The Constitution as a selfish document

There's not much you can write to back up the statement this bog displays as its title. Our Constitution is a document that binds us all together through common aims, goals and a common belief in the community's ability to transcend what one man can accomplish, and if anything, this document has been made less selfish over time by the addition of key amendments.

If there was, however, a breeding ground for selfish attitudes embedded in to this document, it would be in the Second Amendment - the right to bear arms. Here's what it says:

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.

I'm going to immediately throw away any notion of the founding fathers not realizing how truly massive our country and its governing infrastructure would become in the coming decades and centuries. That might be true and it might not be, but what I do know is that it's not relevant to what I want to talk about.

The Tennessee state legislature is currently mulling over an amendment to the state's gun laws which would allow guns to be carried in establishments that serve alcohol and state parks and recreation areas. I don't know the details of this document, but you could glean some info from this article from the Commercial Appeal in Memphis - a city that knows guns and gun violence better than most in Tennessee.

This desire to carry a gun wherever and whenever you please is exactly where selfishness invades our discussion about constitutional rights. Let me reiterate that the Second Amendment guarantees that 'A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms' will not be infringed. Notice that it's not 'a well regulated Militia' and ' the right of the people to keep and bear Arms.' These two things, as they relate to the language of the amendment are actually one and the same. The militia is the expression of this right to bear arms and the militia is what is protected by the Constitution, not the gun strapped underneath your jacket or tucked away in your boot.

'But, I want to carry a gun because what if [insert pseudo-heroic anecdote here]?'

Guess what. I don't care what you want and neither does the Constitution. If you want to be an active participant in the protected activities of the Second Amendment than be a policeman. Join the military. Join the National Guard, which seems to be the true embodiment of the militia in our times. But, whatever you do, don't come crying to me about wanting to carry a gun everywhere.

What if, in your heroic display of marksmanship that will no doubt ensue if some criminal does terrorize your local watering hole, you miss the bad guy and hit someone innocent? I'd ask if you can take the ramifications of this, but that's not the point. The point is that they are not your responsibility now, and they should never be. This is the responsibility of the police and those who make it their life's work to protect and serve. They're trained to do these things and they're educated about the consequences.

I'm not against people owning guns, or even carrying them in some situations (though I would bet that instances where carrying a firearm worked out the way the carrier wanted them to are few and far between). However, I do not think that the individual right to bear arms is in any way protected and I'm not sure that it should be.