My father Vladimir pointed me to this passage in a 1975 book, The Dictionary of Misinformation, which aims to rebut various commonly believed myths:
right to keep and bear arms, the. The second article of the Bill of Rights of the United States Constitution reads — in whole, not in part, italics furnished — “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.” Nothing in the Constitution, thus, forbids the right of federal or state governments to make any gun-control laws they wish in terms of an individual who is not a member of a “well-regulated militia.”
I thought our readers might find this interesting, partly because it does reflect what was the generally accepted view among legal academics in 1975, and thus shows just how much things have changed in a few decades.