James Madison on tools of oppressors

Oppressors can tyrannize only when they achieve a standing army, an enslaved press, and a disarmed populace.

~ James Madison

James Madison
1894

Ruth Bader Ginsburg on the Second Amendment

When we no longer need people to keep muskets in their home, then the Second Amendment has no function, its function is to enable the young nation to have people who will fight for it to have weapons that those soldiers will own.  So I view the Second Amendment as rooted in the time totally allied to the need to support a militia.  So...the Second Amendment is outdated in the sense that its function has become obsolete.

~ Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, District of Columbia v. Heller, June 26, 2008

Lew Rockwell on Roth Bader Ginsburg and the right to bear arms

We should support our basic right to self-defense. This is guaranteed by the Second Amendment, but our rights don’t depend on the State and its Constitution. By the way, the recently sainted Ruth Bader Ginsburg wanted to end the individual right to keep and bear arms. Our rights come from natural law, and only the free market can enforce them and protect us.

~ Lew Rockwell, "Self-Defense and 'Taking the Law into Your Own Hands'," LewRockwell.com, September 26, 2020

Benjamin Franklin on democracy and liberty

Democracy is two wolves and a lamb voting on what to have for lunch.  Liberty is a well-armed lamb contesting the vote.

~ Benjamin Franklin

Kevin Duffy on gun control

The 2nd amendment isn't about duck hunting. What happens if the country is invaded? Where is the second line of defense? Worse, what happens if the country turns into a dictatorship or police state? What defense would we have from our own government?

Gun control will not keep guns out of the hands of criminals. It will keep guns away from the good guys, making us more vulnerable to armed criminals.

~ Kevin Duffy, October 2, 2017, in response to calls for gun control following the mass shootings in Las Vegas

James Madison on the right to bear arms

Americans have the right and advantage of being armed — unlike the citizens of other countries whose governments are afraid to trust the people with arms.

— James Madison, Federalist No. 46 (January 19, 1788)

James Madison
1902-1903

Patrick Henry on the right to bear arms

The great object is that every man be armed.... Everyone who is able may have a gun.... Are we at last brought to such humiliating and debasing degradation, that we cannot be trusted with arms for our defense? 

~ Patrick Henry