Introduction The citizen soldier is a concept as old as, and certainly predating, recorded history. If we examine Plato's thought we find that the first city of the Republic was occupied before the emergence of the warrior class. The second of Plato's three hypothetical cities came emerged precisely because a warrior class had emerged from among the citizenry to dominate and control it. Good government was impossible as long as the warriors ruled. Since Plato's time many political theorists have concluded that the best way to insure that there will be open and honest government is to guarantee the right of the people to keep and bear arms as an unorganized militia. The idea that the people be armed weighed heavily in the minds of the English Puritans and radical Whigs who were writing substantial political philosophy in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. They returned to the major premise of antiquity: that only freemen may be armed and that the mark of a freeman was his right to keep and bear arms. While there were some assumptions that only an armed citizen could resist the proverbial "intruder in the night" and that a citizen might use arms for recreation and hunting, there was, constantly, the clear commit- ment that the state had made that the best and ultimate defense and protection of the state rested in the hands of the citizen-soldiers trained at arms. In medieval law there was a three fold obligation shared by all freemen. They must repair and maintain public roads and bridges and the like; they must serve as an ancillary police force; and they must be prepared to bear arms in defense of the state as a militia. Both the posse and the militia requirements were based on the need for privately owned arms. Medieval law in these areas developed slowly, but was always based in common law and practice. Each man was required to keep in his home the arms of his socio-economic class and have these in order ready to use in case of emergency. Regular practice with one's arms was a general requirement. At least one English king attempted to discourage participation in any form of recreation except practice with arms, primarily with the long bow. There were three levels of military obligation generally accepted in medieval states. The standing army was populated with trained, professional soldiers. Some of the citizenry was trained to at least a minimal degree and comprised a select militia. The untrained masses of able-bodied freemen comprised a general militia. The principle of levee en masse, recognized under interna tional law, grew out of the unenrolled, mass militia of the middle ages. The first significant contribution to the literature of the militia was made by Niccolo Machiavelli who argued that freedom was incompatible with standing armies. Given to great mischief, the standing armies represented a great threat to the people and the state in Machiavelli's writings. Although we frequently associate Machiavelli with authoritarian government as a matter of fact he looked forward to the establishment of a democratic regime as soon as possible following the establishment of a nation-state. In democracies militias were established early as a part of the general western commitment to integral liberal values. The English militia is intimately associated with the transition from divine right kingship to liberal democracy. One of the grave errors of the Stuart monarchy was to seek control over the total armed forces of the nation. The trained bands, as the popular militias were then called, sought autonomy and identified their independence with freedom for the people. In the British colonies in North America the provincials demanded complete control their own military affairs. Two democracies, Israel and Switzerland, have placed great emphasis on the citizen-soldier and the popular militia. Both nations require essentially universal military service and training of their subjects. Universal military service and training has resulted in wholly armed states in these two nations in which firearms are immediately available to the citizens. There is no indication that this has had any negative bearing on crime rates. Israel patterned its militia system after the Swiss program. Jews who emigrated to Israel after the near extermination of European Jewry during World War II knew that authoritarian political systems permitted no private ownership of firearms, at least among minority populations. They have vowed that they will never again be caught in the position of being effectively disarmed in the face of their enemies. The Swiss have come to believe that their long history of autonomy is inter- related with the armed nation. Few Western democracies have followed Machiavelli's advice or the Swiss or Israeli example. A few of the Nordic nations, such as Sweden and Finland, have militia systems and a very few other democratic nations have universal military training. Most democracies have accepted the perspective of those who believe that mature nations have advanced beyond the "Wild West" mentality. Anti-firearms rhetoric has created a climate of opinion that accepts conclusions such as that firearms breed violence and that civilized nations are disarmed nations. They see a military armed with advanced weapons systems that are electronic, comput erized, specialized and complex. Such is the current state of military preparedness. The foot soldier with small arms training is obsolete. Without any need for the foot soldier there is no need for small arms and marksmanship training and thus there is no need for the militia or ancillary support for individual firearms training. Totalitarian governments have heeded Machiavelli's advice more than have Western democracies. They have armed their citizens and made certain that their citizens from early childhood through adulthood have become familiar with the arms regularly used by their military. They train their people in the use and assembly and disassembly of arms of all military types. The Soviet Union uses its D.O.S.A.A.F. ["Voluntary Society for the Assistance of the Army, Navy and Air Force"] as a pre-induction military support organization. Likewise, Communist China has an advanced and well funded people's militia system. Fascist Italy, Imperial Japan and Nazi Germany all had para-military organizations which provided for training of military eligibles of all ages. Non-demo cratic governments have built regime support by showing their military hardware and building pride among the people in the sheer show of terror which only military hardware can bring. Knowing that either they were limited by international agreements not to exceed a certain size in the military, or knowing that their budgets cannot fully fund the military they would like, they arm and train the populus. Totalitarian governments are well aware that they may fight total and unrestrained warfare and hence become totally armed camps. Pre-militia and militia training is a key ingredient in the concept of the armed nation. Totalitarian governments realize that an armed and trained population is a threat to their authoritarian rule so they train the population under careful supervision and control the supply of arms. Some totalitarian nations like the Soviet Union and Communist China train their people in basements of factories and other public facilities. The government provides arms, training, instruction and ammunition. Most compel their citizens to participate. Contemporary totalitarian governments have drawn their inferences and conclusions about weapons and citizen arms training from a very realistic view of the realities of war. The war in Korea, the Vietnam War, the war in Afghanistan and the recent joint western military action in the Middle East have all utilized advanced weapons systems, but have depended no less on the foot soldier armed with a rifle. The holy wars of communism, "wars of national liberation," have not disappeared, and will not disappear, with the collapse of communism in the former Soviet Union. Communism is still much alive in China and in the nations of southeast Asia under its influence. And wars of national liberation have always depended upon the success of the individual citizen-soldier and his small arm. Many successful wars of national liberation have been fought with obsolete and obsolescent weapons. American soldiers found Russian World War I bolt action rifles on bodies of many Viet Cong soldiers. Wars of national liberation are necessarily fought by citizen-soldiers, that is, unorganized militia, consisting of men who are first and foremost agricultural peasants and second arily soldiers in the revolution. Soldiers in wars of national liberation are engaged in guerilla warfare and so must disguise their role in the armed camp. It was these citizen-soldiers who defeated the French in Indo-China and eventually brought great pressure on the American military in Viet Nam, and scored successes elsewhere. The Citizen Soldier The citizen-soldier may have been either conscript or volunteer. He stands in marked contrast to the professional soldier whose vocation is war. The citizen-soldier does not enter war for pay or booty. He goes to war only reluctantly, spurred on by notions of patriotism and nationalism and of duty. The citizen- soldier was the backbone of every American army. He deplores war. It was he who called attention to the excesses of professional soldiers in such disgraceful events as My Lai, Vietnam. He fights only as last recourse, when his nation is threatened, and not in imperialistic adventures. A recent article concluded that the Second Amendment to the United States Constitution was adopted "as a declaration that Federal Government can never fully nationalize all the military forces of this nation" because the masses of men with their own guns constitute "an essentially civilian-manned and oriented set of military forces" who can "inveigh against federal professionalization of the state militia." The Preamble to the Declaration of Independence listed as two grievances against King George III that "[h]e has kept among us, in times of peace, standing armies without the consent of our legislatures [and] [h]e has affected to render the military independent of and superior to the Civil power." The citizen soldier is seen, again, in medieval times, as the peasant conscripted to fight as a foot soldier. After the wars were over the peasant, too, returned to the fields. He is seen in the Minuteman of Lexington and Concord who left his business to attend to the matter of the nation's liberty. Of the wrongs done to the colonists, the Minute Men of Massachusetts, and the role of the citizen-soldiers, Chief Justice Earl Warren once wrote, Among the grievous wrongs of which [the Americans] complained in the Declaration of Independence were that the King had subordinated the civil power to the military, that he had quartered troops among them in times of peace, and that through his mercenaries, he had committed other cruelties. Our War of the Revolution was, in good measure, fought as a protest against standing armies. Moreover, it was fought largely with a civilian army, the militia, and its great Commander-in-Chief was a civilian at heart. . . . [Fears of despotism] were uppermost in the minds of the Founding Fathers when they drafted the Constitu tion. Distrust of a standing army was expressed by many. Recognition of the danger from Indians and foreign nations caused them to authorize a national armed force begrudgingly. The citizen-soldier is a militiaman, a member of the unenrolled or the enrolled militia. Those enrolled formally today belong to the National Guard units of their state. A simple dictionary definition of militia is, "a body of soldiers for home use." The term meant "miles" or "troops" and was derived from the latin word for soldiers. In medieval Europe it was "the whole body of freemen" between the ages of 15 and 40 years, who were required by law to keep weapons in defense of their nation. In the later Middle Ages the militia was the whole body of "citizens, burgesses, free tenants, villeins [serfs] and others from 15 to 60 years of age" who were obliged by the law to be armed. Webster's New Collegiate Dictionary defines the militia as "a part of the organized armed forces of a country liable to call only in emergency" and as "the whole body of able-bodied male citizens declared by law as being subject to call to military service." One who participates in the militia, Webster notes, is a militia man. Webster's New World Dictionary provides an even more comprehensive definition of militia: Militia. 1. originally, any military force. b. later, any army composed of citizens rather than professional soldiers, called out in time of emergency. 2. In the United States, all able-bodied male citizens between 18 and 45 years old who are not already members of the regular armed forces: members of the National Guard, Organized Reserve Corps (Army and Air), and the Naval and Marine Reserves constitute the organized militia; all others, the unorganized militia. A mid-Nineteenth Century dictionary merely defines militia as a trained band, a standing and total military force of the nation. Another dictionary defines the militia as follows: 1. an authorized military force other than that of the full time, professional military establishment, especially an army of citizens trained for war or any other emergency . . . . 