Muskets may be the answer for all

In glancing at California’s penal code it occurred to me that — willingly or not —many of us live with limits on our constitutional rights. Specifically the second amendment, that collection of 27 words that is used like a truncheon by gun rights advocates against anyone wanting to reasonably discuss gun laws in this country.

Back before that All-American tradition of mass shootings at movie theaters, malls, churches and high schools become “a thing,” in 1791 a group of men came together and decided “A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.”

They probably had good reason for including language ensuring people had a right to bear arms — only eight years earlier the American Revolution had ended. Who knows, if British soldiers killing American patriots at the time hadn’t had access to muskets and balls maybe today we’d be queuing up at the corner bakery and marvelling at the glorious colours of the biscuits we’d be taking home for dessert in front of the telly.

Since then — and with the exception of the Civil War — there have not been mass, armed uprisings of the people against the state. Maybe that is because these days there are a proliferation of assault weapons and more gun-toting Americans than ever before, or maybe it is because we, as a group, have found a more civilized way of reform and change.
In time and in California we have learned to live with the exceptions there are right to bear arms. We accept that generally prohibited weapons include belt buckle knives, cane swords, lipstick case knives, metal knuckles, nunchakus, short-barreled rifles and short-barreled shotguns. We have demonstrated we can live with limits.

So maybe it’s time to reconsider the limits. Maybe it’s time to trade in the high-powered, multiple-round shooting rifles and handguns for the right to brass knuckles and cane swords. Or maybe we go a little further and add today’s modern handguns and rifles to the list of prohibited weapons and instead learn to live with only muskets, metal balls and black powder.

As the national conversation once again is turned to gun control laws and preventing mass shootings at schools and solutions offered by the president of the United States and gun enthusiasts include having armed teachers in classrooms maybe we should even the playing field by allowing only law enforcement to have high powered weapons. Everyone else gets a musket.

Gun fans would get to keep their deadly noisemakers and teachers at schools would have a fighting chance against a maniac who had to painstakingly load his single-shot weapon with black powder and iron while jamming the ammunition down a barrel with a thin rod. Seems like a reasonable and small price to pay to save multiple lives.