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Recently, Donald Trump made a statement that those in the media have deemed controversial:

“Hillary wants to abolish, essentially abolish the Second Amendment. By the way, and if she gets to pick — if she gets to pick her judges, nothing you can do, folks. Although the Second Amendment people, maybe there is, I don’t know. But I’ll tell you what, that will be a horrible day.”

Many media outlets have expressed outrage over the idea, claiming that Trump is provoking an assassination attempt. Paul Waldman, in the Washington Post, wrote:

“But most important, the reason Trump doesn’t get a pass on hinting that violence against politicians or judges is an appropriate response to an imagined threat to gun rights is that there’s a context in which this statement comes, a context created by gun advocates, by other Republicans, and by Trump himself… And Republicans at all levels frequently argue that one of the primary purposes of owning guns is so that you can use them to kill representatives of the government, whether police or soldiers, when they become too tyrannical.”

The problem is that “Republicans” aren’t suggesting it, the Founding Fathers suggested it.

President James Madison, in Federalist Paper 46, explained that the American people must be armed so they can defend the nation from tyrants both internal and external:

“Let a regular army, fully equal to the resources of the country, be formed; and let it be entirely at the devotion of the federal government; still it would not be going too far to say, that the State governments, with the people on their side, would be able to repel the danger… To these would be opposed a militia amounting to near half a million of citizens with arms in their hands, officered by men chosen from among themselves, fighting for their common liberties”.

St. George Tucker, a contemporary to the Founding Fathers and an influential source on our country’s early theory of jurisprudence, wrote in a footnote to his edition of Blackstone Commentaries (App 300):

“This may be considered as the true palladium of liberty… The right of self defence is the first law of nature: in most governments it has been the study of rulers to confine this right within the narrowest limits possible. Wherever standing armies are kept up, and the right of the people to keep and bear arms is, under any colour or pretext whatsoever, prohibited, liberty, if not already annihilated, is on the brink of destruction.”

Similarly, the pre-eminent scholar of the Constitution, Justice Joseph Story explained in his Commentaries on the United States Constitution:

“The right of the citizens to keep and bear arms has justly been considered, as the palladium of the liberties of a republic; since it offers a strong moral check against the usurpation and arbitrary power of rulers; and will generally, even if these are successful in the first instance, enable the people to resist and triumph over them.”

From the very beginning to the present, the Second Amendment has always represented the right of the people to bear arms to prevent a government that seeks to take away their rights. If a president does attempt to abolish the Second Amendment, it would lead to a rebellion as the Founding Fathers rightfully intended.

As the Federalist Papers explains, the United States is a republican form of government that relies on checks and balances to prevent corruption. The Federal government is divided in three parts to limit abuse, the Federal government is set against the States, and the government is set against the people.

The Second Amendment empowers the people to serve as the rightful check when their ability to vote fails to prevent abuse. It was only through the individual bearing of arms that the Founding Fathers were able to lead the people against the tyranny of the British Monarchy. Our very nation was founded on this principle.

All politicians must be constantly reminded that the Second Amendment is the ultimate way for the people to ensure that tyranny does not overthrow our Constitution. The media outrage shows a complete disregard for the United States Constitution.