Second Amendment of the U.S. Constitution
	“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.” The 2nd Amendment is separated into 3 parts. The first part, “A well-regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State,” is the right for the state or group of people to replace the army in case of an emergency. The second part, “the right of the people to keep and bear Arms,” states that every citizen of person of the United States can bear Arms, or guns. The final part of the amendment “shall not be infringed.” clearly says that these are not to be taken away.
	The bill of rights was an extremely important document at the time of its release, even though not everyone supported it. At the time that the constitution was opposed by the anti-federalists, who thought that the constitution would just turn the United States into a constitutional monarchy without the Bill of Rights. It was hard-fought and was well needed to stop from a tyrannical government from being overbearing.
	The Bill of Rights contains the peoples personal ten most important rights, or our “unalienable rights”. The second amendment was added to the constitution to prevent an overbearing government and make the United States harder to invade. It is also there to let citizens protect themselves from harm. This amendment is extremely important, for the fact that it is the amendment that protects all of our other rights.
	People make arguments over the second amendment and try to interpret what the founding fathers meant. These arguments have been going on for a long time, some stating that the founding fathers meant that no one should be able to bear arms unless they were forming a militia, others say that they meant for there to be a limit on the number of guns you could own. The interpretation of this and laws regarding it are ever changing and updating with new technology and new ideologies.
	In 1934 the very first federal regulation regarding firearms was the National Firearms Act of 1934. More federal regulations were enacted to create restrictions on the Second Amendment in terms of gun control. Some of the first of these acts were the 1939 Federal Firearms Act which requires dealers shipping firearms through state lines to be federally licensed. One of the more important acts was the 1967 Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Street Act, stating that convicted felons owning any firearm was henceforth unlawful.
	There were many acts that kept going on throughout the years, like the 1968 Gun Control Act that banned selling firearms to people that are convicted as a felon, are fugitives, or were drug users. There were also much more controversial ones that many argued were unconstitutional like the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act, which was proposed by the Clinton Administration, that mandated a five-day waiting time on the purchases of all handguns. This eventually faded away due to popular demand and the assistance of background checks. Another more controversial act would be the 1994 Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act that enacted a ban on 19 different semi-automatic weapons that included “multiple assault weapon features” such as magazines containing over 10 rounds, which also phased out in 2004 from the Sunset Provision/Clause.
	Courts regularly rule in favor of States’ rights over individual’s rights, saying that the power to defend themselves against foreign and domestic enemies by having capable citizens reduced to need for a large standing army because each state had its own National Guard. This was the case until the Heller Decision, what made a precedent for future cases regarding gun ownership. After the District of Columbia v. Heller 443 U.S. 570 (2008), where the District of Columbia violated the Second Amendment by banning possession of functional handguns in homes and the Supreme Court ruled in favor of Heller stating that the Second Amendment is an individual right to possess a weapon in one’s home regardless of ones relation to the militia. During 2010 a similar case happened in Chicago, in 2010 McDonald v. Chicago, the city of Chicago banned nearly all possession or ownership of a handgun by citizens. The supreme court ruled in favor of McDonald, stating that he felt vulnerable to others because while others had handguns unlawfully he could not attain a handgun legally as to defend himself.
	All rights are not absolute, and they should not conflict with other rights. Strict gun control that teeters on the edge of breaking the second amendment has seen to not work time and time again, yet people still push for it trying to make streets safer. A certain amount of gun control can be okay to have and can be reasonable, but after specific types of firearms and ammunition becomes restricted it starts to limit our second amendment cause more harm than it does to help.