I hope, therefore, a bill of rights will be formed to guard the people against the Federal government as they are already guarded against their State governments, in most instances."
Thomas Jefferson to James Madison, 1788
"Laws that forbid the carrying of arms disarm only those who are neither inclined nor determined to commit crimes. Such laws make things worse for the assaulted and better for the assailants; they serve rather to encourage than to prevent homicides, for an unarmed man may be attacked with greater confidence than an armed man."
Thomas Jefferson
"Honor, justice, and humanity, forbid us tamely to surrender that freedom which we received from our gallant ancestors, and which our innocent posterity have a right to receive from us. We cannot endure the infamy and guilt of resigning succeeding generations to that wretchedness which inevitably awaits them if we basely entail hereditary bondage on them."
Thomas Jefferson (Declaration of the Causes and Necessities of Taking up Arms, 6 July 1775)
"Every citizen should be a soldier. This was the case with the Greeks and Romans, and must be that of every free state."
Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826), US Founding Father, drafted the Declaration of Independence, 3rd US President
"The constitutions of most of our states (and of the United States) assert that all power is inherent in the people; that they may exercise it by themselves; that it is their right and duty to be at all times armed; that they are entitled to freedom of person, freedom of religion, freedom of property and freedom of the press."
Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826), US Founding Father, drafted the Declaration of Independence, 3rd US President
Source a letter from Thomas Jefferson to John Cartwright in 1824
"One loves to possess arms, though they hope never to have occasion for them."
Thomas Jefferson Letter to George Washington, 1796
"No free man shall ever be debarred the use of arms."
Thomas Jefferson, Proposed Virginia Constitution, 1776
"For a people who are free, and who mean to remain so, a well organized and armed militia is their best security."
Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826), US Founding Father, drafted the Declaration of Independence, 3rd US President. Source: Eighth Annual Message, November 8, 1808
"None but an armed nation can dispense with a standing army. To keep ours armed and disciplined is therefore at all times important."
Thomas Jefferson 1803
"When governments fear the people, there is liberty. When the people fear the government, there is tyranny. The strongest reason for the people to retain the right to keep and bear arms is, as a last resort, to protect themselves against tyranny in government."
Thomas Jefferson (attributed without source)
"A strong body makes the mind strong. As to the species of exercise, I advise the gun. While this gives moderate exercise to the body, it gives boldness, enterprise and independence to the mind. Games played with the ball and others of that nature are too violent for the body and stamp no character on the mind. Let your gun therefore be the constant companion of your walks."
Thomas Jefferson's advice to his 15 year-old nephew Peter Carr 1785
"God forbid we should ever be twenty years without such a rebellion.... And what country can preserve its liberties, if its rulers are not warned from time to time, that this people preserve the spirit of resistance? Let them take arms.... The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants. It is its natural manure."
Thomas Jefferson, letter to William Stephens Smith, November 13, 1787; The Works of Thomas Jefferson, Federal Edition (New York and London, G.P. Putnams Sons, 1904-5) Vol. 5
"Among the natural rights of the colonists are these: first, a right to life, secondly to liberty, thirdly to property; together with the right to defend them in the best manner they can."
Samuel Adams
"...It is always dangerous to the liberties of the people to have an army stationed among them, over which they have no control...The Militia is composed of free Citizens. There is therefore no danger of their making use of their power to the destruction of their own Rights, or suffering others to invade them."
Samuel Adams
(Note that a militia controlled by a State for the State's benefit is just a form of army.)
"The said Constitution [shall] be never construed to authorize Congress to infringe the just liberty of the press, or the rights of conscience; or to prevent the people of the United States, who are peaceable citizens, from keeping their own arms."
Samuel Adams of Massachusetts -- U.S. Constitution ratification convention, 1788
"Besides the advantage of being armed, which the Americans possess over the people of almost every other nation... Notwithstanding the military establishments in the several kingdoms of Europe, which are carried as far as the public resources will bear, the governments are afraid to trust the people with arms."
James Madison, Federalist Papers, #46 at 243-244.
