US Constitution study guide: Difference between revisions

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* Congress and States have enacted many restrictions on lobbying and lobbyists, especially regarding money and gifts to governmental officials}}''' for a redress of grievances.
* Congress and States have enacted many restrictions on lobbying and lobbyists, especially regarding money and gifts to governmental officials}}''' for a redress of grievances.


==={{#tip-text: Amendment 2|}}===
=== Amendment 2 [Right to bear arms]===
 
'''{{#tip-text:[Amendment 2 notes]|Second Amendment notes:
* protects the right of the people to "keep and bear Arms" ("shall not be infringed")
* justifies that protection by the need for a "well regulated Militia"
* however, the individual right to keep and bear arms is not contingent (dependent) on that justification
* some opponents of the Second Amendment protection argue that the main clause of the sentence is "A well regulated Militia"
** however that creates a non-sensical Main Clause, "A well regulated Militia shall not be infringed"
** the main clause is "the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed"
** by conventions of punctuation from the Founding era, the comma after "Arms" does not separate the subject ("the right") from the verb "infringed"
** this type of sentence construction is found frequently across the Constitution itself and other documents from the period of it and the BOR's writing
Limits, extents &
* Courts have restricted the "right to bear arms" by limiting the type, size, and lethality or type of those weapons, generally assuming that those types would be used by a "militia"
* Courts have also restricted or allowed localities to restrict the right to bear arms and to regulate such things as "conceal carry" (bearing an arm beneath one's clothing, i.e., not visible to others), automatic
* gun-control proponents (anti-2nd Amendment) argue that the Amendment creates a "collective" right, i.e., of the people in general, not of individuals
** however, "the right of the people" is understood to be an individual right, as per its same expression in the First, Fourth, Ninth & Tenth Amendments.}}'''
 
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.
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.