2. an authorized but unorganized military force consisting of the entire body of able-bodied men in the United States or its territories who have reached the age of 18 and are not more than 45 . . . . 3. any citizens' army; any nonprofessional armed force organized or summoned to duty in an emergency. A recent author distinguished among army, trained bands and the various types of militia. An army is any armed land force that is organized and controlled by a clear chain of command. A militia derived from the Latin miles and the old English and French milice and indicated "the obligation of every able bodied English man to defend his country." It implies the obligation all citizens and perhaps resident aliens have to serve in the armed forces of their nation. In the American colonies the transition was made from English common law to the colonies. The federal Constitution made certain that any national obligation did not preclude service to the state which was primary and original. Initially the enrolled militia (or organized militia) included those select or specially trained militia enlisted by the colonies or states. Early select and enrolled militia were occasionally called Trained Bands. The Minute Men of New England were select or enrolled militia. After the federal Militia Act of 8 May 1792 was enacted the enrolled militia was simply those who had registered for militia service, providing their full names and addresses. Eventually, the select and organized militias of the states were called the National Guard. National Guard units called into federal service, from the Whiskey Rebellion through the World Wars were occasionally called Volunteers. The Army of the United States consists of all armed men and women in the national service, including all enrolled militia men. During the War of 1812 a conflict over the enrollment of militia by the national and state governments developed. Massachu setts and Connecticut objected to the attempt of the national government to call their state militias into the service of the nation. The state position was sustained by the highest state courts, but remained unresolved in the federal courts. By the end of the Civil War the issue had been decided in favor of the federal government, and the federal militia was firmly established. Theoretically, a citizen after the Civil War was, because of the dual citizenship clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, liable for service in both the federal militia and the militia of the state in which he resided. Theoretically at least, a naval militia may exist under letters of marque and reprisal. During the Revolution a few states, notably Pennsylvania, had state navies manned by militia. President Thomas Jefferson toyed with the idea of protecting our shires with large row boats armed with smaller cannon and manned by militia. In 1889 Massachusetts created a naval militia as a counterpart to the regular, land-based state militia, and a very few other states followed. Trained Bands (or Trainbands) are found primarily in Elizabethan and Stuart England. The concept and term may be found as early as the reign of Alfred the Great (849-899). "For greater security, certain men in or near each settlement or City, who volunteered or were selected otherwise, were given, or agreed to procure, arms in advance of any emergency." These men became the mainstay of Cromwell's army during the Puritan Revolution. These units developed from the broader militia. The term is occasionally encountered referring to select militia in the American colonies. Another authority defined militia as follows, The word militia has in the past been given three widely different meanings. In its broadest sense it covers all citizens who could be called out in an emergency to defend the country, our able bodied manpower. In a narrower sense . . . it refers to those citizens, roughly between the ages of 18 and 45 years, who were enrolled by law in regularly organized units . . . The National Guard . . . is the third class of militia. . . . [T]he guardsman is essentially an amateur soldier; the [other two classes of] militiaman was ever a civilian. Another term that applies to "the military organization of the entire nation" is levees en masse. This force "must be recruited from men . . . women, children and the aged." It stands quite a part from the regular army, and even the militia. Its forces commonly have no uniforms or military discipline or training. They fight only in their home areas, along ill-defined battle lines. It is an uprising of all the people, or of a significant portion thereof. Usually, it is called forth by a general call to resist the enemy, rather than a muster call; or it may simply issue forth spontane ously. It never fights abroad. Its weapons are whatever are available from among the people. While it most frequently occurs immediately after the local area is attacked, the term might apply to a popular uprising that occurs after an area is occupied. The U.S. Supreme Court discussed the meaning on militia in a 1939 decision which was based on traditional views expressed in state court decisions. The significance attributed to the term Militia appears from the debates in the Constitutional Convention, the history and legislation of Colonies and States, and the writings of approved commentators. These show plainly enough that the Militia comprised all males physically capable of acting in concert for the common defense. "A body of citizens enrolled for military discipline." And further, that ordinarily when called for service these men were expected bearing arms supplied by themselves and of the kind in common use at the time. . . . In all the colonies, as in England, the militia system was based on the principle of the assize of arms. This implied the general obligation of all adult males inhabitants to possess arms, and, with certain exceptions, to cooperate in the work of defense. The possession of arms also implied the possession of ammunition, and the authorities paid quite as much attention to the latter as to the former. The sentimental role of the citizen-soldier is found in the parallel to the Roman Cincinnatus who left his plough in the field to answer his country's call. In one of the very few rulings given by the Supreme Court on the right to keep and bear arms, the high court looked at the historical context in which militias had devel oped. It is undoubtedly true that all citizens capable of bearing arms constitute the reserved military force or reserve militia of the United States as well as of the States; and, in view of this prerogative of the general government, as well as of its general powers, the States cannot, even laying the constitutional provision in question out of view, prohibit the people from keeping and bearing arms, so as to deprive the United States of their rightful resource from maintaining the public security, and disable the people from performing their duty to the general government. James Harrington, the philosopher of property rights and economic determinism, called the militia, "the vast body of citizens in arms, both elders and youth." Harrington also noted that the militia was "Men accustomed to their arms and their liberties." Commenting on Harrington's thought, Sir Henry Vance the Younger wrote that the militia was comprised of those who "have deserved to be trusted with the keeping or bearing Their own Armes in publick defense." Adam Smith, author of the influential treatise on economic liberalism, The Wealth of Nations, published in 1776, defined the term militia as, either all the citizens of military age, or a certain number of them, to join in some measure the trade of a soldier to whatever other trade or profession they may happen to carry on. If this is found to be the policy of a nation, its military force is then said to consist of a militia. A French writer observed that "a well regulated militia [is] drawn from the body of the people." It is "accustomed to arms" and "is the proper, natural and sure defense of a free state." He cautioned his readers that a standing army was destructive of liberty. French military theorist Comte de Guibert expressed little admiration for militiamen who were not well disciplined. He described the citizen-soldier as a real barbarian who is terrible when angered, he will carry flame and fire to the enemy. He will terrify, with his vengeance, any people who may be tempted to trouble his repose. And let no one call barbarious these reprisals based on laws of nature [although] they may be violations of so-called laws of war. . . . He arises, leaves his fireside, he will perish, in the end, if necessary; but he will obtain satisfaction, he will avenge himself, he will assure himself, by the magnificence of this vengeance, of his future tranquility. Sir James A.H. Murray in his New English Dictionary of Historical Principles, defined the militia as, a military force, especially the body of soldiers in the service of the sovereign of the state, [who are] the whole body of men amenable to military service, without enlistment, whether drilled or not . . . . A citizen army as distinguished from a body of mercenaries or professional soldiers. Simeon Howard (1733-1804), writing in Boston in 1773, said that a militia was "the power of defense in the body of the people . . . [that is], a well-regulated and well-disciplined militia. This is placing the sword in hands that will not be likely to betray their trust, and who will have the strongest motives to act their part well, in defence of their country." Justice Story in his Commentaries defended the militia system. He wrote, The militia is the natural defense of a free country against sudden foreign invasions, domestic usurpation of power by rulers. It is against sound policy for a free people to keep up large military establishments and standing armies in time of peace, both from the enormous expense with which they afford ambitious and unprincipled rulers to subvert the government, or trammel upon the rights of the people. The rights of the citizens to keep and bear arms has justly been considered as the palladium of the liberties of a republic; since it offers a strong moral check against the usurpation and arbitrary powers of rulers; and will generally, even if these are successful in the first instance, enable the people to resist and triumph over them. Benjamin Franklin defined the militia as a voluntary association of extra-governmental armed troops acting under their own authority. Franklin wrote that a militia is a voluntary Assembling of great Bodies of armed Men, from different Parts of the Province, on occasional Alarm, whether true or false, . . . without Call or Authority from the Government, and without due Order and Direction among themselves . . . which cannot be done where compulsive Means are used to force Men into Military Service. . . . In Presser v. Illinois the United States Supreme Court noted that, It is undoubtedly true that all citizens capable of bearing arms constitute the reserve military force or reserve militia of the United States as well as of the states . . . . [T]he States cannot, even laying the constitutional provision in question out of view, prohibit the people from keeping and bearing arms, so as to deprive the United States of their rightful source for maintaining the public security, and disable the people from performing their duty to the general government." In 1939 the Supreme Court reaffirmed this point of law. The militia is "comprised [of] all males physically capable of acting in concert for the common defense . . . . [W]hen called for service these men were expected to appear bearing arms supplied by themselves and of the kind in common use at the time . . . ." The Idea of the Militia The generation which produced the American Constitution approached military matters in terms of the tripartite system that has prevailed in England through the early 18th Century. The first level consisted of a small cadre of trained professional soldiers. They were similar to the houscarls in medieval times and the landsknecht in early modern times. They were few in number, representing less than one percent of the population. This group provided the experience, training, personnel and supply agents necessary for a major military mobilization. On the second level, representing perhaps two to five percent of the population, would be the trained militia, corresponding to the Trained Bands of Stuart England. These men would be drilled in military fashion and trained under supervised conditions in riflemanship. They were true trained militia. They were first civilian farmers, craftsmen, tradesmen and professionals, and only secondarily soldiers. The third group, by far the largest in numbers, encompassed virtually the entire, able-bodied adult male population. In medieval days this group was known as the Great Fyrd. They were not ordinarily combat troops. They were mustered only in the case of actual invasion of their immediate home area. In that unlikely event they would function as levees en masse, local citizens rising up in their own immediate area to resist invaders. The principle of levess en masse has long been recog nized under international law. Normally, they would be the reservoir upon which the armed