A short thought on the Second Amendment

We pro-gun people have heard the militia clause of the Second Amendment referred to time and again as being – somehow – the definitive determinate that it is not an individual right.  Never mind court cases, and all that, e.g., Heller, I would put forward this simple thought chain:

In the First Amendment there is the phrase “right of the people” which has, repeatedly, been held to mean an individual right.

That same phrase appears in the Fourth Amendment, and like it’s First Amendment use it has been held to mean an individual right.

So for that phrase in the Second Amendment, using the very same words, to mean some kind of collective right of the people-at-large rather than an individual right you’d have to:

• Assume that these men, who were some of the most learned, well-read persons of their age, wrote the First Amendment to mean what it means, somehow flipped that meaning in the very next Amendment to be the opposite of the prior use, and then flipped it back right afterwards.
• Assume that these men, who knew they were writing a document for the ages, and who considered, weighed, and argued vehemently over every word and punctuation mark, would be so sloppy and careless in this place while writing the foundational Law of the Land that is the Constitution and its first ten Amendments.

Such assumptions defy the simple logic “smell test.”