Your Civil Rights Shouldn't Depend on Your Address or Your Judge

The American tradition of home gunsmithing was not specifically codified in the Constitution.

Perhaps it should have been.

I understand why the Founders left it out. They were practical men, of course, chock-full of

common sense. They knew Americans couldn’t fully enjoy their newfound right to keep and bear arms without the ability to build and maintain firearms in their homes, so why add unnecessary verbiage to a document that was already running a bit long.

Unfortunately, the Founders had no idea how their brilliant composition would be misused,

misquoted and misinterpreted a couple centuries later, by prosecutors, judges and politicians

whom they would have tarred, feathered and run out of town on a rail.

I had never built a firearm in my home or anywhere else until last year, when 80% Arms offered

to send me two GST-9 pistol kits. They were looking for someone with zero gunsmithing

experience—I certainly qualified—to build the pistols and chronicle the experience.