"The highest number to which, according to the best computation, a standing army can be carried in any country, does not exceed one hundredth part of the whole number of souls; or one twenty-fifth part of the number able to bear arms. This proportion would not yield, in the United States, an army of more than twenty-five or thirty thousand men. To these would be opposed a militia amounting to near half a million of citizens with arms in their hands, officered by men chosen from among themselves, fighting for their common liberties, and united and conducted by governments possessing their affections and confidence. It may well be doubted, whether a militia thus circumstanced could ever be conquered by such a proportion of regular troops."
James Madison, The Federalist Number 46 January 29, 1788
"Besides the advantage of being armed, which the Americans possess over the people of almost every other nation, the existence of subordinate governments, to which the people are attached and by which the militia officers are appointed, forms a barrier against the enterprises of ambition, more insurmountable than any which a simple government of any form can admit of."
James Madison, The Federalist No. 48, February 1, 1788
"The right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed; a well armed, and well regulated militia being the best security of a free country: but no person religiously scrupulous of bearing arms, shall be compelled to render military service in person."
James Madison, Proposed Amendments to the Constitution June 8, 1789
"Suppose that we let a regular army, fully equal to the resources of the country, be formed; and let it be entirely at the devotion of the federal: still it would not be going to far to say that the State governments with the people at their side would be able to repel the danger...half a million citizens with arms in their hands"
James Madison, The Federalist Papers
"A well regulated militia, composed of the body of the people, trained to arms, is the best and most natural defense of a free country."
James Madison (1751-1836), Father of the Constitution for the USA, 4th US President
"A people armed and free forms a barrier against the enterprises of ambition and is a bulwark for the nation against foreign invasion and domestic oppression."
James Madison (1751-1836), Father of the Constitution for the USA, 4th US President
"A government resting on the minority is an aristocracy, not a republic, and could not be safe with a numerical and physical force against it, without a standing army, an enslaved press and a disarmed populace."
James Madison (1751-1836), Father of the Constitution for the USA, 4th US President
Source: The Federalist No. 46.
"[Tyranny cannot be safe] without a standing army, an enslaved press, and a disarmed populace."
James Madison, In his autobiography
"To suppose arms in the hands of citizens, to be used at individual discretion, except in private self-defense, or by partial orders of towns, counties, or districts of a state, is to demolish every constitution, and lay the laws prostrate, so that
liberty can be enjoyed by no man; it is a dissolution of the government. The fundamental law of the militia is, that it be created, directed, and commanded by the laws, and ever for the support of the laws."
John Adams (1735-1826) Founding Father, 2nd US President A Defense of the Constitution of Government of the United States of America, 1788
"Resistance to sudden violence, for the preservation not only of my person, my limbs and life, but of my property, is an indisputable right of nature which I have never surrendered to the public by the compact of society, and which perhaps, I could not surrender if I would. Nor is there anything in the common law of England ... inconsistent with that right."
John Adams(1735-1826) Founding Father, 2nd US President
Source: BOSTON GAZETTE, September 5, 1763, The Works of John Adams, p.438 (Charles F. Adams ed., 1851).
"There is danger from all men. The only maxim of a free government ought to be to trust no man living with power to endanger the public liberty."
John Adams (1735-1826) Founding Father, 2nd US President
"If the representatives of the people betray their constituents, there is no recourse left but in the exertion of that original right of self-defense which is paramount to all positive forms of government."
Alexander Hamilton Federalist #28
"Let us recollect that peace or war will not always be left to our option; that however moderate or unambitious we may be, we cannot count upon the moderation, or hope to extinguish the ambition of others. ...The best we can hope for concerning the people at large is that they be properly armed."
Alexander Hamilton (1757-1804) Source: the Federalist Papers at 184-8
"...but if circumstances should at any time oblige the government to form an army of any magnitude, that army can never be formidable to the liberties of the people, while there is a large body of citizens, little if at all inferior to them in discipline and use of arms, who stand ready to defend their rights..."
