When people say the Second Amendment should be abolished because it was “written for muskets,” they’re ignoring both history and logic. If we applied that reasoning across the Constitution, we’d also have to toss out the First Amendment because it was written before the internet, television, and smartphones.
But that’s not how our rights work.
The Founders wrote the Bill of Rights to protect timeless principles, not temporary tools. The Second Amendment guarantees the right to self-defense, not the right to own a musket specifically. Just as the First Amendment evolved to protect blogs, livestreams and podcasts, the Second naturally extends to the modern firearms used for lawful defense today, including semiautomatic pistols, shotguns and AR-style rifles.
Let’s not forget who these men were. Benjamin Franklin invented bifocals and harnessed electricity. Thomas Jefferson used a mechanical writing machine — basically the first autopen — to duplicate his letters. These were visionaries and innovators, not men afraid of change. They understood that technology would evolve, and they wrote a constitution designed to endure through that evolution.
At the time the Second Amendment was ratified, repeating arms already existed. The idea that the Founders only intended to protect single-shot firearms is not just wrong — it’s insulting to their intelligence.
And what of today’s firearms? AR-15s are not military weapons. They are modular, civilian rifles used by millions of Americans for hunting, training, home defense and sport. Semiautomatic pistols are the standard self-defense tool, just as muskets were in 1791. The Constitution protects what is common, lawful and essential for a free people.
Technology has changed. Human nature has not. Americans still have the right to protect their lives and liberty. The Second Amendment didn’t expire with the flintlock. It lives on, because freedom still matters.
This Letter to the Editor was written by Women for Rights Louisiana State Director Stephanie O’Rouke and appeared in The Advocate.