forces could draw in case large numbers were needed in wartime. In medieval times it was a matter of law that common folk have weapons, as used by ordinary citizens in their homes. Before induction the rulers expected the peasants to have acquired certain skills with their weapons in the course of daily life. The English Assize of Arms (1181), enacted by Henry II, required that each man keep at his own expense in his home a weapon appropriate to his rank and position. The American use of militia was, in reality, a throwback to the practices of an earlier age. Most European nations had abandoned the militia system by the Sixteenth Century. Americans chided the English for abandoning the militia system which had worked so well here. The militia, alone, had served as a check on the native aborigine in the colonial period of American history. When General Braddock was defeated near Pittsburgh, then Ft. DuQuesne, the Virginia militia under Colonel George Washington's command stood against the French and Indians. The British army fled to the eastern seaboard. During the colonial period Americans came to trust the militia to a far greater extent than they trusted the regular royal army. The fancy uniforms and European battle formations may have served the British well in wars in the old world, but they were ill suited for backwoods America. Award winning historian and former Librarian of Congress Daniel Boorstin noted, Everywhere, Americans relied on an armed citizenry rather than a professional army. The failure to distinguish between the "military man" and every other man was simply another example of the dissolving of the monopolies and distinctions of European life . . . . In a country inhabited by "Minute Men" why keep a standing army? . . . The fear of a standing army which by European hypotheses was the instrument of tyrants and the enslaver of peoples, reenforced opposition to a professional body of men in arms." While the English Parliament and His Majesty's government argued that the colonials ought to bear some part of the cost of the wars with the French and Indians, the colonists disagreed. The colonial legislatures had appropriated money to pay their militias. The British troops were useless in the woods. The British troops had been effective against the French armies in Canada, but that was of little concern to the colonials. Let the English bear the cost of their wars with France. After all, the wars here were only an extension of the greater wars in Europe. Since the colonists' wars were generally brought on by England's massive conflicts on the Continent the home country could rarely spare many of its professional soldiers to defend the colonies against the French. In peacetime Royal troops were more numerous, but they were unpopular. Royal troops enforced the hated smuggling laws and, later, Britain's policy against westward expansion for the colonies. Such "tyranny", and the memory of the uses to which Cromwell and the Stuarts had put standing armies, seemed to validate the truisms of classical political philosophy: that an armed populace provides all the security necessary against either foreign invasion or domestic tyranny, while a professional army allows rulers to oppress their unarmed subjects. After the Revolution began the British decided to avoid any future armed conflict with the colonists over the payment of taxes or for any other cause. The British government had planned to disarm the Americans completely had they won the war of the American Revolution. In 1777 the British cabinet, confident of impending victory, planned to abolish the militia. The cabinet had planned that, The Militia Laws should be repealed and none suffered to be re-enacted and the Arms of All the People should be taken away . . . . nor should any Foundry or Manufactory of Arms, Gunpowder or Warlike Stores, be ever suffered in America, nor should any Gunpowder, Lead, Arms or Ordnance be imported into it without Licence. In the late Seventeenth century the militiamen, coming from the towns and cities of New England, proved sadly deficient in the firearms skills and discipline necessary to contain even the ragged, ill-clothes and underfed braves of King Philip's army. The southern militia was all but non-existent. Only in the middle colonies of Pennsylvania, Maryland and Virginia, and to a slightly lesser degree, New York, were really a formidable force. During the Revolution George Washington recognized that, however useful the militia might be in harassing or semi-guerrilla warfare, lasting victory could be forged only with a regular army. The militia concept had appealed to the Founding Fathers because it accorded with their philosophical predispositions and their own experience in warfare. From their inception the American colonies had to rely upon an armed populace for defense. Many times the colonies simply could not afford to maintain a sufficient standing military establishment. It also became a matter of duty. One had to work and to be prepared to defend the colony if he wished to live within its borders. Necessity, popular opinion and abstract philosophy had combined to commit the Founding Fathers to a military system based ultimately on what was then described as the "unorganized militia." The unorganized militia ideal remained the basis of Amer ican military defense to the beginning of the Civil War. The ideal of Cincinnatus was epitomized in Lincoln's call for 60,000 three month volunteers who were supposedly to win the war in 90 days and return home. But the urban citizenry was no longer skilled in marksmanship. Few city dwelling unorganized militiamen had even the most rudimentary training with firearms. Archeological evidence suggests that many of the soldiers, particularly Northern troops, engaged in action throughout the Civil War were notably lacking in the firearms skills which were supposed to characterize the militia. Many rifles recovered either at the time or in subse quent excavation of Civil War battlefields had multiple charges poured into their barrels. Soldiers had continued to load their weapons without firing them. It would be quite unfair to dismiss the militia by cataloguing only its failures. From their earliest days, the American colonies and subsequently the American Republic owed their existence to the valor of hastily organized militia forces in holding their own, and eventually overcoming, equally disorganized opposing forces. Militia as a Reservoir Though the nation could not realistically depend for its defense upon an unorganized and undisciplined citizen-soldier, no matter how well armed, those citizens who owned and regularly used firearms in their private lives were found to excel when mobilized into a disciplined and well ordered military force. Toward the end of civilian, and subsequently governmental programs to maintain and expand civilian marksmanship. As early as the 1870s the National Rifle Association was founded for the purpose of promoting the shooting sports and, thereby, civilian and military marksmanship. These remained its sole objectives for its first half-century of existence. During this time it engaged in no controversy or political activities and re mained a tiny organization largely dominated by retired military officers of whom the most prestigious were its early presidents Ulysses S. Grant, Philip Sheridan, and Rutherford B. Hayes. During the administration of President Theodore Roosevelt, and his Secretary of War, Elihu Root, the civilian marksmanship program was created by Congress. This program financed the construction of shooting ranges around the country and, in conjunction with the NRA, helped popularize the publicize shooting contests and exhibitions and other activities designed to focus young men's attention on the development of marksmanship skills. Particularly dramatic in this respect was the NRA's organization in 1908 of the first American Olympic Rifle Team to win a gold medal. In the same year President Roosevelt recommended to Congress that it appropriate further monies to establish target ranges in public schools. Although it has continued for over 75 years, the Civilian Marksmanship Program has never been generously funded. Limited amounts have been expended in the construction of shooting ranges in a few areas. The program's activities have consisted primarily in encouragement of and assistance to civilian shooting clubs and civilian shooters & competitors. Probably the most significant activity by the Director of Civilian Marksmanship (DCM) has consisted in selling, lending or leasing firearms and ammunition to both citizens and shooting clubs. Under the DCM vast numbers of obsolete and obsolescent firearms were sold to these clubs and private parties. The national government had made two assumptions. First it had concluded that civilian marksmanship programs were a small, but highly important, part of total military preparedness. Second, it was important that civilians become familiar with military type weapons. In the case of a grave national emergency the reserve militia would have weapons of military type and of a standard military calibre. The militia system failed when and where it was misused. When it was used as a primary unit of defense, and occasionally as an offense it rarely behaved well. It was never supposed to be the first line of anything. It was supposed to be a reservoir of man power which could be trained, disciplined and drilled as organized militia. It also was to be a general reservoir of untrained manpower skilled only in the use of firearms, who might be conscripted, drilled, disciplined and formed into cohesive fighting units within the setting of a military system. A number of factors have combined so substantially diminish government support for civilian marksmanship in the United States in the post World War II era. To the uninitiated, marksmanship skills have come to seem militarily irrelevant because infantrymen are now equipped with fully automatic rifles with which (it is assumed) "hits" can be assured by simply pointing in the general direction of the target and depressing the trigger until the weapon is empty. Moreover, during the Cold War period, first priority for disposal of surplus American military weapons was for distribu tion to American allies around the world, rather than to the American civilization population. Initially this diminution of government surplus sales of little importance because millions of foreign military surplus weapons were being imported and sold at very low cost throughout the post war period. In 1958 then Senator John F. Kennedy, himself a NRA life member, proposed legislation to end this traffic for the explicit purpose of protecting domestic American firearms manufacturers. The legislation particularly mentioned five Massachusetts manufac turers. Domestic manufacturers had sought such legislation for years, but unsuccessfully because their comparative unimportance, and their concentration only in the New England region, had precluded their building the necessary political base of support. This situation was dramatically altered by President Kennedy's assassina tion with a foreign military weapon of type which, ironically enough, would have been prohibited under the firearms manufactur ers' bill which he had introduced. As a result, such imports were subsequently prohibited by federal law. Philosophical Background The right to keep and bear arms and the militia and citizen- soldier concepts figure frequently in political philosophy. We find both democratic and authoritarian political theorists arguing the issue of the people keeping and bearing arms. There is an interest ing philosophical question for authoritarians. Most authoritarian theorists agree that a citizen-soldier army affords the best possible defense for the state. Those bearing arms must be familiar with arms in order to use them effectively. How can a king provide for the arming and discipline of a militia unless he grants to the people rather free access to weapons? If the people have weapons will they not use the arms to secure their freedom? We are hard pressed to find any democratic political theorist who would absolutely deny to the people the right to keep and bear arms. The problem for a democratic theorist is thus far different than it is for an authoritarian theorist. The democrat must consider how a government may grant free access to arms among the citizens and yet preserve the peace. The Greeks Plato (c.427-347, B.C.) in the Republic created a class of warriors which would be alone and in sole possession of arms. It is not coincidental that the elite also controlled all political activity. The rulers whom Plato called guardians could tell the "noble lies" to the masses and otherwise control them as they saw fit. The arms- bearing class emerged politically and economically supreme naturally as the pure, ideal, first state underwent corruption and disappeared. As men obtained more than they actually needed, the first state lost its base. When men lived in the primitive society they had only what they actually needed and therefore did not attempt to obtain more. After men fell metaphorically from grace and became greedy, disparities of wealth and poverty became the bitter condition of society. To maintain their position the hunters and warriors appropriated to themselves alone the right to