Gungnir--
Thanks. That's a very thoughtful answer. Recognizing that this sounds a lot like the anti-RKBA crowd's argument against any weapon post-dating the American revolution, I have to ask whether the concept of the fundamental human right to keep and bear arms can be viewed as expansively in the 21st century as it could have been in the 18th century, when the Constitution was drafted. The reality of the modern world is that the arms available to mankind now include weapons that have the capability to inflict death on a scale that was unimaginable until the advent of the twentieth century. Since that time mankind has figured out how to produce chemical, biological, and nuclear weapons that can inflict death upon thousands in one fell swoop.
I view the moral right to kep and bear arms pretty expansively, certainly well beyond that permitted under current interpretations of the Constitution, but I have a hard time accepting that in 2010 it can be absolute. This is one area where it seems that the expanse of a fundamental right sometimes has to adapt to circumstances beyond the possible comprehension of those who drafted the Constitution.
To accept that there is no limit on the right to keep and bear arms, you must accept that anyone with the cunning to obtain a WMD should be accorded that right. If you disagree with that, then you need to arrive at a definition of the RKBA that is somehow justifiable.
You make the assumption that those with enough determination, power, money and cunning do not already possess such weapons. I don't believe that for an instant. We know Drug Cartels hire fighter aircraft and pilots for defense, own tanks and APC's and have various other heavy weaponry.
As far as chemical and biological weapons are concerned they've been in use for centuries, from poisoning wells, to lobbing animal carcasses over walls. Even in the US, using smallpox infected blankets passed to native Americans. Nuclear is slightly different, but in all essence it was developed as a really big bomb, fallout is an unintended side effect, in all but neutron bombs. All of these are indiscriminate and target both combatants and non-combatants alike that are within the radius of effect.
Now since the introduction of real artillery, for instance cannon firing canister. It's been responsible for a growing percentage of deaths on the battlefield. This was available at the time of the American Revolution, so it id reasonable to assume that people smart enough to draft up a document that has in the main weathered 300 years of infringement, would be able to foresee the development of artillery. Yet they stayed their hand when writing the constitution, and did not exclude anything from the definition of arms; or qualify arms to mean small arms.
Back to Websters...
arm
Function: noun
Usage: often attributive
Etymology: Middle English armes (plural) weapons, from Anglo-French, from Latin arma
Date: 13th century
1 a :
a means (as a weapon) of offense or defense; especially : firearm b : a combat branch (as of an army) c : an organized branch of national defense (as the navy)
2 plural a : the hereditary heraldic devices of a family b : heraldic devices adopted by a government
3 plural a : active hostilities : warfare <a call to arms> b : military service
— up in arms : aroused and ready to undertake a fight or conflict <voters up in arms over the proposed law>
So definition 1a is the most likely candidate, so lets look at firearm... since it's "most often"
fire·arm
Function: noun
Date: 1646
a weapon from which a shot is discharged by gunpowder —usually used of small arms
Now look at the date... 1646, hmm, now in 1789 the framers of the 2nd would quite rightly have known the word firearm, yet chose not to use it. They used arms specifically, now it could be argued that by choosing arms it included personal arms like swords, tomahawks, knives, but then wouldn't we be discussing the right to bear personal arms. No in all honesty I think the framers of the 2nd meant ALL arms, henceforth and that are used in armies.
Now sure we can argue whether that's smart, but the problem is self limiting anyway, an M1 Abrams costs about $6.25M A LAW costs $1100 for a single shot a 155mm Howitzer is $500k for the gun and for an M795 round it's $333 unit cost and a Mk 82 iron bomb is about $300 unit cost this is the price that the Military pays. So not many people are going to buy these things anyway even if it's not prohibited. I mean a 50 BMG by comparison is a piddly little $2k+ for a rifle and about $3 per round, and how many here have them...?
