[Henry Bowman]

. . . in US v. Miller?

Saw the thread about how the USA would be different if there had been no 2nd Amendment. Got to wondering how it would be different if Miller had been represented in 1939 and the SCOTUS had ruled clealy that the entire NFA '34 was unconstitutional.

Care to speculate?

[TXBera]

How about no federal laws concerning firearms? If it was ruled differently and SCOTUS had stated that this matter should be left in the hands of the individual states. Add to that statement about any federal firearms laws would be unconstitutional because it infringes on the 2A.

I would feel that we would be better off, we would still have the 'for the children' ppl, but they would not have the federal playground on which to bully the law-abiding citizens.

[Henry Bowman]

But would we have eventually had other encroachments like background checks or bans on non-militia arms? Would the states more than have made up the difference? Or would we have a ruling that the 2A is binding on the states, too?

[Andrew Wyatt]

I'm thinking i'd still be in the same position.

The military would have arms that better fit their needs now, i think, since developing an MG would be much cheaper.

[care-less]

I'll take this opportunity to run this by all of you. In the fifth or sixth grade; we all learned in English Class that a "prepositionary phrase has no bearing on either the Subject or Verb in a sentence". Apparently, not many people in the government went to school that day. Since the first part of the second ammendment is a prepositionary phrase; it has no bearing on the subject ( Right) or the verb ( in this case a verbal phrase: Keep and Bear). The second ammendment says quite plainly that the Right of the People to Keep and Bear Arms, Shall Not Be Infringed.... Therefore, ANY gun control law, no matter how trivial, is by its very nature an infringement, and therefore unconstitutional. The problem we have is that all three branches of government are controlled by the Judiciary. Our presidents, congressmen, senators, are all Lawyers!! It should be against the law for a lawyer to serve in the congressional or executive branch; since by definition, they are "officers of the court". Separation of powers and all that, right? By the way, NOWHERE in the Constitution is it required that an appointed judge, whether local, state, or federal court, or even Supreme Court; has to be a lawyer. Seems to me that we need a few plumbers, teachers, truck drivers, etc in the congress, and on the Supreme Court. Lawyers are only necessary to argue the case before a "judge" with hopefully some common sense. As it is now, the congress and senate, being full of lawyers, write laws to serve the interests of their fellow lawyers, then courts, also full of lawyers; hear the cases. Are we all suprised at the results? Guess I better stop here; I now need a drink.

[feedthehogs]

I am afraid to say things would be the same as they are today or worse.
My reasoning is society has continued to ignore the social and mental problems we have. We all know a firearm by itself can do no harm. It has to have an operator. The availability of automatic firearms at cheap prices would undoubtedly contribute to higher fatality rates by the individuals that have had enough with life and decide to take out the work place or their family, school mates, neighbors, etc.
Society would be outraged and thus laws would be created to combat the problem.
And as usual they would come after the guns and not the operator.
We keep making all kinds of laws to satisfy our conscience instead of setting up programs and caring for our fellow human beings when they have problems.