The Second Amendment (Amendment II) to the United States Constitution is the part of the United States Bill of Rights that protects the right of the people to keep and bear arms. It was adopted on December 15, 1791, along with the rest of the Bill of Rights. The Supreme Court of the United States first ruled in 2008 that the Second Amendment protects an individual right to possess and carry firearms.

It reads as follows:

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.

In 2008 and 2010, the Supreme Court issued two landmark decisions officially establishing this interpretation. In District of Columbia v. Heller, 554 U.S. 570 (2008), the Court ruled that the Second Amendment protects an individual's right to possess a firearm, unconnected to service in a militia and to use that arm for traditionally lawful purposes, such as self-defense within the home within many longstanding prohibitions and restrictions on firearms possession listed by the Court as being consistent with the Second Amendment. In McDonald v. Chicago, 561 U.S. 3025 (2010), the Court ruled that the Second Amendment limits state and local governments to the same extent that it limits the federal government

The Militia Act of 1903 defines the US Militia as "Every able bodied male between the age of 18 and 45." It further stipulates this as the organized militia which is the National Guard and the unorganized militia which is every other citizen or resident alien who has declared his intent for citizenship.

We must stop writing laws that only punish and strip rights away from the law abiding citizens. This does not solve the problem but instead creates another. The problem is not firearms or the legal ownership of them. Mental illness and the lack of proper availability of proper treatment and identification of this condition is a contributor as well as the lack of prosecution or appropriate punishment for those who choose to use firearms with malicious intent in the commission of criminal activity.

By signing this petition you are saying enough is enough, stop punishing those who have done nothing wrong for the unconscionable acts of criminals and the mentally ill and instead focus efforts towards helping the mentally ill and creating stricter punishments for those who would use a firearm in the commission of a crime to deter firearm violence in an appropriate way.