The Founders' Second Amendment
Page 51
CHAPTER 15
1. Mary Haldane Coleman, St. George Tucker: Citizen of No Mean City (Richmond, Va.: The Dietz Press, 1938), 127.
2. See Stephen P. Halbrook, “St. George Tucker: The American Blackstone,” Virginia Bar News, 32, at 45–50 (February 1984).
3. Coleman, St. George Tucker, 35, 48–58.
4. “Biography of the Judges,” 4 Virginia Reports (4 Call.) xxviii (1827).
5. William Blackstone, Commentaries, St. George Tucker ed. (Philadelphia: William Young Birch and Abraham Small, 1803), vol. 1, at 143 n.40.
6. Ibid., App. 300.
7. See Stephen P. Halbrook, That Every Man Be Armed: The Evolution of a Constitutional Right (Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1984; reprinted, Oakland, Calif.: Independent Institute, 1994, 2000), 51–53.
8. Blackstone, Commentaries, vol. 1, App. 357.
9. Ibid., vol. 1, at 289.
10. Ibid., vol. 1, at 315–16.
11. Ibid., vol. 5, App. n.B, at 19.
12. Jonathan Elliot ed., Debates on the Adoption of the Federal Constitution in the Convention Held at Philadelphia ... Vol. V. Supplementary to Elliot’s Debates (Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott, 1845), 203–05.
13. Documentary History of the Ratification of the Constitution, John P. Kaminski and Gas pare J. Saladino eds. (Madison: State Historical Society of Wisconsin, 1995), vol. 18, at 127.
14. The Law Practice of Alexander Hamilton, Julius L. Goebel Jr. ed. (New York: Columbia University Press, 1964), vol. 1, at 831.
15. Merrill Lindsay, “Pistols Shed Light on Famed Duel,” Smithsonian, at 94 (November 1976). See also Joseph J. Ellis, Founding Brothers (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2000), 37.
16. Adams to James Lloyd, February 17, 1815, in The Works of John Adams, Second President of the United States (Boston: Little, Brown, & Co., 1856), vol. 10, at 124.
17. To William Branch Giles, April 20, 1807, in Thomas Jefferson, Writings (New York: Library of America, 1984), 1175.
18. Federal Gazette, June 18, 1789, at 2, col. 1.
19. See Stephen P. Halbrook and David B. Kopel, “Tench Coxe and the Right to Keep and Bear Arms, 1787–1823,” 7 William & Mary Bill of Rights Journal (February 1999), 347.
20. Democratic Press (Philadelphia), January 23, 1823, at 2, col. 2.
21. Sherman [Coxe’s pen name], “To the People of the United Stares,” no. IX, apparently published in the Democratic Press or in the Philadelphia Sentinel and Mercantile Advertiser in 1823, or possibly 1824. Papers of Tench Coxe in the Coxe Family Papers at the Historical Society of Pennsylvania (microfilm; Philadelphia: Historical Society of Pennsylvania, 1977), Reel 113, at 716.
22. Ibid., at 717.
23. William H. Sumner, An Inquiry into the Importance of the Militia to a Free Commonwealth in a Letter ... To John Adams ... With His Answer (Boston: Cummings & Hilliard, 1823), 21.
24. Ibid., 39–40.
25. Ibid., 69–70.
26. Timothy Dwight, Travels in New England and New York (New Haven, Conn.: Timothy Dwight, 1821), vol. 1, at 17.
27. Ibid.
28. The Writings of Thomas Jefferson, Paul Leicester Ford ed. (New York: G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 1892–99), vol. 7, at 84.
29. For photographs and derailed descriptions, see Ashley Halsey, Jr., “George Washington’s Favorite Guns,” American Rifleman (February 1968), 23.
30. Benjamin Ogle Tayloe, Our Neighbors on LaFayette Square: Anecdotes and Reminiscences (Washington, D.C.: Library of American Institute of Architects, 1872), 47.
31. The rifle is now at the Frazier Historical Arms Museum, Louisville, Kentucky. Sheldon S. Shafer, “Historic gun finds a home,” Courier-Journal, February 16, 2004.
