CHARLES C.W. COOKE: Even Obama Understands the Second Amendment Better Than Liberal Activists:

Consider: In order to argue with a straight face that the right to keep and bear arms is inextricably linked with “service in an organized and sanctioned militia,” you would have to believe the following unbelievable things: 1) that the Founders’ intent in codifying the Second Amendment was to protect the right of individuals to join an organization over which the federal government has constitutionally granted plenary power; 2) that unlike every other provision in the Bill of Rights — and every other constitutional measure that is wrapped in the “right of the people” formulation — the Second Amendment denotes something other than an individual right that can be asserted against the state; and 3) that every major judicial figure of the era was mistaken as to its meaning — among them, Joseph Story, William Rawle, St. George Tucker, Timothy Farrar, and Tench Coxe, all of whom explained the Second Amendment perfectly clearly — whereas a few judges and politicians in the 20th century have been bang on in their comprehension.

Furthermore, one has to grapple with the theory’s obvious consequences. If it is indeed the case that “a well regulated militia is necessary to the security of a free state” — and if this supposition is binding rather than explanatory — then one has no choice but to conclude that America is both insecure and unfree, and and no choice but to wonder aloud whether the government has abdicated its enumerated constitutional responsibilities to the point at which its legitimate authority must not only be called into question but supplanted by volunteers.

As Fordham’s Nicholas Johnson has noted trenchantly, presumptions such as these are flatly unsustainable in the face of sedulous investigation, and their key progenitor — the now-retired Justice John Paul Stevens — has done little but embarrass himself with their promulgation.

Most of them, however, are beyond embarrassment.