Guns then helped the new nation spread west to the Pacific Ocean (subduing and decimating entire civilisations along the way, but that’s a whole other debate).

‘Very sad’: Trump turns on FBI over school shooting after criticism from survivors

While novel ideas about equality and governance derived from the Enlightenment established the template for America, unfettered access to firearms helped make the project happen.

Throughout this history and until the present day, many Americans feel strongly that they need guns as a measure of protection against anyone, be they lawmakers, bureaucrats or trespassers, who might seek to infringe on their rights.

So American lawmakers trying to restrict that access in the wake of the latest gun massacre have a difficult hill to climb.

“I’m going to be a professional school gunman.” That was the comment left on a YouTube video last year under the name Nikolas Cruz. This, together with violent and disturbing social media posts by the accused, should have prompted law enforcement to close in on him sooner, many pundits have declared.

Given this response so far, and the likely inaction on gun control, efforts to protect schools and communities from gun violence will probably turn to more surveillance of what Americans say or post online.

And this is where the course of action by the government may become very ironic.

We all sometimes make dramatic statements for effect. How often have we said we wanted to “kill” someone or something that has enraged us? How often have we followed through?

Everyone will need to think twice about using any language that can be construed as a credible threat.

So the inaction we can expect from lawmakers on keeping guns away from the mentally unstable will lead to greater restrictions on what the rest of the country’s citizens can say.

Just the sort of thing that gun rights supporters would be up in arms about.

Robert Delaney is a US correspondent for the Post based in New York