NRA’s VanDerStock Brief

August 21, 2024

Of the eleven amicus briefs filed yesterday at the Supreme Court in Garland v. VanDerStok, I’d like to highlight the NRA’s. Joseph Greenlee expands on his previous work to explain how the right to privately build firearms is “deeply rooted in our nation’s historical tradition” and is a necessary part of the Second Amendment.

We digital gunsmiths could say: “But of course.” But this an argument Cooper & Kirk may have been too shy to make! The NRA, and Mr. Greenlee, deserve real credit and thanks here, and I will certainly renew my membership.

An Historical Supplement

After cases like Rahimi, some say the golden age of Bruen is now past. Two short years! So I’m glad Greenlee’s work has the chance to become authority. While it’s on my mind, and because I’ve only had one other chance to fight for the historical tradition of firearms manufacturing technologies in court, I’d like to supplement Greenlee’s work, which often relies on Sawyer’s Firearms in American History vol’s 1 and 2.

I agree with Sawyer’s general divisions of this history into 1) American colonial riflemaking, including the birth of the Kentucky Rifle, 2) the work of Simeon North and John Hall as contractors for the federal armories, and 3) Samuel Colt’s development and production of the patent revolver. And this gets us to the 1850’s, where Bruen asks us to go. But Sawyer’s work shares the style (and accuracy) of 19th century history, and there is a stronger and more interesting story to be told.

In Chapter 1 of David Hounshell’s From the American System to Mass Production, 1800-1932, we find a commanding and well-sourced account of the origin and mechanization of American small arms production. Some historical points of entry:

1. The 1765 Gribeauval system and the efforts of Honore Blanc to standardize French weapons and parts (The “Military Enlightenment” is an entire study unto itself).
2. Thomas Jefferson, minister to France, introduces the system to John Jay in a 1785 letter. After French Revolution of 1789, Jefferson tries to remove Honore Blanc to the U.S to continue his work for the War Department.
3. Jefferson’s letters to Secretary Knox and the creation of the War Department policy of a “system of uniformity,” reflected in government arms contracts.
4. Simeon North and a vocal Eli Whitney, as private contractors, secure government contracts in 1798 requiring interchangeable musket parts.
5. Whitney stages 1801 demonstration of “interchangeable” musket lock components before Adams and Jefferson in Washington. Jefferson writes to Governor Madison of Virginia fully endorsing machine production of American arms.
6. Simeon North builds the very first milling machine in 1816 as a private contractor under the American system.
7. John Hall of Harper’s Ferry refines milling and machining techniques as a private contractor in the system.
8. Milling machines and so-called “armory practice” spread freely from Springfield Armory and Harper’s Ferry to New England manufactories.
9. Viral adoption of this technology in clock making, sewing machines, bicycles.

It’s no exaggeration to say the story of the private manufacture of firearms with machine tools = the story of American mass production, and this is why I find the California (and now Massachusetts) CNC laws backwards and worth fighting by any means. There would be no CNC without the American tradition of privately made firearms.

For details about Simeon North, Thomas Blanchard and John Hall’s work, I recommend Charles R. Morris’ The Dawn of Innovation.

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