The Armed Citizen In The Early Republic By Shalhope Analysis

In the selected reading The Armed Citizen in the Early Republic, by Robert Shalhope, the author aims to focus on the society, individual and the constitutional ‘right to bear arms’. In doing so, Shalhope thinks that the Second amendment was expressive of the individual and the right to possess arms. This examined through the influence of republican ideals (as well as liberal) to form what is now the Second Amendment, beliefs and thinking he thinks shaped the establishment of the amendment. Shalhope looks at the environment and political setting for creation of this amendment, which serves as a frame of reference for political thinking during what he calls an ‘early republic’. The author attempts to answer questions about arms and the individual and the authors in an 18th century perspective rather than a more modern one. He does so by capturing the theories of early writers …show more content…
The surveyed sources are various in format, and most of these sources used is meant to portray the political observations by conservative theorists of arms. He also does use drafts of documents to also show different forms of interpretations for the idea of the individual. As a source, it would prove there were more sides and impressions about arms during the time. The second selected essay, A Well-Regulated Militia: The Origins and Meaning of the Second Amendment by Lawrence Cress. This text is also about the Second Amendment, but is fairly different to what Shalhope interpreted- Cress sees the meaning of the Second Amendment as an assertion of conservative thinking and ideals. In the essay, he focuses on the Second Amendment’s political meaning to its early republican thinkers and writers. He talks well about Federalists, in addition to Anti-federalist roles in the coming of the Second Amendment, and the American militia’s significance to it as