have, keep and bear arms. They created the second state. In the third, proposed state of the Republic, the remnants of the hunter-warrior class maintained a monopoly on arms bearing. They were especially recruited because they had superior physical and mental abilities. The arms bearers were now called the Guardians. They were interbred and educated apart from the rest of humans in the state. Plato likened the Guardians to faithful dogs. In normal times they were placid and docile. In times of war or internal strife they became defensive and loyal to their masters and ready to defend him and what was his to the death. His great distrust of the common man may be observed in the following, If a war with outside forces arises, the oligarchy are faced with the following dilemma: either they must call out the common people or not. If they do, they will have more to fear from the armed multitude than from the enemy; and if they do not, in the day of battle, these oligarchy will find themselves only too literally a government of the few. While Plato condemned the oligarchy of wealth and privilege that he saw in many lands, and he knew that the tyranny was backed by the great force of arms for which the oligarchies had a monop oly, he did not see that his Republic created much the same sort of system. He was the first political philosopher to discuss the distinctive and obvious link between tyranny and arms monopoly. Plato was no friend to democratic theory in his Republic, but he did teach his fellow Greeks that the art of war was a distributive activity. His entire guardian class was bred to serve as the protec tion of his ideal state in war. They were trained as faithful dogs who loved and obeyed their masters and were at peace at home, but necessarily protective of their masters and brutal to his enemies. In Book XVII of the Republic Plato took up the question of the conduct of war. He set rules which the citizen-soldiers of the Republic must not violate. His rules did not civilize war, but they did set reason able limits on the conduct of war and on the treatment of prisoners of war. In war, Men and women will take the field together and moreover bring with them the children who are sturdy enough to learn this trade, like any other, by watching what they will have to do themselves when they are grown up; and besides looking on, they will fetch and carry for their fathers and mothers and see to all their needs in the time of war. In the Laws, written after the failure of his experiment with a practical model of the Republic, Plato again suggested the disarmament of the general populace. Plato knew that a democracy required that the common people enjoy the right of keeping and bearing arms, and that with arms they were a constant threat to rebel against tyranny or excessive authority. Xenophon, like Plato, was a student of Socrates in Athens. He became a mercenary soldier on an ill-fated expedition in Persia that was designed to change rulers in that nation. After the pretender Xenophon supported died he and his men were trapped in hostile country. His Anabasis recounted the retreat of the 10,000 soldiers. During that retreat he discovered that an army like a city is a community of friends. It was governed by as pure a form of democracy as was known in antiquity. He came to regard to his leadership as a form of paternal care of his friends. In a retreat like that undertaken by Xenophon and his comrades one had the opportunity to observe how training and discipline worked on the citizen-soldiers. He concluded that military service simply magnifies civic virtues and vices. The strengths and weaknesses of the parent civil society from which the men had come are written small in the military child. The system which draws upon men who are first citizens and only secondarily soldiers works best and has the greatest stability in times of crisis. Xenophon was the first to concentrate on studying and developing techniques of effective military and civic leadership, and of the relationship between the military and civil authorities. Xenophon was also the first to observe and write on the intimate relationship between hunting and the art of war. Nothing prepares a citizen to go to war as thoroughly as the chase. It was Xenophon who related the legend that Churon the centaur had learned the hunt from the gods and had passed its arts and mysteries along to humankind. Hunting, the gods knew, was the way to prepare for war. One learned to know nature and how to blend in with it; and one learned sciences such as typography and geology. So convinced was Xenophon of the value of hunting that he prepared to first treatise on the subject, Cynegeticus. He also wrote of the values as well as pleasures of hunting in Cryopaedia. Aristotle (384-322, B.C.) is generally viewed as the father of republican thought. We are accustomed to reading his classic definition of the polis (city-state) as the locus of moral activity and the politics carried on in the state as a form of applied ethics, of "ethics in action." The good state was obliged to distribute justice as its primary function, rendering to each his due by a constant and perpetual will. Plato was Aristotle's mentor and his political opponent in that Aristotle favored a more democratic form of government. Aristotle rejected Plato's transcendental approach, substituting for it an empirical methodology based on observation. Plato had made astute observations on political realities, as we have seen, above, but he constantly returned to the guidance of innate knowledge gained in pre-existence in a "World of Ideas." Typical of Aris totle's observations of practical political events in his description of the disarming of the Athenians by Peisistratus: Winning the battle of Pellenis, he seized the government and disarmed the people; and now he held the tyranny firmly and he took Naxos and appointed Lygdamis ruler. The way in which he disarmed the people was this: he held an armed muster at the Temple of Theses and began to hold an assembly, but he lowered his voice a little, and when they said they could not hear him, he told them to come up to the forecourt of the Acropolis, in order that his voice might better carry, and while he used up time making a speech, the men told off this purpose gathered up the arms . . . . Male citizens are to govern in the best of all forms of government, the Republic, "the members of which are those who bear arms." Those who are not privileged to bear arms will be the servants of those who possess arms. Aristotle described the oligarchy of a warrior class: "The farmers have no arms. The workers have neither arms not land. This makes them servants of those who do possess arms." Aristotle rejected Hippodamus' argument for a city-state based on classes with definite functions, including an arms bearing warrior class. His distinct preference was for a republic in which arms bearing is an attribute of true citizen ship. War would be made in the ideal republic by citizen-soldiers. Aristotle based his principles on observations of political practices in 300 states known in his time. He drew conclusions from realities and became the first political scientist in that he described rather than prescribed based on personal insight and philosophical presuppositions. Much of what he observed was held by men over two millennia to be absolutely true and final. Power was held by those who controlled arms. States seemed to move from distributive arms possession to highly restrictive arms possession as they became more despotic. There was no real challenge to the conclusion being based on cause and effect. Aristotle had made the classic division of governmental types: monarchy, aristocracy and republic. Each pure form of government had its corresponding corrupt form: tyranny, oligarchy and mob rule. One way one might tell a monarchy from tyranny and aristocracy from oligarchy would be that in the good forms, people might keep and bear arms, whereas in the corrupted forms, the state would have a monopoly on arms. Aristotle described the rule of the "30 tyrants" of Athens as being characterized by the disarmament of the general population. Only the 3000 persons who accepted the tyrants could own property of any kind, arms included. The Romans The early Romans based their Republic on the citizen-soldier army. One was not a professional soldier; one was a citizen engaged in normal civilian occupations who served on demand, as a soldier. Arms bearing the citizenship were co-extensive and co-terminus. The decline of the Republic paralleled the emergence of the professional soldier, and, worse, the employment of mercenary soldiers. They left behind very little literature concerning the militia and the citizen-soldier. In the Roman Republic all citizens, patricians and plebeians alike, had the right and the obligation to keep and bear arms. The compiler of much Roman law and philosophy of history, Cicero (106-43, B.C.), argued that states, unlike people, do not naturally die. When a state dies, its entire world and world-view perishes with it. It must survive in order to preserve a way of life in which it has placed its supreme values. In order to continue to live the state must occasionally engage in war. War may licitly be entered only to save honor or for the safety of the state and its citizens. The citizen-army represents the very spirit of the state and it must be the cornerstone of its defense. The republic had been founded on the principle of the citizen-warrior. Arms bearing served two purposes. Citizens bearing arms protected and defended the state against foreign enemies. The militia was also a guarantee against tyranny. As late as c. 50 B.C. Cicero defended assassins whose acts of murder had been done for the good of the state. In 63 B.C. Cicero defended Gauis Rabirius who had killed Lucius Appuleius Santurnius because the latter had conspired with Gaius Marius to replace the arms bearing populace with a standing army. Once a standing army, mercenaries generally, was created the people could be deprived of their arms and denied the arms necessary to preserve a republic. Again, in 53 B.C., Cicero defended a republican colleague accused of the murder of Publius Clodius Pulcher, a disciple of Caesar. Cicero argued that the alleged murderer, Titus Annius Milo, had used justifiable force and had acted in the best interests of the state. His actions were justified under natural law. Cicero's speech in the politically charged atmosphere of this trial is a classic defense of the right to keep and bear arms. And indeed, gentlemen, there exists a law, not written down anywhere but inborn in our hearts; a law which comes to us not by training or custom or reading but by derivation and absorption and adoption from nature itself; a law which has come to us not from theory but from practice, not by instruction but by natural intuition. I refer to the law that lays it down that, if our lives are endangered by plots or violence or armed robbers or enemies, any and every method of protecting ourselves is morally right. When weapons reduce them to silence, the laws no longer expect one to await their pronouncements. For people who decide to wait for these will have to wait for justice, too -- and meanwhile they must suffer injustice first. Indeed, even the wisdom of self-defense, because it does not actually forbid men to kill; what it does, instead, is to forbid the bearing of an inquiry passes beyond the mere question of the weapon and starts to consider the motive, a man who had used arms in self-defense is not regarded as having carried them with a homicidal aim. The court did find Milo guilty, perhaps in part because of the politics of the times, and perhaps in part because of the popular pressures brought to bear (there were riots in the streets of Rome), and perhaps in part because the murder had occurred as a result of a clash between the two rival camps, and there was some real guilt. But Milo was exiled, not executed, perhaps in part because the jury thought that Milo had removed a tyrant. Shortly after Milo's trial, Caesar made his historic crossing of the Rubicon (49 B.C.). This act confirmed Gaius Marius' abolition of the citizen-soldier and the replacement of it with professional mercenaries. Rome became more imperialistic, embarking on wars of conquest which allowed the soldiers to collect booty from the conquered peoples. The wars in Gaul marked the end of the republic for Romans and the end of liberty for many non- Romans who were conquered. Caesar bragged that he had "cut off the hands of all who had borne arms" against him and had slain "a great number of them and stripped all of their arms." The result of the replacement of the citizen-army with a mercenary one was that when the Roman Empire fell, the mercenar ies fled or turned against Rome and there was no one left to mount the ramparts. The sturdy Roman citizens who had defeated Carthage and all opponents over seven hundred years fell quickly to the barbarians. Early Christian Thought Saint Augustine of Hippo (354-430) was the first great synthesizer of Christian thought. In his discussion of the just war, Augustine defined the state as "a multitude of men bound together by some bond of concord." A citizen of the state "may do the duty belonging to his position in the State by fighting by the order of his sovereign" even if