Economic history, my collegiate academic fascination, focuses upon the adaptation of societal institutions to technical innovations. The American legal history of the right to keep and bear arms can be traced back to the deposition of King James II, who prevented Protestants from owning firearms. The English constitutional right that “Protestants may have Arms for their Defence suitable to their Conditions and as allowed by Law” then served as the model for the American Bill of Rights. Here in the States, however, firearms were not stored in a castle “keep” with villiens, as part of their required service, bearing...