Dear Editor:

Mr. Kelly and Mr. Reed both seem to be under the assumption that the Second Amendment pertains to muzzle loaders only, for surely the founders couldn’t foresee the weapons we have today. They should look up both the Puckle gun and the Girandoni rifle. To think that men astute enough to craft a document as timeless as the Constitution could not see forward to repeating firearms is absurd.

As to the idea that the founders meant the Second Amendment to apply only to the militia, I invite them to look up some of the earliest state constitutions of Pennsylvania, Vermont and Georgia; they all indicated an individual right to bear arms. The U.S. Supreme Court recently upheld that belief in two cases and we only have to look to the words of the framers of the Bill of Rights to know that those great men understood the importance of self defense. Reed’s assertion that only the military should have semi-automatic firearms flies in the face of not only the beliefs of the founders but logic as well.

Kelly’s argument that if a person can’t get it in three, four, five or six shots they probably shouldn’t own a gun is borne of ignorance. I encourage him to take a look at the number of rounds in a police duty weapon. Maybe he should educate himself on the most popular shooting sports of today that utilize the very same guns that both he and Reed vilify. Ignorance is a dangerous thing, gentlemen, rights are given away because of it.

Reed may want to look to the words of the left’s golden boy Rahm Emanuel to see where I got the “crisis” idea.

Kelly’s annoyance at my single mindedness is fine by me. What he doesn’t get is that I had to choose a fight and the protection of the Second Amendment from people like him is it. I vowed to refrain from writing unless someone wrote misinformed letters about guns and once again here we are.

Linc Sample

Boothbay Harbor