"By the president of the prestigious Brennan Center for Justice at NYU School of Law, the life story of the most controversial, volatile, misunderstood provision of the Bill of Rights. At a time of renewed debate over guns in America, what does the Second Amendment mean? This book looks at history to provide some surprising, illuminating answers. The Amendment was written to calm public fear that the new national government would crush the state militias...

This work offers the most complete collection of primary documents on the subject of guns and gun politics, giving readers a comprehensive, unbiased understanding of the complex and often-surprising evolution of gun ownership, gun culture, and gun politics in the United States.

Thom Hartmann, the most popular progressive radio host in America... looks at the real history of guns in America and what we can do to limit both their lethal impact and the power of the gun lobby... Hartmann examines how guns have played important roles throughout American history, from early European settlement to the Revolutionary War and Manifest Destiny, through the use of Slave Patrols in the Deep South (which became the "well-regulated militias"...

"Civil rights scholar Charles E. Cobb, Jr. reveals how nonviolent activists and their allies kept the civil rights movement alive by bearing and, when necessary, using firearms. Whether patrolling their neighborhoods, garrisoning their homes, or firing back at attackers, these men and women were crucial to the movement's success, as were the weapons they carried. Drawing on his firsthand experiences in the Southern Freedom Movement and interviews...