the leader is "an ungodly king" and the militiaman is "a righteous man." Augustine followed Cicero in agreeing that "a state should engage in war for the safety which preserves the state." The evil of war is not in killing and dying; rather it is in the change wrought in the hearts of those who come to love war and violence, and who hate their enemies. If Christ had intended to condemn war outright He would have done so. He would have told the soldiers who came to him that he could not earn or merit salvation as long as he bore arms. God Himself may order some men into battle. He may unite his faithful to serve Him in a great war against the Evil One. God had called the Chosen People to war in the Old Testament. He might have cause to do the same again. In that case all of God's people would be called. It would be a heavenly militia that might fight at the Battle of Armageddon on God's side. Regardless of the nature of war, God's saints can never be harmed. The saints are immune to all things of the world. Whether they are the soldiers in a battle or the victims of a war, they cannot be led astray, for they are impelled to God by irresistible grace. After the fall of the Roman Empire, defense against external and internal enemies was provided in the many small kingdoms by a complex arrangement of obligations based on class distinctions. The lower classes provided common arms of the day and were known as the fyrd. Those subject to discipline were the select fyrd, and the untrained masses were known as the great fyrd. Nobles maintained a standing arm of professionals or mercenaries known as houscarls. By 690 A.D. the ceorl, the lowest freemen in England, had been ordered to keep and bear arms as an obligation to the lords to whom they were bound. Arms were to be borne in defense of the state, but there is little evidence that they afforded protection to the commoners. The nobles had, on occasion, used arms to force a king to reduce his powers over the nobility, as in the case of the English Magna Charta. One reason that commoners did not use arms to check tyrannical power may have been the strong influence of church theology and philosophy which widely condemned the assassination of kings. Generally, such medieval thinkers as Saint Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274) and John of Salisbury (1115-1180) condemned regicide and rebellion. Early European Thought Niccolo Machiavelli (1469-1527) returned to Aristotle's principles in constructing much of his public political philosophy. We have discussed Machiavelli more fully elsewhere. His principle that arms bearing was the major proof of the existence of a republic, and that only in the republics were the people at large permitted to arm themselves in peacetime, became the cornerstone of much of republican thought that continued through the American Revolution. We will discuss Machiavelli in more depth shortly. In 1516 Thomas More (1478-1535) published the first great novel depicting a hypothetical land that is unknown, but which, once described, can serve as a model for other lands. He chose as its title Utopia, the Greek word for "nowhere," and such novels ever after were called "utopian." In Book II he devoted a brief section to the war among the Utopians. He wrote, They hate and detest war as a thing manifestly brutal, and yet practiced by man more constantly than by any kind of beast. Contrary to almost all other peoples they consider nothing so inglorious as the glory won in war. Nevertheless, both the men and the women of Utopia regularly practice military exercises on certain days, so that they will be prepared when the need arises. . . . When they promise their resources to help in a war, they furnish money abundatly, but citizens very sparingly. . . . If possible they use only their mercenaries and so avoid sending their own citizens to battle. When this is impossible and they must take part in the fighting themselves, they join battle with a boldness as great as their prudence in avoiding it. Even after the Reformation, revolution was unacceptable in western theology. Martin Luther (1483-1546), for example, condemned the German peasant uprising and apologized for the brutal suppression of that rebellion. Luther told the rebels that not only were they to be tortured to death in this world, they would also be condemned to everlasting hell fire and damnation in the next world. At the beginning of modern thought, many writers were strongly in favor of absolute monarchy. Jean Bodin (1530-1596), who wrote the Six Books of a Commonwealth in 1606, saw sover eign power as unlimited, and advised his followers never to permit the people to keep and bear arms. "Another and most visual way to prevent sedition, is to take away the subjects' arms . . . " A staunch advocate of unlimited power of sovereigns, Thomas Hobbes (1588-1679) wrestled with the problem of the people bearing arms before arriving at a solution which is not either logical or internally consistent. One must always attempt to provide for his own self-preservation, and thus Hobbes was reluctant to disarm the people. Nonetheless, sovereign power, if it is truly sovereign (i.e., unlimited) must allow the king a monopoly on force, meaning, practically, a monopoly on arms. For individuals Hobbes wrote, "A covenant not to defend myself from force, by force, is always voyd." Yet when he discussed the power of the monarchy he wrote, "Covenants, without the Sword, are but Words, and have no strength to secure men at all." "There are two things necessary," Hobbes reasoned, "for the people's defense: to be forewarned and to be forearmed." The enrollment of a militia is a part of being forearmed, "for the listing of soldiers and taking up of arms after the blow is given is too late . . . ." When the people hire the king, having formed a covenant among them, the king is in no way bound by the contract for he is not a partner to the contract. Hobbes always cautioned that the cause of that greatest political evil, civil war, was the king having insufficient sovereign power. Hobbes had no intention of giving the people the right to use their arms to overthrow a king, whether just or unjust. That would be sedition, the great disease in the body politic; and Hobbes acknowledge no right of tyrannicide. The king alone in Hobbes has the right to order the use of, and training in, arms. "[O]ne council or one man, who hath the right to arm, [is] to gather together, to unite so many citizens, in all dangers and on all occasions, as shall be needed for common defence against the certain number and strength of the enemy." The people have bargained away "their whole right of war and peace unto some one man or council." The king can call out his whole body of subjects but "no man can by right compel citizens to take up arms." A king may "punish him that doth not obey" a call to arms. John Milton (1608-1674), whose Tenure of Kings and Magistrates (1649) defended the execution of Charles I (1649), was one of the leading intellectuals of the Puritan community. In his Eikon Milton wrote, "Our trained bands are the trustiest and most proper strength of a free nation." The democratic political philosophers who followed Hobbes and Bodin granted the people the right to arm themselves. John Locke (1632-1794) and James Harrington (1611-1677) saw that democratic governments can exist only when the tyrant is threatened by a people which had the arms to effect revolution in defense of freedom. Locke noted that when people "have given themselves to the absolute power and will of a legislator, they have disarmed themselves, and armed him, to make prey of them when he pleases." James Harrington emphasized general property ownership as a pre-condition for establishing and maintaining republics. He conceived one form of property, arms, to be the primary means by which individuals affirmed their political participation. How they exercised the right to possess arms told us much about their ability to act as responsible moral agents. Bearing arms, simply, symbol ized political independence. Because the landed gentle class had leisure time on its hands it could exercise many attributes of citizenship, including voting and bearing arms. As Harrington wrote, "Men accustomed unto their arms and liberties will never endure the yoke" of tyranny. As one recent article concluded, James Harrington " . . . associated political stability with the armed, enfranchised and propertied citizenry." Property as land was an insufficient proof of citizenship. Arms guaranteed both political and participation and maintenance of other property rights. Like most other English political theorists of his time, Harrington thought that only the citizens' militia could preserve the democratic constitution which they advocated. Algernon Sidney (1622-1683) opposed the policies of Charles II in England, and in 1670 was beheaded for his "treason able" opposition to the arms policies of the monarch. Catholics, favored by the Stuart King, had been armed, and Irish mercenaries were imported to bolster kingly power at the expense of the majoritarian Protestant populace. These Anglicans and other Protestants in communion with the established church had been disarmed. Sidney's protest cost him his life, but that sacrifice added fuel to the fire which eventually led to the Glorious Revolution, and the promulgation of the English Bill of Rights. He was among the several prominent radical Whigs who taught that arms were "the only true badges of liberty." Sidney warned against disarming the people while allowing the legislator to have his powers to "make prey of them when he pleases." In "a popular or mixed Govern- ment, Sidney wrote, "the body of the People is the publick defense, and every man is arm'd and disciplin'd." The militia, however, consisted only "of the same Persons as have Property." John Toland (1670-1722) expanded the importance of the militia as it had been described in the writings of Sidney and Harrington. His The Militia Reform'd (1698) planned to arm the vast body of English freemen who were also property owners. Only such a group as the property owners would be able to discern and serve the public good. This body was Toland's Roman citizenry under arms and the backbone of the Roman Republic. Those who had to work for a living lacked the time to reflect upon the meaning of the public good. The young nobles and gentry of England might make her army the best in the world. In the ancient world, "a general Exercise of the best of their People in the use of Arms was the only Bulwark of their Liberties." Sir Walter Raleigh (1552-1618) also viewed arms bearing as a fundamental right of a free people over and against attempt of government to suppress arms. His "Sophisms of a Tyrant" was written to parody those English monarchs who would violate the natural rights of Englishmen (and all peoples). One principle that a tyrant must always follow is to "unarm his people and store up their weapons." Freemen possess arms, and when we wish to know if a nation is free, we need only examine the distribution of arms. If the people may possess arms we have a republic and if the king has all the arms we have tyranny. Marchamont Nedham (1620-1678), writing in the second half of the Seventeenth Century, held that "responsible citizens, freemen" alone had the right to keep and bear arms. Those "such as had an Interest in the Publick" might be enfranchised with this right. His universe of armed citizenry was smaller than the pool established by democratic writers, but the principle was here reaffirmed. Only freemen bear arms and only those are free who possess the right. The far left of the English Puritan Revolution was well represented by the True Levellers (or "Diggers"), led by Sir Gerard Winstanley (c.1609-c.1660). In their view the citizen-soldiers had rescued England from foreign influences. They drew an analogy between Charles I and William the Conqueror. "And now the Commoners of England in this Age of the World are risen up in an army, and have cast out the Invasion of the Duke of Normandy, and have won their Land and Liberties again by the Sword." One model Puritan government given by John Rushworth (1612-1690) for the Levellers was entitled, "The Agreement of the People." It was presented to Parliament in October 1647 and again, in a slightly revised version, in January 1649. Regarding the popular militia and the restricted use of armed force generally, it proposed, as its eighth point, the following. We do not empower them [Parliament] to impress or constrain any person to serve in a foreign war, either by sea or land, nor for any military service within the kingdom; save that they may take order for the forming, training and exercise of the people in a military way, to be in readiness for resisting foreign invasions, suppressing of sudden insurrections, or for assisting in execution of the laws; and may take order for the employing and conducting of them for those ends . . . . The effectiveness of the English Puritan political philoso phers who advocated a militia in place of a standing army can be seen in the writings of contemporary royalists. In 1647 a group of professional soldiers wrote, "The Case of the army Truly Stated." They argued that the army "took up Arms in judgment and con science for the people's just rights and liberties." But reading the Puritan