# Why the change in 2nd Amendment jurisprudence between 19th and 20th centuries? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [January 29, 2017, 3:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-the-change-in-2nd-amendment-jurisprudence-between-19th-and-20th-centuries/778483 "2017-01-29T03:50:37Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 4\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Lumpy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lumpy/32/446_2.png) [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)\ **Post date:** [January 29, 2017, 3:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-the-change-in-2nd-amendment-jurisprudence-between-19th-and-20th-centuries/778483/1 "2017-01-29T03:50:37Z")
Whether you hold with the “individual right” interpretation of the Second Amendment or the “collective right” interpretation, one thing seems clear from the history: for virtually all of the 19th century, both judicial decisions and informed commentators held the Second to guarantee an individual right. But then in the 20th century, this was reversed in several circuit court decisions such as _Tot v. United States_. My question is, how did the 20th century collective right rulings repudiate over a century of previous opinion on the subject? To give just one example, here’s one cite quoted by Wikipedia: > [@](#): > > Judge Thomas Cooley, perhaps the most widely read constitutional scholar of the nineteenth century, wrote extensively about this amendment,[142][143] and he explained in 1880 how the Second Amendment protected the “right of the people”: > > It might be supposed from the phraseology of this provision that the right to keep and bear arms was only guaranteed to the militia; but this would be an interpretation not warranted by the intent. The militia, as has been elsewhere explained, consists of those persons who, under the law, are liable to the performance of military duty, and are officered and enrolled for service when called upon. But the law may make provision for the enrollment of all who are fit to perform military duty, or of a small number only, or it may wholly omit to make any provision at all; and if the right were limited to those enrolled, the purpose of this guaranty might be defeated altogether by the action or neglect to act of the government it was meant to hold in check. The meaning of the provision undoubtedly is, that the people, from whom the militia must be taken, shall have the right to keep and bear arms; and they need no permission or regulation of law for the purpose.[144] And yet by the time of Tot such opinions were either forgotten, ignored or repudiated. How exactly? ---
**Author:** ![rat\_avatar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rat_avatar/32/255_2.png) [@rat\_avatar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rat_avatar)\ **Post date:** [January 29, 2017, 4:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-the-change-in-2nd-amendment-jurisprudence-between-19th-and-20th-centuries/778483/2 "2017-01-29T04:15:43Z")
Most those cases were from the southern states and create the precedents. But it is the same stuff different day… People will hand over all types of rights due to fear uncertainty and doubt. Most of the cases you mention above were directly targeted at disarming people of African decent. > [@](#): > > The original Act of 1893 was passed when there was a great influx of negro laborers in this State drawn here for the purpose of working in turpentine and lumber camps. The same condition existed when the Act was amended in 1901 and the Act was passed for the purpose of disarming the negro laborers and to thereby reduce the unlawful homicides that were prevalent in turpentine and saw-mill camps and to give the white citizens in sparsely settled areas a better feeling of security. The statute was never intended to be applied to the white population and in practice has never been so applied. (Note I am not taking on either side of this debate, just answering the question) Note this part “to give the white citizens in sparsely settled areas a better feeling of security” ---
**Author:** ![watchwolf49](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/e9c0ed/32.png) [@watchwolf49](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/watchwolf49)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2017, 1:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-the-change-in-2nd-amendment-jurisprudence-between-19th-and-20th-centuries/778483/3 "2017-01-30T13:58:58Z")
There was also the gangland killings in Chicago during the 1920’s … thus the National Firearms Act of 1934 … ---
**Author:** ![DrCube](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/a3d4f5/32.png) [@DrCube](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrCube)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2017, 5:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-the-change-in-2nd-amendment-jurisprudence-between-19th-and-20th-centuries/778483/4 "2017-01-30T17:00:38Z")
Racism. Gun rights were only for upstanding white folk, not for the dangerous and unstable underclass of poor black people who threatened those upstanding white folk’s place in society. That only became a problem later in the 19th and early 20th century, for obvious reasons. Slavery was repealed, and all the sudden white people had to contend with the fact that their hated underclass was due the same rights as them. Judges had to adjust their opinions accordingly.