The Most Consequential Comma in U.S. History?

Editor’s Note: This article previously appeared in a different format as part of The Atlantic’s Notes section, retired in 2021.

A reader, Jack Parker, makes an interesting case:

Regardless of one’s position on gun -ownership rights and the consequences of those rights, there is one singular problem with the Second Amendment: It is grammatically incorrect and, as a result, nonsensical.

1. 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.

1. 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.

Elsewhere in misplaced commas of great historical consequence, check out this Priceonomics post. Money quote:

In 1872, one misplaced comma in a tariff law cost American taxpayers more than $2 million, or $38,350,000 in today’s dollars.

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