Quote:
Hugh Manatee said:
When it says Bear Arms..... does that mean I can own a tank with armor piercing rounds.... you know for self defense....
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Yes, and thermonuclear ICBMs. But not for self defense, for the security of the state. 'Arms' certainly does not imply 'guns', but rather, any military weapon. The framers did not know about fusion, and probably expected that the power of a weapon would always be proportionate to the number of people required to mobilize it (as with then-modern battleships). However, this right is still explicitly present, and has been (+is) unconstitutionally infringed on numerous occasions. There is an amendment system in place, in case unanticipated things like nukes show up, but the US government prefers to simply create and enforce illegal laws until the Supreme Court strikes them down - or doesn't, because their declarations rarely hinge on constitutionality anymore.
On the other hand, it may have been the intention of the framers - and remember, this was before widespread dictionaries standardized English spelling - to encourage more liberal dress codes. Bare arms (and bare legs, called an 'implied right' by constitutional scholars) are pretty hot, on the right person.