Abstract
This chapter argues that every constitutional order must aim to restrain political violence. The colonial Framers bequeathed a mythic structure for that task: the people acting directly by virtue of the militia are checked and balanced by those who are indirectly acting through the Congress. Americans today do not embrace this same mythic structure, and have replaced it with myths that do not properly serve the purpose of restraining political violence. These myths fruitlessly pit one segment of the population against another in the hope that if the right people have the guns, all will be well. But if the population is fragmented and filled with hate, no amount of tinkering with the distribution of guns will be enough to solve the problem. This crisis shows that the original myth holds no relevance, and that the present myth fails to perform the tasks entrusted to it.
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