Second Amendment – Militia (United States), Sovereign state, Right to keep and bear arms.
A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.
Connection:
This article is called U.S. v. Miller. This is the only case in which the Supreme Court has had the opportunity to apply the Second Amendment to a federal firearms statute. This article states that "The Court, however, carefully avoided making an unconditional decision regarding the statute's constitutionality; it instead devised a test by which to measure the constitutionality of statutes relating to firearms and remanded the case to the trial court for an evidentiary hearing. The Court remanded to the case because it had concluded that: In the absence of any evidence tending to show that possession or use of a "shotgun having a barrel of less than eighteen inches in length" at this time has some reasonable relationship to the preservation or efficiency of a well regulated militia, we cannot say that the Second Amendment guarantees the right to keep and bear such an instrument." It is not within the judicial branch to notice that this weapon is any part of the ordinary military equipment or that its use could contribute to the common defense. So, for the keeping and bearing of a firearm to be constitutionally protected, the weapon should be a military fire weapon. The case also made clear that the militiary consisted of all males capable of the common defense and that when called for service these men were expected to appear bearing arms supplied by themselves and the kind in common use at the time. This article also states "In setting forth this definition of the militia, the Court implicitly rejected the view that the Second Amendment guarantees a right only to those individuals who are members of the militia. Had the Court viewed the Second Amendment as guaranteeing the right to keep and bear arms only to all males physically capable of acting in concert for the common defense, it would certainly have discussed whether, on remand, there should also be evidence that the defendants met the qualifications for inclusion in the militia, much as it did with regard to the militia use of a short-barrelled shotgun." This ties in to the second amendment because it focuses on what type of arms a person can bear for their common defense.
Works Cited
"U.S. v. Miller". http://www.firearmsandliberty.com/fedcases.2nd.html.
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