Alexander Hamilton Federalist 29
"The project of disciplining all the militia of the United States is as futile as it would be injurious if it were capable of being carried into execution. A tolerable expertness in military movements is a business that requires time and practice. It is not a day, nor a week nor even a month, that will suffice for the attainment of it. To oblige the great body of the yeomanry and of the other classes of the citizens to be under arms for the purpose of going through military exercises and evolutions, as often as might be necessary to acquire the degree of perfection which would entitle them to the character of a well regulated militia, would be a real grievance to the people and a serious public inconvenience and loss."
Alexander Hamilton Federalist #29Webmaster's Note: This quote by Hamilton sheds some much needed light on the term 'Well-Regulated' mentioned in the 2nd Amendment. It does not mean what it does today, such as regulation through restrictive legislative activity. It meant at the time that something would be working as it should, properly calibrated and in good order.
"... of the liberty of conscience in matters of religious faith, of speech and of the press; of the trial by jury of the vicinage in civil and criminal cases; of the benefit of the writ of habeas corpus; of the right to keep and bear arms.... If these rights are well defined, and secured against encroachment, it is impossible that government should ever degenerate into tyranny."
James Monroe (1758-1831), 5th US President
"The right of self-defense never ceases. It is among the most sacred, and alike necessary to nations and to individuals."
President James Monroe (November 16, 1818)
"A free people ought not only to be armed but disciplined; to which end a uniform and well digested plan is requisite: And their safety and interest require that they should promote such manufactories, as tend to render them independent on others, for essential, particularly for military supplies."
President George Washington First Annual Message to Congress January 8, 1790
"To each of my Nephews, William Augustine Washington, George Lewis, George Steptoe Washington, Bushrod Washington, and Samuel Washington, I give one of my swords or Cutteaux of which I may be Possessed; and they are to choose in the order they are named. These Swords are accompanied with an injunction not to unsheathe them for the purpose of shedding blood, except it be for self defense, or in the defense of their Country and its rights; and in the latter case, to keep them unsheathed, and prefer falling with them in their hands, to the relinquishment thereof."
George Washington from his Last Will and Testament
George Mason (1725-1792) Statesman, Founding Father, Patriot and known as the "Father of the Bill of Rights"
"And we do each of us, for ourselves respectively, promise and engage to keep a good firelock in proper order, and to furnish ourselves as soon as possible with, and always keep by us, one pound of gunpowder, four pounds of lead, one dozen gunflints, and a pair of bullet moulds, with a cartouch box, or powder horn, and bag for balls."
George Mason's Fairfax County Militia Plan, 1775
"That a well-regulated militia, composed of the body of the people, trained to arms, is the proper, natural and safe defense of a free state; that standing armies, in time of peace, should be avoided as dangerous to liberty; and that, in all cases, the military should be under strict subordination to, and governed by, the civil power."
Virginia Declaration of Rights 13 (June 12, 1776), drafted by George Mason
"I ask sir, what is the militia? It is the whole body of the people except for a few public officials. To disarm the people is the best and most effectual way to enslave them..."
George Mason (1725-1792), drafted the Virginia Declaration of Rights, ally of James Madison and George Washington
"That all men are by nature equally free and independent, and have certain inherent rights, of which, when they enter into a state of society, they cannot by any compact deprive or divest their posterity; namely, the enjoyment of life and liberty, with the means of acquiring and possessing property, and pursuing and obtaining happiness and safety."
George Mason (1725-1792), Virginia Declaration of Rights, 1776
"That the people have a Right to mass and to bear arms; that a well regulated militia composed of the Body of the people, trained to arms, is the proper natural and safe defense of a free State..."
George Mason (1725-1792), drafted the Virginia Declaration of Rights, ally of James Madison and George Washington
Source: Within Mason's declaration of "the essential and unalienable Rights of the People," -- drafted by Thomas Jefferson, George Mason and others, and later adopted by the Virginia ratification convention, 1788
"Government is, or ought to be, instituted for the common benefit and security of the people, nation or community; whenever any government shall be found inadequate or contrary to these purposes, a majority of the community hath an indubitable, unalienable, indefeasible right, to reform, alter, or abolish it, in such manner as shall be judged most conducive to the public Weal."
