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Home > Gun Control and the Constitution: Should History Be Decisive?

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Gun Control and the Constitution: Should History Be Decisive?

February 8, 2013

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9. United States v. Miller, 307 U.S. 816 (1939), addressing 26 U.S.C. §5811 (1934).

10. 354 U.S. at 628, describing "the inherent right of self-defense" as "central to the Second Amendment right."

11. 554 U.S. at 592 (emphasis in original).

12. Enacted into law by Parliament as a clause in the English Bill of Rights. 1 W.&M., sess. 2, c. 2, spelling and punctuation as in 2 Eng. Stat. at Large 1554-55 (1706). The Declaration of Rights was approved by the Convention that convened beginning Jan. 22, 1689. The Convention became a valid parliament as of Feb. 12, 1689, when William and Mary acceded to the throne, and it thereafter ratified the Declaration of Rights. See Note 19 infra.

13. 554 U.S. at 664.

14. J. Rakove, Original Meanings: Politics and Ideas in the Making of the Constitution at xiii (1996).

15. See, e.g., R. Menaker, A History of England's Arms Control Laws to 1870, Dissertation, University of Oxford (1972).

16. 2 Cnut, c. 80 (c. 1027), in 1 F. Liebermaan (ed.), Gesetze der Angelsachsen 366 (1898); 2 Edw. III, c. 3 (1328); 25 Hen. VIII, c. 17 (1534); 33 Hen. VIII, c. 6 (1542); 2 Acts & Ords. Interregnum 124, 196, 399, 1293, 1297, 1311, 1453 (1649-60).

17. 14 Car. II, st. 1, c. 6 (1662). The quoted language is a paraphrase of the act that appears in 2 R. Burn, The Justice of the Peace and Parish Officer 383 (1756). For the Game Act, see 22 & 23 Car. II, c. 25 (1671). For disarmed population, see J. Western, The English Militia in the Eighteenth Century 71 (1965). In view of this background, the assertion in J. Malcolm, To Keep and Bear Arms, 78, 123 (1996) (relied on in Heller), that English law incorporated a "tradition that everyone was entitled to firearms for personal defence" is polemic, not history.

18. See generally G. Scott Thompson, Lords Lieutenants in the Sixteenth Century (1923); 13 Edw. I, c. 1. (1285), repealed in 1624, 21 Jac. I, c. 28, although posse duty continued into the 18th century. 4 W. Blackstone, Commentaries 122 (1765).

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  • Arms Control Laws
  • Second Circuit
  • Seventh Circuit
  • Cry for Arms
  • Acts & Ords
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  • Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History
  • Menaker & Herrmann
  • US District Court
  • Columbia University
  • House of Lords
  • Oxford University
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