pamphlets "the people begin to cry louder for disbanding the Army because they see no benefit accruing. . . . The Army is exposed to contempt and scandal, and the most black reproaches, and infamies are cast upon them . . . ." Oliver Cromwell (1599-1658) remained unimpressed and implacable. He preferred a standing regular army to the militia. Article XXVII of his constitution provided for 10,000 horse soldiers and 20,000 infantry to be stationed in the realm. Many of the Puritans were greatly disappointed at this development. The anonymous author of "A True State of the Case of the Common wealth," put forth the most thoughtful and comprehensive defense of Cromwell's constitution. Included was the statement that the army was "the only visible support of the Nation's security" and "the great Impediment in the way of their Monarchy." Andrew Prynne (1600-1669), among others, argued that the Protectorate had erred on occasion. He blamed those errors on the lawyers and the professional military men. Among the mistakes was Cromwell's placing reliance on the army and not a popular militia. Andrew Fletcher (1655-1716), writing in the early years of the next century, observed that, "he that is armed is always the master of the purse of him that is unarmed." Few Europeans had more influence on the development of political theory in American than did Charles-Louis de Secondat, Baron de la Brede et de Montesquieu (1689-1755). Montesquieu was one of Thomas Jefferson's favorite authors. In his best known work, The Spirit of the Laws (1748), Montesquieu observed, [I]t follows that the laws of an Italian republic, where bearing fire-arms is punished as a capital crime and where it is not more fatal to make an ill use of them than to carry them, is not agreeable to the nature of things. Jean Jacques Rousseau (1712-1778) did not accept the traditional view of war, that war is a natural human activity, because war is a social activity and man for him was not a social animal. As humans came together, unnaturally for Rousseau, they made war. The root cause of early wars, before firm states were formed, was the inequality of human possessions. The rich wanted more and the poor wanted something. These wars were, for Rousseau, informal and unorganized mob activities, not infrequently carried on by gangs of bandits. Later unequal states forced the masses of men to war on one another. All citizens in Rousseau's state are torn between law and order in the state and the violence that international disorder brings. Rousseau gave humans no way out of the dilemma. Peace would come only occasionally as a unilateral and temporary measure. The citizen would eternally be required to serve the state at the will and pleasure of his sovereign. During 1745 an anonymously written work, A Plan for Establishing a National Militia in Great Britain, Ireland, and in all the British Dominions of America, appeared on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean. The author strongly advocated the re-enactment of the long dormant militia law and the reinvigoration of the militia. The militia was to be comprised of "all men capable of bearing arms, from the age of eighteen to that of fifty years; except such as may be exempted by law." He urged that all citizen-soldiers be treated with compassion and dignity. "In a right institution of this kind no military tyranny ought to be practised." Noting the traditionally brutal discipline of the armed forces, he urged that "No corporal punishment should be inflicted, but all military discipline encouraged by example and rewards, or enforced by pecuniary fines." He extolled the virtues of a militia, claiming that "nine of the greatest military exploits recorded in history were performed by well trained militia." The militia performed best when "divided into two branches, viz., the superior military composed altogether of men of property, and the subordinate militia of the common people." The propertied classes could form mounted troops while the common folk would serve in the infantry. He urged popular election of officers, and, with Jeffersonian confidence in the people, believed that they would select the best of the numbers to fill these positions. By 1740 the English standing army had been increased in size. The author expressed concern over two practices: mainte nance of the standing New Model Army; and the growing use of hired mercenary troops. The author believed that the revival of a national militia would have a positive effect on national morale and unity. The profession of a soldier, like all other arts, has its craft, pretending that military discipline is to be acquired only by long practice; but general experience vouches the contrary. Innumerable instances from ancient history, and many late examples, prove beyond all contradiction, that the essential parts of discipline may be learned very soon under a right direction. But supposing it is true . . . is there any time more urgent that the present, when we think it necessary to call in foreign assistance [mercenaries] against invasion? Is the safety, the very being, of this great and mighty nation, to depend upon an handful of auxiliaries, and perhaps an untrained rabble when it might become invincible by arming all the people of property? Who are so capable of defending the national wealth as those who have the largest share? . . . Neither riches or populousness are able to give security to a nation untrained to arms. . . . [W]henever they become a distinct body of mercenaries, making the profession of arms the only means of subsistence, their interest is opposite to that of the people in general . . . . [T]heir pay is at best a grievous burthen [burden] upon public industry. The militia in this plan was to train fourteen days a year, a substantial reduction from the thirty days required under feudal law. A militia was especially desirable as the basis of military organiza tion in North America. The author expressed hope that a militia law may extend to every part of the British dominion, where it is practicable; more especially to our Provinces and great cities of North America, situated near a restless, enterprising neighbor [New France], now at enmity, whose interest it is to subdue, by fraud or force, all those countries lying between his dominion and the sea. . . . For preventing therefore such fatal incroachments on the British dominions no means can be so effectual as the establishment of a general militia, well trained to arms in those Provinces, where the governor of each may be invested with the same powers which are exercised by the lords-lieutenants of counties of this Kingdom. On the very eve of the American Revolution, James Burgh (1714-1775) returned to the classic Machiavellian theory. His writings were owned by many prominent American political philosophers, including Thomas Jefferson and John Adams. Burgh contrasted citizen-soldiers and a mercenary army in his Political Disquisitions: There is no end to observations on the difference between the measures likely to be pursued by a minister backed by a standing army and those of a court awed by the fear of an armed people . . . No kingdom can be secured otherwise than by the arming of the people. The possession of arms in the distinction between a freeman and a slave. He who has nothing and who belongs to another must be defended by him whose property he is and needs no arms. . . . A militia consisting of any others than the men of property in a country is no militia, but a mongrel army. . . . If a militia be not upon a right foot . . . the liberty of the people must perish. Matthew Rokeby (1713-1800) had likewise observed the tie colonists had established "all democratical governments where the power is in the hands of the people and where there is not the least difficulty or jealousy about putting arms into the hands of every man in the country." Writing after the war was over, English political commentator Richard Price observed that, "Free States ought to be bodies of armed citizens, well regulated and well disciplined and always ready to turn out . . . Such, if I am rightly informed are the citizens of America . . . hardy yeomen, all nearly on a level, trained to arms and instructed in their rights." In contrast, British citizens who are far less free, have a political system "consisting as it does . . . of unarmed inhabitants and threatened" by tyrannical governors and by foreign enemies. William Blackstone (1723-1780), in his Commentaries on England's laws, written on the very eve of the American Revolu tion, listed the right to bear arms for self defense as an auxiliary right of the individual. Blackstone wrote, The fifth and last auxiliary right of the subject that I shall at present mention is that of having arms for their defense, suitable to their condition and degree, and such as are allowed by law. [It] is indeed a public allowance, with due restrictions, of the natural right of resistance and self-preservation when the sanctions of society and laws are found insufficient to restrain the violence of oppression. In these several articles consist the rights, or, as they are frequently terms, liberties of Englishmen. Algernon Sidney, in writing of the militia, noted that "every man is armed." It would be difficult to read Richard Price without appreciating his perspective on both rights, i.e., of the people to have a militia, and the individual to bear arms. The culmination of the English republican thought was the Bill of Rights. At least one authority believed that the English Bill of Rights conferred the right to bear arms on the individual. American political theory had many European roots. No viable political thought is merely the sum of its sources. Neither is political thought bounded or circumscribed by its antecedents. Few philosophers in any field accept an entire system from past. Philosophers take ideas that they like and use them as they see fit. Alexis de Tocqueville, the French political philosopher, travelled extensively through America and was an honored foreign visitor. He observed, and developed a strong preference for, the militia system of military organization. He liked the democratic organization of the militia which avoided "blind, minute, submissive and invariable obedience" that marred standing armies. He hoped that democracy would always mark our militia system because to allow greater authoritarianism would be to deprive the militia of "its natural advantages." Few Americans owed more to a European precursor than Thomas Jefferson owed to John Locke. Jefferson was very close to Locke in many of his views. Jefferson rejected the residual absolutism in John Lock's thought. Locke was silent on the major points of revolution while Jefferson had no trouble accepting revolution. When Jefferson paraphrased Locke on rights in the Declaration of Independence he chose to alter the examples Locke had given. Locke mentioned, "life, liberty and property" whereas Jefferson noted, "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness." Jefferson took what he liked from Locke and ignored Locke on points where he disagreed with him. Many, but not all, European radical republicans accepted the notion of a citizen-army instead of a standing army as the first line of defense of the state. Some, but not all, radical republicans supported an individual right to keep and bear arms. Apparently, all those who defended the idea of an individual right to keep and bear arms also placed their trust in the militia system, although the reverse is not always true. That some of the Founding Fathers believed in the right of the individual to keep and bear arms has been shown, above. It is certainly not true, and no one has claimed, that all the Founding Fathers supported either the total militia system or the individual right to keep and bear arms. Some American republicans supported the militia system without supporting an individual right to keep and bear arms. Few, especially in the South, would have cared to arm slaves or indentured servants. In time the right to bear arms would become more distributed. Machiavelli Niccolo Machiavelli (1469-1527) was the father of the idea of the citizen-soldier as the best and principal defense of the democratic state against all enemies, foreign or domestic. All western liberal thought respecting the militia as the main defense of the state may be traced back to him. Machiavelli was also the father of political realism. He set down the observations he had made on politics during his years of active participation in the government of Florence. He drew heavily on history to provide examples of points he wished to make. History was a source of valuable lessons if only we chose to find, understand and profit from them. Niccolo Machiavelli was the son of a Florentine lawyer, an educated man of modest means who held a minor post in the government. Niccolo had a common education and proved to be a superior student with a highly perceptive mind. Livy, the Roman historian, was his favorite subject of study. The young Machiavelli embarked on a program of legal studies, but apparently did not complete his law degree. He took little notice of many of the great events of his time, such as the discovery of the New World, or Renaissance arts. Politics and history were his consuming passion, his entire life's study. It is hard to fit Machiavelli