George Mason (1725-1792), drafted the Virginia Declaration of Rights, ally of James Madison and George Washington
"[W]hen the resolution of enslaving America was formed in Great Britain, the British Parliament was advised by an artful man, who was governor of Pennsylvania, to disarm the people; that it was the best and most effectual way to enslave them; but that they should not do it openly, but weaken them, and let them sink gradually, by totally disusing and neglecting the militia."
George Mason (1725-1792), drafted the Virginia Declaration of Rights, ally of James Madison and George Washington
Source: from debates during the Virginia state ratifying convention (June 14, 1788), quoted in Elliots Debates
"... as all history informs us, there has been in every State & Kingdom a constant kind of warfare between the governing & governed: the one striving to obtain more for its support, and the other to pay less. And this has alone occasioned great convulsions, actual civil wars, ending either in dethroning of the Princes, or enslaving of the people. Generally indeed the ruling power carries its point, the revenues of princes constantly increasing, and we see that they are never satisfied, but always in want of more. The more the people are discontented with the oppression of taxes; the greater need the prince has of money to distribute among his partisans and pay the troops that are to suppress all resistance, and enable him to plunder at pleasure. There is scarce a king in a hundred who would not, if he could, follow the example of Pharaoh, get first all the peoples money, then all their lands, and then make them and their children servants for ever ..."
Benjamin Franklin, before the Constitutional Convention, (June 2, 1787)
"Guard with jealous attention the public liberty. Suspect everyone who approaches that jewel. Unfortunately, nothing will preserve it but downright force. When you give up that force, you are ruined."
Patrick Henry (1736-1799), Virginia's U.S. Constitution Ratification Convention
"Have we the means of resisting disciplined armies, when our only defense, the militia is put in the hands of Congress?"
Patrick Henry (1736-1799), 3 Elliot Debates 48.
"They tell us that we are weakunable to cope with so formidable an adversary. But when shall we be stronger? Will it be when we are totally disarmed, and when a British guard shall be stationed in every house? Three million people, armed in the holy cause of liberty, are invincible by any force which our enemy can send against us."
Patrick Henry (1736-1799), 1775
Webmaster's Note: It is interesting to note that the population in 1775, was approximately 2.9 million. In Patrick Henry's above quotation, he refers to ALL THE PEOPLE, and NOT just those meeting the qualifications of service in the Militia.
"The great object is that every man be armed. Everyone who is able may have a gun."
Patrick Henry
"O sir, we should have fine times, indeed, if, to punish tyrants, it were only sufficient to assemble the people! Your arms, wherewith you could defend yourselves, are gone... Did you ever read of any revolution in a nation... inflicted by those who had no power at all?"
Patrick Henry, Elliot p. 3:50-53, in Virginia Ratifying Convention
"Are we at least brought to such a humiliating and debasing degradation, that we cannot be trusted with arms for our own defense? Where is the difference between having our arms in our possession and under our own direction, and having them under the management of Congress? If our defense be the real object of having those arms, in whose hands can they be trusted with more propriety, or equal safety to us, as in our own hands?"
Patrick Henry, 3 Elliot Debates 168-169.
"Another source of power in government is a military force. But this, to be efficient, must be superior to any force that exists among the people, or which they can command; for otherwise this force would be annihilated, on the first exercise of acts of oppression. Before a standing army can rule, the people must be disarmed; as they are in almost every kingdom in Europe. The supreme power in America cannot enforce unjust laws by the sword; because the whole body of the people are armed, and constitute a force superior to any band of regular troops that can be, on any pretense, raised in the United States. A military force, at the command of Congress, can execute no laws, but such as the people perceive to be just and constitutional; for they will possess the power, and jealousy will instantly inspire the inclination, to resist the execution of a law which appears to them unjust and oppressive."
Noah Webster (1758-1843) American patriot and scholar, author of the 1806 edition of the dictionary that bears his name, the first dictionary of American English usage.
Defined the militia similarly as "the effective part of the people at large."
Source: An Examination of the Leading Principles of the Federal Constitution, Philadelphia, 1787
"As civil rulers, not having their duty to the people duly before them, may attempt to tyrannize, and as the military forces which must be occasionally raised to defend our country, might pervert their power to the injury of their fellow citizens, the people are confirmed by the next article in their right to keep and bear their private arms."
