Parse This: Glaring Clarity in the 2nd Amendment

I always find it entertaining when people try to make this one right a collective right. The Founding Fathers saw fit to put quill to parchment for a list of individual rights, all limiting the government, except this one, right in the middle of it all, to make a collective right. Rather than people trying to decipher the grammar (which is actually different in the multiple Declarations written) they should read the writings of our Founding Fathers to see what they meant. If people would read the letters of Washington, Adams, Jefferson, etc., they would know exactly what our Founders meant by "A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed".

Wow, that's a lot of grammatical gymnastics to try and make a bad point. Let's try something right quick.

A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state.

The right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.

Which of those two statements stands on its own? If you said the second, you probably did better on the verbal section of the SAT than the fool who wrote this birdcage lining of an article. The entire first clause of the 2nd Amendment is subordinate, it establishes a justification but is not the prime part of the amendment. Put another way, if the 1st Amendment read 'A free press being necessary to an informed public, Congress shall pass no law restricting the freedom of the press', you wouldn't be citing the first part as a way of trying to shut down the free press. While we're at it, since the author brings up the Founders and history, what other amendment within the Bill of Rights requires membership, beyond US citizenship, to apply? And where else in the Constitution does the phrase 'the People' mean anything but? Last but not least, was the Federal or state governments handing out weapons or were militia members expected to bear their own arms?

Have any other native English speakers found that they no longer understood English after their first High School English Class?