Describe what you think Fussell means by a "militia" and why it is central to his argument.