into one or two categories. He published and had performed several dramas, one of which had some literary merit. Mandragola is still performed occasionally and remains in print. He was a philosopher with a bent (uncommon to philosophers) for the practical side of things. He was an historian of merit. His History of Florence remains a model of objective history for historians of all ages. It was the first history of merit and notice to have been written in Italian. It banished fables and other embellishments. It provided a smooth flowing narrative instead of just a chronology. Although he borrowed heavily from other authors and made mistakes of fact, the book was the best history written in Italy since Roman times. It argued that mercenary armies had been the shame and ruin of Italy. Paid troops were the result of a slothful people. Machiavelli also produced a treatise on war, L'arte della guerra, in 1520. There he expanded on themes drawn from both The Discourses and The Prince. From his place of retirement he sought to tell the active military commanders, present and future, how to win in battle. In The Art of War he argued that rich states come to enjoy the good life far too much. Their urban populations become soft. The city dwellers lose their martial virtues and the state declines. Too much wealth, as Plato had observed, makes for the easy life and the decay of the military. The farmers are less given over to the life of luxury. As long as they own their land, they will work it hard. Hard work produces sturdy citizens who make sturdy soldiers. Machiavelli's Discourses on Livy's History of Rome were meant to establish principles that are valid for all peoples and all times. He completed his commentaries on only the first three of Livy's history. He wrote as much for as yet incon- ceived republics as for his own times. He did not derive his political philosophy from history. Rather, he used historical incidents to support conclusions at which he had already arrived, largely in his life as a politician. Most of the examples he used in the Discourses were drawn straight from Livy, although we occasionally encounter bits of legend and myth, and an occasional example drawn from Polybius. In the Discourses he argued, as he had in The Prince, that a citizen army was the best check on unrestrained military, and was to him the only effect the citizenry on evil impulses that drove tyrants, and with them nations, toward unjust wars. The real wealth of the state is not found in its supply of precious metals; rather, it is found in a strong citizen-army. "Gold alone will not procure good soldiers, but good soldiers will always procure gold." Machiavelli was also heavily involved in practical politics. In 1498 the Florentine Dieci della Guerra, the Council of Ten for War, appointed Machiavelli to the post of secretary to the Council, a post he held until 1512. In 1507 he persuaded the republican government to adopt a militia system instead of relying on a standing army as its primary military protection. He argued that a mercenary army was the worst of all kinds of standing armies. It could be bribed to change sides. No state dared to rely on merce naries in times of crisis. The soldiers fought only for booty. In times of peace mercenaries became restless and were apt to commit outrages on the local populace. Citizen soldiers should be drawn from among the hardy peasants. These men already endured great hardship and were accustomed to long, hard work days. They fought for principle. Kept in good order and subjected to reasonable discipline, they were the best soldiers. These themes, developed early in his life, he repeated in his Discourses and The Prince after he was retired from politics. In 1508 Machiavelli marched his newly formed militia to victory at Pisa. Sent on a diplomatic mission to France in 1510, Machiavelli visited Switzerland. The Swiss militia appealed to him. He urged that the Florentine militia be ordered along the lines of the Swiss militia. He dreamed of the day when Florence and all the other Italian cities would contribute to a greater Italian militia, just as the Swiss cantons contributed to the national Swiss militia. In 1512, Pope Julius II, angry because Florence had not joined in his crusade against France, ordered the mercenaries of the Holy League to overthrow the Florentine republic and restore rule to the Medici family. This was to be the acid test of the citizen- army. But Fate had not dealt Machiavelli or Florence a winning hand this time. The militia was overwhelmed by the hordes of mercenaries and broke rank and fled before the Pope's superior forces at the Battle of Prato. Florence was defeated and occupied, the republic was crushed and the authoritarian rule of the Medici family was restored. Machiavelli lost his post in the government and his ideas were discredited. Machiavelli was captured, and, with his usual diplomacy, attempted to reconcile with the Medicis. His personal magnetism almost carried the day. Several youthful conspirators were captured and charged with plotting to overthrow the Medicis and reestablish the republic. The Medicis' secret police uncovered a list of supposed supporters and among the names was Niccolo Machiavelli. He was arrested and accused of plotting to restore the Republic, was tortured and fled into exile to the family's villa at San Casciano. Because he was not executed, he was suspect among the under ground republicans. During his last fifteen years of his life he was an outcast, rejected by both republicans and the dictator. It was during that bitter time that he did most of his writing. The militia had been discredited in practice, but Machiavelli continued to defend it in the theory that poured from his pen. Machiavelli wrote The Prince in 1513, during the period in which he had fallen into disfavor in his native Florence. He owned a small property in the hills just outside the city. There he could look over his beloved city to which he dared not return, and whose politics he could never again influence by acts. It was during this period of involuntary retirement that he did most of his writing. Perhaps he could influence the course of Florentine politics through his writing, if only from the grave. Machiavelli thought to purchase his return to Florence. Having little money, he decided to dedicate a book to the Medicis. He began The Discourses, but progress was slow. So he composed a separate book The Prince which actually contains most of the major ideas of the uncompleted Discourses. It took only a few months to turn out The Prince, but the usually decisive Machiavelli vacillated. By the time he decided to send it to the man to whom it was dedicated, Giuliano de' Medici, in 1516, Giuliano had died. Having decided to release the book, Machiavelli then decided not to waste the dedication on a dead man, so he rededicated it, this time to Lorenzo the Magnifi cent, Duke of Urbino. Whether Giuliano, had he lived, would have been moved by this peace offering is problematic; it did not move Lorenzo, who simply ignored its author. The book continued to circulate in manuscript form until it was finally published five years after its author's death. In 1525 Charles V (1519-1556), the Holy Roman Emperor, defeated Francis I (1515-1547) of France. This defeat left Italy open for an attack by Spain and Germany. Florence, as a vassal of Rome, had been an ally of the French, and thus was open to rapine and plunder. Pope Clement VII greatly feared for himself and the Church, and so turned to Machiavelli. In 1526 the Medicis appointed Machiavelli as an inspector of the city's walls. As it was, the German Emperor passed by Florence and sacked the richer prize, Rome. Clement VIII was made prisoner. With his fall, support for the Medici disappeared. The republicans again reigned in Florence. Machiavelli applied for his old post as secretary to the Council of Ten for War, but he was suspect. The denial came on 10 June 1527 and doubtless hastened his death just twelve days later. His modest intention of conveying an understanding of politics as it was, rather how we might wish it to be, was executed so well that he has become the prophet of a new age. He accom plished his mission so thoroughly that he brought the curse of politicians to his doorstep and the enmity of the Roman Catholic Church to his soul. The Holy Father placed all his works on the Roman Index of Forbidden Books, which meant that the faithful could not read them except under penalty of mortal sin. It may be that both church and state did not want commoners reading about what they practiced. In the divided Italy in which Machiavelli lived the greatest need was for political union. Only a strong prince may accomplish that goal. Democracies do not unite a divided nation. That is the function of an heroic figure, a strong prince. He wrote The Prince in order to attract a type-forming hero who would unite the nation. Such men are born, not made. But great men can make great mistakes and The Prince would provide practical experience and guidance to help the king to avoid the main pitfalls of statesmanship. The past is the most reliable guide to the future and this a good king must understand. His lessons are the stories of history. Wise man say, not without reason, that whoever wishes to foresee the future must consult the past; for human events ever resemble those of preceding times. This arises from the fact that they are produced by men who have been, and ever will be, animated by the same passions; and thus they must necessarily have the same results. Nothing was more important, or central to, his political theory than the concept of the citizen-soldier. Successful states of the past had always relied heavily on a citizen-army, rather than on paid soldiers. He wrote extensively on the uses and value of a citizen-army and the militia. It would be difficult to say whether Machiavelli's emphasis on arms bearing by the general populace was given greater position because of the primacy of militia over a standing army or because it was such an important attribute of citizenship. As a recent scholar observed, For Machiavelli, the most dependable protection against corruption was the economic independence of the citizen and his ability and willingness to become a warrior. From this developed a sociology of liberty that rested upon the role of arms in society; political conditions must allow the arming of all citizens; moral conditions must be such that all citizens would willingly fight for the republic; and economic conditions must provide the citizen-soldier a home and occupation outside the army. This theme relating arms and civic virtue, runs throughout Machiavelli, and from it emerged the belief that arms and a fully array of civic rights were inseparable. To deny arms to some men while allowing them to others was an intolerable denial of freedom. Machiavelli's belief [was] that arms were essential of liberty. It was best to have all able-bodied men serve in the militia. There was no advantage to having a smaller number of men in the militia. It was not a true militia unless it drew on all physically and mentally able male citizens. "The smallness of the number does not ever make them better soldiers in a country in which there are plenty of men," Machiavelli wrote, "without a doubt, it is much better to have a large number of them than a small number; indeed, where there is not a great number, it is impossible ever to have a good militia." He rejected the idea of a select militia which was based on religious tests, property or personal valuation, or political orientation. The life and continued existence of the state was of the greatest concern to Machiavelli. If the state was to be defended by a citizen-militia, he had to consider the possibility that the citizens might use these arms against the state. Would its citizens have the potential for using weapons against, as well as for, the state? Would citizen-soldiers provide the best possible defense against both foreign and domestic enemies? He found that, by a considerable margin, the greater danger to the state lay in disarming the citi zenry. It was the armed citizenry which kept republic "free and incorrupt." Machiavelli observed that the maintenance of arms by the general populace had kept Sparta free some 800 year and Rome free for 400 years. His study of history showed that disarmed peoples had lost their liberties in a matter of only a few decades. Civil disturbances among armed populace were few, "for men who are well disciplined will always be as cautious of violating the laws when they have arms in their hands as when they have not." Machiavelli wished to arm the general populace in order to insure that any authoritarian government would not be permanent. After the nation-state is formed there would be precious little use for the prince. The people will then demand their rights as the architects of freedom. If the king continues to deny them their rights they would have the arms they need to successfully revolt. Some rulers had built great fortresses to guard their persons and to protect them more from their people than from foreign enemies. They found that such castles were unable to afford protection from either. Static fortifications are nothing more than monuments to the stupidity of bad rulers. When rulers do not understand the hearts