Posted on 01/22/2008 6:48:45 PM PST by Copernicus
To suggest that men epitomizing the culmination of the Age of Enlightenment lacked the foresight to expect technological progress and innovation in the tools of war is obnoxiously pessimistic, at best.
There were several signatories of the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution expressly involved in scientific endeavors and its practical application.
Benjamin Franklin, for instance, was a leading scientist and active inventor; a significant figure in not only political history but scientific. He pioneered work in electricity, oceanic currents, meteorology, and heat transfer. He invented the lightning rod, bifocals, iron furnace stove, carriage odometer, flexible urinary catheter, and a musical instrument known as the glass [h]armonica. This was a man with certain philosophical and technological vision. Hugh Williamson was a fellow scientist and physician of international renown. The polymath Thomas Jefferson was among other things, a horticulturalist, architect, archeologist, paleontologist, and inventor. Josiah Bartlett and Benjamin Rush were physicians. Stephen Hopkins was a foundryman and surveyor. Jacob Broom was a fellow surveyor.
Moreover, the balance of the Founding Fathers had a general intellectual character and experience taken from soldiering, business activity, litigation, and philosophy further proving they had a clear idea of the broad implications and consequences of a populace keeping and bearing the latest, most advanced armaments.
American Revolutionaries, lest one forget, brought their own cannons to the fields of battle; they had private artillery pieces. As well, they used the latest in contemporary small arms, e.g., rifles. Smoothbore, shoulder-fired weapons were destined for obsolescence with the introduction of the rifled barrel.
(Excerpt) Read more at truthalert.net ...
Nevertheless, it is always helpful to post yet another refresher course.
Best regards to all,
What are you going to do when they come for your guns? You may soon have to decide.
Good stuff.
Someone should submit a brief. . . ;)
I’ll let them have the ammo first!
give them the bullets first ...one at a time.
I hope I’m brave and smart enough to make them “earn my guns” and to get my guns they are really have to earn their money.
All of them to the guillotine let Heaven sort them out?
Wait, wrong revolution.
Best regards,
This is good.
I feel that in a short while this country will be torn asunder.
Wonderful post. Thank you!
great post - thanks
;o)
(I knew what you meant!! I was Navy, and I have a brother who was a Marine!)
Mike
Oh. Sorry.
The “Puckle Gun”, invented in 1717, was essentially a detachable-magazine machinegun.
The “Girandoni Rifle”, invented in 1780, was equivalent to a 20-round .45ACP semiautomatic.
Leonardo da Vinci conceived of the tank in 1482, the submarine in 1515 (with a real one built in 1624 and deployed in US combat in 1776), the RPG, and the helicopter.
The Founding Fathers, being well-educated and well-connected Rennaisance men, were undoubtedly aware of these creations - and aware that lineal and revolutionary improvements would occur.
The 2nd Amendment isn’t about products, it’s about ideas: specifically, the idea that every free man (and group thereof) must have the right to own & wield arms equal or superior to their enemies.
A militia IS self-armed individuals coming together for common defense.
2. Owning a gun is a privilege that should be regulated.
Those who would take away our means of resisting enemies are not our friends.
3. The Constitution was written for flintlock muskets; they couldn’t foresee modern weapons.
See my previous post. Most "modern weapons" were conceived of around 1500, and most of those were in use by the late 1700s.
4. The Second Amendment was written in a time when people needed to hunt.
Some people still do. Don't make them beg for dinner.
5. The Second Amendment says “well regulated.”
...in a manner intended to enhance the right. The Second Amendment also says "shall not be infringed" - the two phrases work together, not in opposition.
Semper Fi
An Old Man
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