Rev. John D. Buttrick writes from his Vermont Folk Rocker in his Concord home, Minds Crossing. He can be reached at johndbuttrick@gmail.com.

It’s time to have the talk – that is, the talk about carrying firearms in public places.

In February, House Bill 352 was defeated in the New Hampshire legislature. It would have banned carrying firearms at all polling places in the state. The National Rifle Association supported the rejection of that proposed ban, citing the over 200-year-old Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.

Invoking the Second Amendment, however, takes the debate quickly into the weeds. It misdirects the discussion away from practical questions including: Who are the good people that may carry the firearms? How are they “well regulated,” as required by the Second Amendment? Which procedures are to be used to separate out “the violent criminals?” Who among those “good people” have the power and authority to build those procedures? How many gun-owners lack training, perceive dangerous enemies where they may or may not be and seek to enforce their particular political beliefs with their firearms? Would their intimidating presence make polling places safer?

The composers of the amendments to the Constitution were deep into a debate over the choice between forming a standing government army or preparing for a state-regulated militia. The final text of the Second Amendment favored a militia over a standing army. They believed a standing professional army would lead to a force that could limit or take away the freedom of citizens. A militia included the obligation of all citizens to come together as a militia, if and when necessary for the security of all citizens. They were farmers, craftsmen and merchants called together only when the state was threatened.

In this way, the possession of firearms by citizens was a duty to be fulfilled if there was a need to defend the whole community. However, the reality of forming a militia was short lived. A professional army was deemed necessary in conflicts that occurred away from citizens’ home town and state. Nonprofessionals did not have the ability nor the will to win a war on foreign soil.

Without a prepared militia, the reason for the possession of firearms became moot. Therefore, there needed to be other reasons to support the determination to continue the personal possession of firearms. In his book “One Nation Under Guns,” Dominic Erodozain explains that the possession of firearms became a necessity to control slaves. Slavery could not exist without the threat of deadly force. Over time, the enforcers, slave owners, learned to depend upon bullying and brutality to control their slaves.

However, as they became more comfortable with the use of such force, some became domestic abusers and the culture of dueling with pistols grew as a way to solve disputes with a neighbor. Firearms became an instrument to assert individual judgment rather than be guided by “well regulated” laws and social norms for community security. The line between “good people” and dangerous people has become blurred.

The slave culture may be mostly in the past, but individuals still claim the right to judge others and the groups to which they belong, asserting prejudice against immigrants, people of color, people of different genders and people of different cultures. The right to bear arms has become self-centered and self-serving, resulting in disrespect and degradation of the rule of law.

Our nation and state need to take seriously their obligation to the Second Amendment concept of “well regulated.” Without a well regulated militia, it has fallen upon the federal and states governments to regulate firearm possession for the safety of its citizens. The founders of our country were worried about the potential abuses of a standing army. Today, our state and national governments need to worry about millions of individuals waving firearms in all directions to assert their own safety while jeopardizing the democracy of the people for the people.

New Hampshire needs to take on the responsibility of assuring a well regulated election process. Our legislators must have the courage to declare that individuals with the coercive force of firearms at polling places will not be allowed. There is no place for the perception of intimidation during a free and fair democratic election.