Regarding Kenneth A. Hubel’s Feb. 20 letter on the Second Amendment (“Amendment was made to protect government.”)

During ratification of the Constitution, the fear of several states was that they would be “taken over” by a powerful central government. And these were not just southern states. The Second Amendment does guarantee states the means to deter and forcibly resist the imposition of a strong tyrannical federal government on the freedoms of the people (read “states” in the language of the day). The Civil War imposed the might of a federal government over the sovereignty and freedom of the states (and their people). Gun control is one more step in the process. It is about control. Gun control and gun registration was used by Hitler to confiscate privately owned guns and render the people powerless to oppose his dictatorship.

Richard Pohorsky

Cedar Rapids