dscntnt: GW who "was loathe to endorse even a militia rkba to everyone" said: "A free people ought to be armed."
dear dscntnt: open mouth, insert foot: George Washington, 1790: A free people ought not only to be armed, but disciplined; to which end a uniform and well-digested plan is requisite; and their safety and interest require that they should promote such manufactories as tend to render them independent of others for essential, particularly military, supplies.
George Washington, First Annual Address, to both House of Congress (8 January 1790)
http://www.thefederalistpapers.org/posters/george-washington/george-washington-a-free-people-ought-not-only-to-be-armed-but-disciplined
Ron Chernow, whose "Washington: A Life" won the 2011 Pulitzer Prize for biography, helped us translate.. "In this passage, Washington is talking about national defense policy, not individuals arming themselves, and the need for national self-sufficiency in creating military supplies," Chernow told us by email.
.... John Woolley said Washington was speaking about external threats and "not being dependent on imported weapons." .. "there is no hint in either of these that the members of Congress thought there was something in that speech about gun rights." http://www.justplainpolitics.com/showthread.php?49020-Washington-Said-What
You took GW out of context, & portrayed a different intention than he meant. Is that what you consider ethical? then you mock me to boot; couldn't you at least google your ooc quote to check for accuracy? or are you so eager to accept any 2nd amendment fantasy that you swallow bogus quotes hook line & sinker? Don't these bogus quotes fabricated & manipulated to infer individual rights theory, teach you anything? that your 2ndA beliefs are inside a house of cards?
... an army was expensive, as Washington wrote in a May 2, 1783, memo to a congressional committee .. "We are too poor to maintain a standing Army adequate to our defence," and suggested a small regular army supplemented by a well-organized militia -- a part-time force of volunteers, called up in emergencies.
Steuben proposed seven national legions of select white militiamen that would rotate in service from two to four years and return to their communities trained and disciplined. They would rejoin the general militia and, over time, this militia would also become better prepared.. Washington strongly approved of Steuben's proposal and even believed it to be a more thorough explanation of his own Continental Militia.. http://www.lawsonline.com/LegalTopics/Militia/regulated-militia.shtm
The select militia ideas by Washington, Steuben, and Knox did receive some initial support for providing economically feasible and carefully structured plans for training the population while not over-burdening all citizens. But Knox’s attempt to tie citizenship with service was not popular.
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