Quote from PiggyBank:
Not sure about that. I'm not trying to say I think its a good idea for individuals to be armed with wmd's or anything, but where is your evidence that there were any restrictions on what individuals could or couldn't own at the time. pspr posted a good article in another thread which I just skimmed and it seems that the author has supporting evidence that private citizens owned, or had access to, the most sophisticated weaponry of the time.
Any military organization is regulated as to the firearms it has. Ergo, given the Congress regulates the militia, it can regulate which firearms can and can't be owned.
The First Amendment has no qualifying clause in it but speech is still regulated: in most places you'd need a permit to hold a demonstration, for instance. You can buy a gun with less regulation than what it takes to hold a demonstration.