32. Copies of the Wills of General George Washington... and Other Interesting Records of the County of Fairfax, Virginia (publisher nor identified), 20.
33. Eugene E. Prussing, The Estate of George Washington, Deceased (Boston: Little, Brown, & Co., 1927), 416, 418, 486, 441.
34. George Morgan, The True Patrick Henry (Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincon, 1907), 464.
35. Jefferson, Writings, 505.
36. Thomas Jefferson to ?, 1803, in The Writings of Thomas Jefferson, Andrew A. Lipscomb and Albert Ellery Bergh eds. (Washington, D.C.: Millenium Edition, 20 vols., 1903–4). vol. 10, ar 365.
37. Jefferson, Writings, 547.
38. Thomas Jefferson to Jacob J. Brown, 1808, Lipscomb and Bergh eds., The Writings of Thomas Jefferson, vol. 11, ar 432.
39. “Memoirs of a Monticello Slave as dictated to Charles Campbell by Issac,” in Jefferson at Monticello, James A. Bear, Jr. ed. (Charlonesville: University Press of Virginia, 1967), 17–18.
40. See “Firearms” in Index and referenced text in Jefferson’s Memorandum Books, James A. Bear, Jr., & Lucia C. Stanton eds. (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1997), 1550. See also Ashley Halsey, Jr., “Jefferson’s Beloved Guns,” American Rifleman (November 1969), 17.
41. Halsey, “Jefferson’s Beloved Guns,” 17, 18.
42. Jefferson, Writings, 1246.
43. Jefferson to Peter Minor, July 20, 1822, quoted by former Monticello archivist James A. Bear, Jr., “Guns, Exercise, and Hunting” (Charlonesville, Monticello, n.d. mimeograph), at 3.
44. Jefferson, Writings, 1491–92.
45. Ibid., 1493–94.
46. See will and codicil in The Writings of Thomas Jeffirson, Andrew A. Lipscomb ed. (Washington, D.C.: Thomas Jefferson Memorial Association, 1905), vol. 19, unpaginated facsimile. The inventories and appraisals of Jefferson’s estates included Monticello and the Campbell County Tufton and Lego farms. The originals are in the Albemarle County Will Books referenced as follows: 8:281–83, 9:1–2, 9:20–22.
47. Robert A. Rutland, James Madison: The Founding Father (New York: Macmillan, 1987), 251.
48. Madison, “James Madison’s Autobiography,” 2 William & Mary Quarterly, (1945), 191, 208.
CHAPTER 16
1. See Jack N. Rakove, The Second Amendment: The Highest Stage of Originalism, 76 Chi.–Kent L. Rev., 103, 119–20 n.38 (2000).
2. U.S. Constitution, Art. I, § 8.
3. U.S. Constitution, Art. I, § 2.
4. Noah Webster, A Compendious Dictionary of the English Language (New Haven, Conn.: Sidney’s Press, 1806), 220.
5. Noah Webster, On Being American: Selected Writings, 1783–1828, Homer D. Babbidge, Jr. ed. (New York: Frederick A. Praeger, 1967), 166.
6. Noah Webster, An American Dictionary of the English Language (New York: S. Converse, 1828) (“people,” 3).
7. Ibid., (“right,” 10).
8. Ibid., (“keep”).
9. Ibid., (“keep,” 18).
10. Documentary History of the Ratification of the Constitution, John P. Kaminski and Gaspare J. Saladino eds. (Madison: State Historical Society of Wisconsin, 2000), vol. 6, at 1453.
11. St. George Tucker, A Dissertation on Slavery (Philadelphia: Matthew Carey Pub., 1796), 20.
12. Digest of the Laws of the State of Georgia, Horatio Marbury and William A. Crawford eds. (Savannah: Seymour, Woolhopter, and Stebbins, 1802), 263. Cf. Garry Wills, A Necessary Evil: A History of the American Distrust of Government (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1999), 258–59 (arguing that to “keep” arms meant to hold them in a communal military arsenal).
13. Webster, An American Dictionary of the English Language (“bear,” 2 and 3).
14. § 1 and 4, Militia Act, in Chapter 33, Statutes at Large, vol. 1, at 271, 272 (May 8, 1792).