Tench Coxe (1755-1824), writing as "A Pennsylvanian," in "Remarks On The First Part Of The Amendments To The Federal Constitution," in the _Philadelphia Federal Gazette,_ June 18, 1789, p.2 col.1
"The power of the sword, say the minority of Pennsylvania, is in the hands of Congress. My friends and countrymen, it is not so, for the powers of the sword are in the hands of the yeomanry of America from 16 to 60. The militia of these free commonwealths, entitled and accustomed to their arms, when compared with any possible army, must be tremendous and irresistible. Who are the militia? Are they not ourselves? It is feared, then, that we shall turn our arms each man against his own bosom? Congress has no power to disarm the militia. Their swords, and every other terrible implement of the soldier, are the birthright of an American. The unlimited power of the sword is not in the hands of either the federal or state governments, but where I trust in God it will ever remain, in the hands of the people."
Tench Coxe (1755-1824), writing as "the Pennsylvanian" in the Philadelphia Federal Gazette, February 20, 1788
"Every free man has a right to the use of the press, so he has to the use of his arms."
Tench Coxe (1755-1824)
"The militia, who are in fact the effective part of the people at large, will render many troops quite unnecessary. They will form a powerful check upon the regular troops, and will generally be sufficient to over-awe them"
Tench Coxe (1755-1824), An American Citizen IV, October 21, 1787
"The supposed quietude of a good man allures the ruffian; while on the other hand, arms like laws, discourage and keep the invader and the plunderer in awe, and preserve order in the world as well as property. The same balance would be preserved were all the world destitute of arms, for all would be alike; but since some will not, others dare not lay them aside... Horrid mischief would ensue were one half the world deprived of the use of them..."
Thomas Paine (1737-1809)
Source: I Writings of Thomas Paine at 56, 1894
"...[A]rms discourage and keep the invader and plunderer in awe, and preserve order in the world as well as property...Horrid mischief would ensue were the law-abiding deprived of the use of them."
Thomas Paine (1737-1809), Thoughts On Defensive War, 1775
"The balance of power is the scale of peace. The same balance would be preserved were all the world not destitute of arms, for all would be alike; but since some will not, others dare not lay them aside ... Horrid mischief would ensue were one half the world deprived of the use of them ... the weak will become prey to the strong."
Thomas Paine (1737-1809)
"...if a thief breaks into my house, burns and destroys my property, and kills or threatens to kill me, or those that are in it, and to 'bind me in all cases whatsoever' to his absolute will, am I to suffer it?"
Thomas Paine (1737-1809)
"I am thus far a Quaker, that I would gladly argue with all the world to lay aside the use of arms and settle matters by negotiation, but unless the whole will, the matter ends, and I take up my musket and thank Heaven He has put it in my power."
Thomas Paine (1737-1809)
Source: Writings of Thomas Paine at 56 (M. Conway ed. 1894)
"Whenever governments mean to invade the rights and liberties of the people, they always attempt to destroy the militia, in order to raise an army upon their ruins."
Rep. Elbridge Gerry of Massachusetts Debate, U.S. House of Representatives, August 17, 1789; spoken during floor debate over the Second Amendment, I Annals of Congress at 750
"I ask what is the purpose of the militia? To offset the need of large standing armies, the bane of liberty."
Rep. Elbridge Gerry of Massachusetts Debate, U.S. House of Representatives, August 17, 1789; spoken during floor debate over the Second Amendment, I Annals of Congress at 750
"Self defense is a primary law of nature, which no subsequent law of society can abolish; the immediate gift of the Creator, obliges everyone
to resist the first approaches of tyranny."
Elbridge Gerry (1744-1814) 5th Vice President under Madison, Massachusetts Governor, U.S. House Rep and U.S. Senator. (Probably one of the most important men you've never heard of)
"Such are a well regulated militia, composed of the freeholders, citizen and husbandman, who take up arms to preserve their property, as individuals, and their rights as freemen."
"M.T. Cicero" 1788
"The right of self-defense is the first law of nature; in most governments it has been the study of rulers to confine this right within the narrowest limits possible. Wherever standing armies are kept up, and when the right of the people to keep and bear arms is, under any color or pretext whatsoever, prohibited, liberty, if not already annihilated, is on the brink of destruction."
