Which is wonderful logic. Until you realize that the 2nd doesn’t say shit about rifles or guns (or RPGs). It’s says “arms”. Define “arms”.
^^This.
“Arms” is defined as a weapon. Simple as that.
When the 2nd Amendment was passed there were no restrictions on what kind of weapon you could own. Want a war ship? No problem…buy a war ship if you have the means (the War of 1812 made a lot of use of privateers for instance). Cannons…whatever…you name it you could buy it if you wanted to. (NOTE: There were restrictions on WHO could own a weapon…IIRC if you were black you could not own a gun.)
That said when we wonder on how the government can restrict ownership of machine guns there is no surprise or magic here.
None of our rights under the Constitution are absolute. All of them are circumscribed in one fashion or another. For example free speech is not absolute (e.g. cannot yell “fire” in a crowded theater when there is none and libel/slander laws).
So, there is no mystery to putting restrictions on our rights as it happens all the time. In general for our rights it seems the laws need to be as permissive as possible. A restriction needs to show a real need and be narrow in scope to address a particular issue. It would be absurd to allow private ownership of nukes even though they fall under the exceptionally broad term of “arms” (to be fair the FFs never contemplated, could not have contemplated the kinds of weapons we have today).
Of course this leaves a big gray area. How restrictive can the government be? Such questions keep our courts busy.
You would also have to find someone who already owned one. The manufacture or import of fully automatic weapons is illegal. Practically this can mean spending in excess of $10,000 for a gun. Its really for more for collection than utility.
We’ve done it before and it worked horribly.
We didn’t get rid of the “assault weapons” that people already owned and the definition of an assault weapon came down to some very cosmetic features.
Our constitution is capable of amendment, it just requires a supermajority of both houses and state legislatures. Our constitution is kind of an awesome thing. That is why so many countries use it as a template for theirs.
So you are assuming that democracy has broken down overnight? The only people that believe that are people who just lost an election.
God made men, Colonel Colt made them equal.
As I noted some people seemed to be more “equal” than others.
Confused by this.
Clearly automatic weapons are manufactured in great numbers to supply the military and SWAT teams (and I would guess other law enforcement agencies).
So, manufacture is legal. Who you can sell the product to is restricted.
That’s the problem. I’m pretty pro-gun and yet even I admit that in theory restrictions could yield positive results. The problem is once you’ve established the precedent that possession of at least some types of guns is contrary to the common weal, where does it end? Restriction includes the number zero.
Your mothers been telling stories about me again
-old dude from braveheart.
Some people’s right to free speech is greater than others despite some regulations (just ask Adelson and the Koch brothers).
As a gun owner I wouldn’t mind a LOT more regulation in terms of registration and licensing but trying to limit the cosmetic of a semi-automatic rifle is silly. Frankly I’d rather restrict handguns than rifles.
Yes, sale to civilians is illegal. My bad.
I’d almost rather have my insane spree killer have fully automatic weapons, to be honest.
Full auto fire is hard to control and hard to hit what you’re aiming at, burns through ammunition like nobody’s business, and the weapons get hot as a MFer and tend to suffer a higher rate of malfunction.
Contrast that with semi-auto aimed fire being a lot easier to hit what you’re aiming at, don’t burn ammo nearly so fast, and don’t get as hot, and don’t usually malfunction nearly so much.
I’d wager that if some of these spree killer types had automatic weapons, they might have not killed so many people because their guns might have overheated and/or malfunctioned, and they might have had to spend a lot more time changing magazines and possibly been more burdened with ammunition, or (better) not have brought enough along.
Which one is used by military combat personnel?
I started a whole thread about the merits of full-auto fire: When is firing full-auto a good tactic?. Long story short, it’s for the fairly rare occasions you get caught without a dedicated true machine gun when you need one.
Riflemen trying to hit individual targets? Almost always semi-auto. At least in a well trained, competant professional force.
Roughly how many bullets would you guess are fired in anger for every casualty they inflict during battle? 50? 100? Maybe 200?
It’s between around 50,000 and 250,000 depending on what war and context we’re talking about.
The vast majority of ammunition fired in anger isn’t intended to hit any particular target. It’s used for recon by fire, suppression, to create beaten zones. Your idea that soldiers use full auto at all times to shoot other individual targets comes from action movies, and you have no idea what makes a gun effective, how to use one, what features or capabilities are more dangerous than any other, but your lack of knowledge certainly wouldn’t make you hesitate for even a moment when it comes to enacting laws.
I had no such idea. It was a genuine question. Your assumptions are the ones that are false.
Seriously? You need to do some research and talk to a few vets instead of watching action movies.
The US Army and USMC use aimed, single shots in most circumstances, double taps if in CCB scenarios. Their rifles don’t even go full-auto anymore, and haven’t since the adoption of the M16A2 in the early 1980s. This is from the same Army officer friend who I mentioned in another thread- he enlisted in 2008, got commissioned the same year, and did a tour in Iraq. Plus, several Marine buddies of mine over the years have confirmed the same thing about Marine training.
And speaking from personal experience, you really can’t control many hand-held full-auto weapons with more kick than a submachine gun, and they’re kind of hard to keep on target for more than a 4-5 round burst.
If you need automatic fire, a real machine gun or BAR style squad automatic weapon is the way to go- that extra weight and bipod/tripod really make a huge difference.
Before the M16/M16A1 in the late 1960s, the M14 and M1 Garand were both semi-automatic as well- you can’t really fire a 7.62 NATO or .30-06 rifle on full-auto and even keep it pointed level.
this is largely what has been done with nukes, yes? I mean, even North Korea has them now. and once Iran has then who knows what psychoticness Israel and Iran will go at.
I think this is what most current gun control is asking for, no? Stricter registration and licensing in general, making it harder to obtain handguns period. Kind of like the current New York City laws, but nationally.
Even if you are of the opinion that governments are as unhinged as individuals are, a couple dozen entities capable of world-wide destruction is nothing compared to billions.
It just means it takes a litlle longer before we all die 
It isn’t “hard” to get a handgun in NYC, it’s virtually impossible unless someone on the inside owes you a big favor. It’s about as hard as a peasant in medieval Europe to have gotten permission to own and carry a sword.
That wasn’t true when the Constitution was written.
yes it was. Mortars and howitzers (with exploding shells) were used in the Revolutionary war.