15. Garry Wills, “To Keep and Bear Arms,” New York Review of Books, 42, 14 (September 21, 1995).
16. See Webster, An American Dictionary of the English Language, defining “coat” in part as: “An upper garment, of whatever material it may be made.... That on which ensigns armorial are portrayed; usually called a coat of arms.”
17. While “bearing arms” may mean in some contexts “bearing coats of arms,” bearing arms “in a coat” is not one of those contexts. The College of Arms refers to knights being �
��recognised by the arms they bore on their shields” and to “bear[ing] arms” on a military expedition. See http://www.college-of-arms.gov.uk/About/12.htm#c (accessed December 15, 2007).
18. Webster, An American Dictionary of the English Language (“pistol”).
19. George C. Neumann, A History of Weapons of the American Revolution (New York: Bonanza Books, 1967), 151.
20. Tucker, A Dissertation on Slavery, 93.
21. Michael C. Dorf, What Does the Second Amendment Mean Today?, 76 Chi.–Kent L. Rev. 291, 317 (2000).
22. Webster, An American Dictionary of the English Language (“arms,” 1).
23. Ibid. (“arms,” 4).
24. Ibid. (“arms,” end).
25. Ibid. (“gun”).
26. Noah Webster, An Examination of the Leading Principles of the Federal Constitution (Philadelphia: Prichard & Hall, 1787), 43.
27. Webster, An American Dictionary of the English Language.
28. Wilfrid E. Rumble, “James Madison on the Value of Bills of Rights,” Constitutionalism: Nomos XX, J. Roland Pennock and John W. Chapman eds. (New York: New York University Press, 1979), 122, 137.
29. Virginia Declaration of Rights (1776), XIII.
30. Webster, An American Dictionary of the English Language (“militia”).
31. Ibid. (“regulated”).
32. Ibid. (“necessary,” 1).
33. Ibid. (“security,” 1).
34. Ibid. (“free”).
35. Ibid. (“state”).
36. William Blackstone, Commentaries, St. George Tucker ed. (Philadelphia: William Young Birch and Abraham Small, 1803), vol. 4, at 151–52.
37. The Papers of James Madison, Robert A. Rutland et al. eds. (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1973), vol. 8, at 298–99.
38. Earl of Middlesex, A Treaties concerning the Militia (London: J. Millan, 1752), 13.
39. The syllogism is symbolized as follows:
The above is explained in any standard logic text. E.g., Robert J. Fogelin, Understanding Arguments: An Introduction to Informal Logic (New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1978), 132.
40. See Fogelin, Understanding Arguments, 132. The fallacy of denying the antecedent is symbolized as follows:
41. U.S. Constitution, Art. I, § 8.
42. Cf. Nelson Lund, A Primer on the Constitutional Right to Keep and Bear Arms (Potomac Falls: Virginia Institute for Public Policy, 2002), no. 7, at 6.
43. See U.S. Constitution, Art. I, § 8 (“the Congress shall have power”); Art. II, § 1 (“the executive power”); Art. III, § I (“the judicial power”).
44. Webster, An American Dictionary of the English Language (“power,” 11).
45. U.S. Constitution, Art. I, § 8, cls. 12 and 13.
46. Ibid., Art. I, § 10, cl. 3.
47. Blackstone, Commentaries, Tucker ed., vol. 1, at App. 308.
A Note on the Author
STEPHEN P. HALBROOK received his Ph.D. in Philosophy from Florida State University and J.D. from Georgetown University Law Center. An attorney in Fairfax, Virginia, he has argued constitutional law cases in the Supreme Court, and is a research fellow with the Independent Institute. His books include That Every Man Be Armed: The Evolution of a Constitutional Right; Freedmen, the Fourteenth Amendment, and the Right to Bear Arms, 1866-1876; A Right to Bear Arms: State and Federal Bills of Rights and Constitutional Guarantees; Firearms Law Deskbook: Federal and State Criminal Practice; The Swiss and the Nazis: How the Alpine Republic Survived in the Shadow of the Third Reich; and Target Switzerland: Swiss Armed Neutrality in World War II (also in German, French, Italian, and Polish). See also www.stephenhalbrook.com.
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