The Second Amendment is not necessary. And that’s something every gun owner needs to understand. When our Constitution was written, James Madison and other Founding Fathers argued that the federal government only had the powers specifically granted to it by the Constitution. Think about that for a second. If the Constitution never gave the federal government the authority to take away your right to bear arms, why would you need an amendment telling the government it couldn’t? Your rights didn’t come from the government in the first place.
Alexander Hamilton made this exact argument in Federalist No. 84, asking, “For why declare that things shall not be done which there is no power to do?” Madison eventually helped write the Bill of Rights to make those protections explicit, but the underlying principle is incredibly important. The Constitution wasn’t written to tell Americans what they were allowed to do. It was written to establish a government with limited powers. Somewhere along the way, we’ve started treating our constitutional rights like permissions handed down by politicians, instead of limitations placed on the politicians themselves.
— Stephen Ziegler
Outdoor writer | Rack Junkies Podcast