of their people they shut themselves up in fortresses. Rulers must understand that they must be active among their subjects, an impossibility if they seek refuge in their castles. Fortresses may be useful in defense, but only if they are manned by citizen-soldiers. If subjects were tortured and ruined economically, they would nonetheless still obtain arms wherewith to resist the tyrant. If the tyrant should attempt to disarm them, they would obtain arms abroad or manufacture arms clandestinely. The condition of a subjected and despoiled people would give them the will to find weapons and to use them; or to fight bare-handed is necessary. An independent state would necessarily always have an armed force of some sort. An army guarantees a state's independ ence. States as independent sovereign powers exist in a Hobbesian state of nature. Warfare of all states against all other states is the inevitable result. No international law or treaty can possibly maintain the peace. Only a free people, willing to fight for home and king, can protect national sovereignty. A state without an army is a dependency whose politics is controlled by an outside power. Machiavelli assumed that all treaty arrangements were subject to the principle of autolimitation, that is, that treaties are scraps of paper that one can terminate at will. Sincere foreign diplomacy is a contradiction. Sincere and diplomacy are mutually exclusive terms. There is no international power of policeman to enforce treaties so states will use treaties only as long as they serve the national interest. It would not be reasonable for a state to obey an international treaty or law if the principles contained therein conflicted with the best interests of the nation. The question that any state must answer, then, is not whether it would have an armed force, but what kind of force it would be: citizen-warrior or mercenary. Both would have to be deployed at some training during the interludes between foreign wars. After the training was completed, what would be the position of each? The good prince or other governor must always control his military. [The] armed forces must be under the control either of a prince or a republic. A prince must take personal command of his forces; a republic must appoint commanders from among its own citizens. . . . Experience shows that only armed princes and armed republics make notable advances and mercenary troops bring nothing but woes. A republic guarded by its own citizen army is far less apt to be subjugated by one of its own citizens than a republic armed with forces not its own. Citizens who are otherwise traditionally employed need only to be disciplined occasionally. Machiavelli observed that during Rome's glory years, "there was never any soldier who made war his only occupation." He argued that "a good man [would] not make war his only profession" and a wise prince would not permit it in his kingdom. He thought it was appropriate to muster them on various public holidays when they would not ordinarily be preoccu pied in their normal employment. When called upon to fight they would do so willingly and with great fervor for they had their own liberties and property to defend. They fought for principle and national honor and are motivated by only the most noble of desires. They would not run when confronted by a seemingly superior force. They would stand against any and all odds because of the nobility of their cause and the sentiments they held. Mercenaries are employed by real or potential tyrants. They know no occupation other than making war. "Evils are caused by men who make mercenary war fare their sole occupation," Machiavelli wrote, "You must know the proverb: 'War makes thieves and peace hangs them.'" It peacetime they serve abso lutely no useful function in a democratic state. Their very presence foreshadows nothing good. They look for war and love the long war more than the short and the peace as a means to the next war. They hone their skills by exploiting and oppressing the people. They become parasites on the people, sucking out their life blood. They take food and molest the women and seek housing in the homes of the people. A loss by a mercenary or standing army meant only a temporary inconvenience. Indeed, professionals, and especially that portion of them who were pure mercenaries, might be reemployed by an invader as occupation troops or as agents of the invader. They had no principles and were restrained by no moral sentiments. They looked for loot. They were best known for rapine and terrorism. They would look at the native peoples as a source of food, women and booty. As Machiavelli wrote, I say therefore that the armed forces with which a prince defends his position of power are either his own or mercenary troops, auxiliary or composite. Mercenary soldiers and auxiliaries are dangerous and useless; and if the prince bases his state on mercenary troops, he will never be firm nor secure in his position. For these troops are disunited, ambitious, without discipline, and unfaithful. Strong among their friends, among enemies treacherous, they know neither fear of God nor fidelity toward men. The ruin they inevitably bring is deferred only so long as battle is put off. In peace one is despoiled by them as in war he is despoiled by an enemy. The reason for this is clear. They have no other attachment nor any other reason to keep them in the field than a meager pay . . . . When war comes they either flee or desert . . . . [T]he havoc which prevails in Italy today is due to no other cause than the fact that for many years it has relied on mercenary troops. Troops borrowed or rented from another prince or republic are even worse than mercenaries. Machiavelli called these armed men on loan, "auxiliary troops." Of them he wrote, Auxiliary troops, the second of the kinds which we have called useless, are those obtained by appealing to some strong prince for aid . . . . Anyone, consequently, who does not want military victory, should turn to troops of this kind, for they are much more dangerous than even mercenaries. The source of the ruin they bring is this: they constitute a united force, but wholly obedient to others than yourself. . . . [I]t is cowardice which makes mercenary troops dangerous, but their very strength constitutes a peril in auxiliaries. A wise prince, consequently, has always avoided recourse to this kind of troops, relying rather on his own men. If a citizen army were to be defeated the citizens would be disarmed and they would lose their rank and privileges. Their freedom would disappear. They and their families might be enslaved. They would be brutally treated in a way unique to a defeated, occupied nation. If they won their freedom and rights would be secured. A well-governed commonwealth "should take care that this art of war should be practiced in time of peace only as an exercise, and in time of war only out of necessity." Selection of commanders is important. No commander should have too much authority over his men. Commanders should be chosen for their natural leadership qualities. It is preferable that the commanders not come from the same area as their men. It is imperative that commanders have natural leadership characteristics. They must be brave themselves and share the hardships and lifestyle of their soldiers. There must be a clear chain of command. Each soldier and officer must know his charges, rights, duties, responsi bilities and obligations. He must know over whom he has command and from whom he receives his own orders. While discipline was important, Machiavelli did not wish to compel any one to serve in the militia or in wars. His commentary on republican Rome contained the notation that it did not compel its citizens to serve. Julius Caesar destroyed liberty in the republic by creating a professional army which was no longer under the control of the citizenry. Wars of aggression had been checked by the refusal of the citizens to serve in unjust wars. This popular control was lost when the professional army became the mainstay of the nation. Wars of conquest brought masses of slaves from abroad and undermined the economic liberty of the Romans. Loss of political liberty followed the loss of economic liberty. Loss of economic and political liberty was followed by a breakdown of civic virtue and morality. All of this translated to a loss on citizen control over their future. As Machiavelli wrote, If a city be armed and disciplined as Rome was, and all of its citizens alike in their private and official capacity, have a chance to put alike their virtue and the power of fortune to the test of experience, it will be found that always and in all circumstances they will be of the same mind and will maintain their dignity in the same way. But, then they are not familiar with arms and merely trust to the whim of fortune, not to their own virtue, they will change with the changes of fortune. Military activity produces good citizenship. It buttresses religion and family values. Citizen-soldiers acquired a spirit of cooperation and of sense of community. They learn to be loyal, to fear God, and to demand peace and order in the state. They despise civil disorder and social conflict. The decline of civic virtue can be traced to a decline in the militia. Whether true or untrue, Machiavelli claimed that crime was all but unknown when Rome depended upon its militia. No mercenary army can ever capture the virtue of a citizen army. The ancient lawgivers and governors of kingdoms and republics took great care to inspire all their subjects -- but particularly with their soldiers -- with fidelity, love of peace, and fear of God. For who ought to be more faithful than a man entrusted with the safety of his country and sworn to defend it with the last drop of his blood? Who ought to be the founder of peace than those suffering from nothing but war? Who are under greater obligations to worship God than soldiers, daily exposed to innumerable dangers . . . ? A good war, now and then, keeps an army in shape. Even citizen-soldiers who are accustomed to hard work need the diversion war brings on occasion. All armies must flex their martial muscles just to keep fit. Rome was trim and fit so long as there were wars to occupy the peasants. When the gates of the Temple of Mars were closed for prolonged period the martial spirit was lost. Machiavelli believed in strong martial discipline. It should be backed by rigid military law. He drew heavily on the Roman experience. Severe discipline produce hardy soldiers who had a sense of responsibility and of duty. Harsh discipline created respect for the state and its institutions. He preferred to have the militiamen themselves administer discipline. All men in a militia company were to witness punishment. A well drilled and disciplined army was unlikely to retreat, break ranks or disobey orders. There was much to commend in cavalry and in the various specialties, such as artillery, but the real strength of a state was in its infantry. It was the very nerve and foundation of the military establishment. Citizen-soldiers with pikes and bows could negate any advantage that even the best cavalry could offer. Create a strong infantry of citizen-soldiers and the future of the state was secure. Hunting is a useful recreational activity according to Machiavelli. No peacetime activity is as beneficial to the citizen- soldier. Machiavelli tells of the centaur Chiron was the legendary tutor of ancient kings. He learned the art of the hunt from the gods themselves. Hunting is an imitation of war. It demands that the hunter know various strategies to trap and kill wily animals. The hunter must be in excellent physical shape because he practices his art in all kinds of weather and in inhospitable terrain. He learns how to conceal himself and become one with nature. He must master his weapons. History runs in cycles. There is an inevitability factor in history caused not by God or Fate, but by the nature of humankind. As Machiavelli wrote, Valor produces peace; peace, repose; repose, disorder; disorder ruin. From disorder, order springs; from order, valor; and from this, glory and good fortune. Hence, wise men have observed that the age of literary excellence is subsequent to that of distinction in arms; and that . . . great warriors are produced before philosophers. Machiavelli did not advocate an utopian society devoid of socio-political distinctions. Class distinctions existed and class membership would be determined according to the classes of weapons which the individuals possessed. This had been the case in republican Rome. Those denied arms possession would, in effect, be classless persons, without evidence of class standing or citizenship. Those who were denied ownership of, and access to, arms would be dependent on those who were armed. It seems that Machiavelli did not anticipate that anyone would literally have to use his arms to force his way into ranked citizenship; rather, Machiavelli assumed that the fact that one was able to possess arms was proof positive that one had arrived at full citizenship status in one or another class in the republic. This was to become a recur rent theme in libertarian and classical liberal political theory, especially during the English Puritan Protectorate. The theme became a part of the Anti-federalist thought in the United States.