The National Guard and the 2nd Amendment

by Richard A. Cheatham, Press Media Group, LLC

“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.” That’s the wording of the Second Amendment to the Constitution of the United States acknowledging the right of American citizens to keep and bear arms for the purpose of defending their lives, family, homes and liberty.

Many believe that “ordinary” citizens shouldn’t be “permitted” to have guns, that they don’t have legitimate need for guns and can’t be responsible with them. They believe our armed “servants” should prevent us (with their guns) from having them. They argue that a careful reading of the Second Amendment leads one to believe that “the people” actually don’t have any right to keep and bear arms. They say only those in the “well regulated” militia need to have arms. They then often point to the National Guard of the various states as today’s militia. Let’s consider that very point here.

There’s a substantial difference between militia and a regular, professional standing army. It’s an important distinction.

A regular, standing professional army is familiar to us today. The founding fathers would be ashamed at how familiar and comfortable we’ve become with a regular army. They had a great distaste for such armies. As a revolutionary people we had “taken’ (not been given) our liberty fighting regular professional soldiers. Many Americans with condescension and disgust called professional soldiers the “bodyguards of Kings.” Professional soldiers in regular armies kill anyone who those who pay them tell them to kill. They are mercenaries, hired killers. No pay, no fighting. Regular armies were prone to be used outside their own countries in wars of conquest and aggression. That used to disgust us.

A militia is typically a home guard organization. To the extent it’s equipped and/or trained at all, it’s equipped and trained for defense of the home at home. They’re motivated not by pay, but defense of home against enemies foreign and domestic. Not designed for aggression, they classically haven’t performed well in (nor have they been often used for) invasive warfare.

There it is, militia, defensive, and professional armies, aggressiveness. Now I ask, where is much of the National Guard today? How are they equipped and trained? What are they doing? Who leads them?

I maintain that our present day National Guard is not the militia the founders talked about as “necessary to the security of a free State.” I maintain that, as presently constituted, the National Guard is no more than an extension of the American regular army.

The real “militia” is the armed citizenry at home! The National Guard can’t be the militia and also be invading and occupying foreign countries. If there’s any proof that the Second Amendment is not talking about the National Guard, it’s this undeniable fact.

©2006 by Richard A. Cheatham. All rights reserved. Mr.Cheatham is a professional speaker/writer and is syndicated through Press Media Group, LLC. Contact him through, Living History Assoc., Ltd., at www.LHALtd.com or DrawBackVeil@aol.com.