Does the United States need more strict gun-control laws?
Gun violence in the United States is a problem, but drastic new gun control legislation is hardly the answer. New legislation will only serve to endanger the essential liberty guaranteed by the Second Amendment. This Amendment is inextricably linked to the maintenance of individual liberty in the United States. Nicolo Machiavelli said there were five reasons why it was absolutely essential for individuals to enjoy a right to keep and bear arms: to protect one’s self, to keep rulers honest, to hunt, to defend the state against foreign invasion and to maintain one’s republican character. How could any liberty be more vital than the Second Amendment? It makes every other civil liberty Americans enjoy possible. If not for a citizens’ right to keep and bear arms, they would be at the mercy of their own government ;their rights existing only at their government’s pleasure. To see that is possible in the United States of America, simply review American history. In 1798, Congress passed the Se
