For the first time in 70 years, the U.S. Supreme Court will take on the question
 of whether individual Americans have the right to keep and bear arms
 or whether it a collective right of the people for service in a state militia.

That question is at the heart of a long, impassioned debate
about how much power the government has to keep people
 from owning guns and it could soon be decided by the
U.S. Supreme Court in a case about one of the nation's
 strictest gun control laws.

Set for arguments today, March 18 and with a decision expected by late June,
 the nation's highest court could resolve once and for all the much-disputed
 meaning of the Second Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.

Written 219 years ago, the amendment 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."

Few constitutional law issues have triggered more scholarly debate
and historical research on whether the Constitution's authors intended
 to guarantee an individual right or a collective right tied to service
 in a state-regulated militia, like today's National Guard.


The arguments follow a series of mass shootings in the past year
-- multiple killings on at least three college campuses, two shopping centers
 and one Missouri town meeting.
Gun deaths average 80 a day in the United States, 34 of them homicides,
according to Centers for Disease Control data, and yet the gun issue has
 barely registered in the U.S. presidential campaign.

If the court finds it is an individual right, gun control advocates fear it could
 place in jeopardy not only the ban on private handgun ownership in the
U.S. capital at issue in the case, but also other laws around the country
 regulating and restricting private possession of firearms.

The Supreme Court's last review of the Second Amendment came in
 a five-page discussion in an opinion issued nearly 70 years ago that
 failed to definitively resolve the constitutional issue.



That could change when the justices consider whether a 32-year old
 Washington, D.C., law banning private possession of handguns violates
 the Second Amendment rights of individuals unaffiliated
with any state-regulated militia.


DIVISIVE ISSUE

Former top U.S. Justice Department officials including former
Attorney General Janet Reno, law professors, linguistic experts
 and historians all argued the Second Amendment protects
the right of people only to keep arms for militia service.

On the other side, the National Rifle Association, a majority of
the U.S. Senate and a majority of the House of Representatives
argued an individual has the right to possess arms.

Believe it or not, as they were trampling over all the other amendments,
The current administration, under then-Attorney General John Ashcroft,
reversed the position the federal government had taken for decades
and said in 2001 the Second Amendment protected an individual right
to possess firearms for a lawful private purpose.

Solicitor General Paul Clement, the administration's chief advocate
 before the Supreme Court, filed a brief with the justices that adopted
many arguments made previously by legal scholars for an individual
right to keep arms.

He said placement of the Second Amendment within the Bill of Rights
 reinforced the view that it was intended to put certain individual private
activities beyond the reach of the national government.

Others disagreed, including 15 historians.

"As histories of the Revolutionary era, we are confident ... that the authors
of the Second Amendment would be flabbergasted to learn that in endorsing
the republican principle of a well-regulated militia, they were also precluding
restrictions on such potentially dangerous property as firearms," they said.


Three professors of linguistics and English said the amendment's purpose
 was to preserve or perpetuate a well-regulated militia and that it used
 unmistakably military language.

"The term 'bear arms' is an idiom that means to serve as a soldier, do military
service, fight," they said in citing the Oxford English Dictionary.

Former high-ranking U.S. military officers filed a brief that argued another
 interpretation -- that the amendment guarantees a blend of
individual and community rights.

"The Second Amendment ensures both the individual's right to posses firearms,
subject to reasonable regulation, and the constitutional goal of collective
defense readiness," they said.



The Second Amendment is written in two clauses,
a prefatory and an operative clause.
The first clause, "a well regulated militia" is prefatory.
 The second clause, "the right of the people" is operative.
 Those either choose not to recognize this, or don't know English grammar.

 In determining whether the Second Amendment’s guarantee is an individual one,
the most important word is the one the drafters chose to describe the holders
 of the right—“the people.”

 That term is found in the First, Second, Fourth, Ninth, and Tenth Amendments.
 It has never been doubted that these provisions were designed to protect the
 interests of individuals against government intrusion, interference, or usurpation.


Since the 2nd Amendment (or any other part of the Constitution)
does not clearly and specifically deny personal gun ownership,
 it can simply be argued that there is no legal basis for banning
personal gun ownership.


The National Guard is NOT a professional Army. A professional
at anything makes the major portion of his living from that activity.
Members of the National Guard are "part-time" soldiers, their
professions are the jobs that they get pulled away from.

Having said that, the 2nd amendment states that THE PEOPLE have
 right to bear arms. The Bill of Rights addresses three groups
 the country, the states and THE PEOPLE.
That means that ANY CITIZEN can own a gun.

Of course, any group would be hard pressed trying to defend themselves
 (with a bunch of hunting rifles) from the government
unless you hid in caves or underground tunnels
and struck only when you had the advantage
Our military has had a poor track record when trying to fight
people who's nation was at stake
The military industrial complex mighty as it may be,
 is no match for the sands of time, nor to those with the will and of free mind.