Gun Control & RKBA
In reply to the discussion: Where do you stand? [View all]Savannahmann
(3,891 posts)The trained individual could fire three, or four aimed shots per minute. The range of those shots were usually well under a hundred yards. No one could have imagined that those same three shots could be fired in a second or two. There is simply no way that anyone could have imagined the weapons available today.
Rogers Rangers, the original Rangers, carried an excessive amount of ammunition at that time. Each individual carried enough powder, ball, and flint to fire 40 shots. Yes, the capacity of one magazine, was considered excessive by most military forces. That was enough ammunition for several engagements. Today, the standard is measured in hundreds of rounds of ammunition. Police regularly carry that much on their person, and so do many citizens.
So when did Gun Control start? It started right as the Revolutionary war ended. Look at the hero's of Law Enforcement. Wyatt Earp for example. The first thing he did to clean up a town was ban weapons. Yet he is a hero to many. Why wasn't he challenged on the Second Amendment? The shootout at the OK Corral was supposedly initiated, the cause given was that the Earp's were there to see that the Clantons and McLaurey's surrendered their weapons. Truth was, it was a grudge that was going to be settled.
Yet we celebrate the Earp's, and the other lawmen who brought civilization to the towns, and then the frontier. They didn't do it by arming the citizens. They did it by disarming the citizens. There was some rational argument that people needed guns outside of town, fine. But not in town. In town, you checked your guns before you did anything else. No guns, and there is a lot less trouble.
So we debate the issue today, ignoring those simple facts, those simple truths. We demand the right to carry guns everywhere. While at the same time we point to the Wild West and say, it wasn't that wild. It wasn't, because you checked your guns at the edge of town, or you got shot by the law for carrying guns in town.
What is wrong with that? Why was it OK to do it then, and not now?