Why did the Founding generation think that we needed the Second Amendment?

0:04Let's keep in mind what was fresh in the minds of the founding generation. They had just spent eight years in a bloody revolution against the world's most powerful government, that of Great Britain and a significant amount of that fighting was done by ordinary citizens who brought their own weapons to the fight. There was, I think both a memory of how important that was. But then also there was this profound concern about the fact that up until the ratification of the U.S. Constitution and went into effect in 1789, we didn't have a federal government. There was no government of the United States. There was just this assemblage of states and people weren't super worried about the idea that the state of Virginia, let's say, it's actually a commonwealth where I live now was going to tyrannize the entire country. But when it was proposed to create this federal government by ratifying the U.S. Constitution, suddenly,

0:57there was the prospect of this national government that, to some people, really made them think about the British that we had just spent all this time fighting off because of their oppression. A group called the anti-federalists who were against the idea of creating this federal government and ratifying the Constitution felt very strongly that ordinary individual citizens, but also state governments should have the ability, if necessary, to resist and to resist with arms, any oppression that might come from this newly created federal government. I think that's in the minds of at least some people who urged the Congress to include a protection of guns in the Bill of Rights, I think it was very much of what was on their mind. What if the federal government begins to oppress us, we are going to need to ensure that we have the ability. Maybe just individuals may mean groups of individuals serving as militia under a state government,

1:47can push back and fight off this federal government if necessary [MUSIC].