Guy Smith wrote:
This may be a bit off topic, but studying current militia disputes may be
informative to those interested in American militias past and present.
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,158882,00.html
President Jalal Talabani's backing of the Shiite Badr Brigade militia came
despite accusations by Sunni leaders that the militia has killed members of
the minority. The Sunni leaders have demanded that it be disarmed and
complained that it provides intelligence and support for some
Shiite-dominated special security units.
The Badr Brigade was the military wing of the country's largest Shiite
political party, the Supreme Council of the Islamic Republic in Iraq.
{GS: Were their any militias in the US that were partisan, or tied to
sects? }
There are no accurate figures on the size of the brigade, but it is thought
to be smaller than the Kurdish Peshmerga militia, estimated at 100,000. The
Peshmerga has been largely exempted from efforts to disband militias because
of its close ties to the United States and its supporting role during the
war.
-----------------
Guy Smith
Author, Gun Facts
www.GunFacts.info
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
The example that comes to mind is when the Massachusetts militia was
getting ready to go off to fight
the Pequot War--they refused to leave until the chaplain was replaced
with one that wasn't associated
with Anne Hutchinson's "Antinomian" heresy. Of course, within a few
more months, all of the heretics
were disarmed as threats to public safety, and most were expelled from
the colony.
Jews were excluded from militia duty in Dutch New York, and there are
some attempts to restrict
Catholics from militia duty in a couple of colonies--but it didn't come
to much. I have a collection of
religiously-based arms laws that touch on this slightly at
http://www.claytoncramer.com/primary.html#RaceGunControlStatutes.
Clayton E. Cramer
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
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