Blackstone's 1768 "Commentaries on the Laws of England"
"And, lastly, to vindicate these rights, when actually violated and attacked, the subjects of England are entitled, in the first place, to the regular administration and free course of justice in the courts of law; next to the right of petitioning the king and parliament for redress of grievances; and, lastly, to the right of having and using arms for self preservation and defense."
Sir William Blackstone (1723-1780)
Source: Commentaries on the Laws of England (Clarendon Press: Oxford, 17th edition, 1966, Vol. 1., Chap.1).
"The congress of the United States possesses no power to regulate, or interfere with the domestic concerns, or police of any state: it belongs not to them to establish any rules respecting the rights of property; nor will the constitution permit any prohibition of arms to the people."
Saint George Tucker (1752-1827) Lawyer, Judge and Professor On Blackstone's Commentaries (1803), Volume 1, Appendix, Note D
"This [Second Amendment] may be considered as the true palladium of liberty.... The right of self defence is the first law of nature: in most governments it has been the study of rulers to confine this right within the narrowest limits possible. Wherever standing armies are kept up, and the right of the people to keep and bear arms is, under any colour or pretext whatsoever, prohibited, liberty, if not already annihilated, is on the brink of destruction. In England, the people have been disarmed, generally, under the specious pretext of preserving the game: a never failing lure to bring over the landed aristocracy to support any measure, under that mask, though calculated for very different purposes. True it is, their bill of rights seems at first view to counteract this policy: but the right of bearing arms is confined to protestants, and the words suitable to their condition and degree, have been interpreted to authorise the prohibition of keeping a gun or other engine for the destruction of game, to any farmer, or inferior tradesman, or other person not qualified to kill game. So that not one man in five hundred can keep a gun in his house without being subject to a penalty."
Saint George Tucker, Blackstone's Commentaries (1803), Volume 1, Appendix, Note D [Section 12: Restraints on Powers of Congress.]
"The right of a citizen to keep and bear arms has justly been considered the palladium of the liberties of the republic, since it offers a strong moral check against the usurpation and arbitrary power of rulers, and will generally, even if these are successful in the first instance, enable the people to resist and triumph over them."
Joseph Story (1779-1845) U.S. Supreme Court Justice 1811-1845. His Dad was one of the Sons of Liberty who took part in the Boston Tea Party and fought at Lexington & Concord in 1775. The above quote was from 1833
"No man can well doubt the propriety of placing a president of the United States under the most solemn obligations to preserve, protect, and defend the constitution."
Joseph Story (1779-1845) U.S. Supreme Court Justice 1811-1845. His Dad was one of the Sons of Liberty who took part in the Boston Tea Party and fought at Lexington & Concord
"The importance of this article [the Second Amendment] will scarcely be doubted by any persons, who have duly reflected upon the subject. The militia is the natural defence of a free country against sudden foreign invasions, domestic insurrections, and domestic usurpations of power by rulers."
Joseph Story (1779-1845) U.S. Supreme Court Justice, appointed by James Madison in 1811
"The whole of the Bill [of Rights] is a declaration of the right of the people at large or considered as individuals... It establishes some rights of the individual as unalienable and which consequently, no majority has a right to deprive them of."
Albert Gallatin (1761-1849) Congressman, Treasury Secretary, House Majority Leader, quote from Oct 7, 1789
"The danger (where there is any) from armed citizens, is only to the 'government', not to 'society'; and as long as they have nothing to revenge in the government (which they cannot have while it is in their own hands) there are many advantages in their being accustomed to the use of arms, and no possible disadvantage."
Joel Barlow, Advice to the Privileged Orders, 1792-93
"A man with a sword in his hand demands my purse in the high-way, when perhaps I have not twelve pence in my pocket: this man I may lawfully kill."
John Locke (1632-1704) English philosopher and political theorist. Considered the ideological progenitor of the American Revolution and who, by far, was the most often non-biblical writer quoted by the Founding Fathers of the USA.
Source: "An Essay Concerning the True Original Extent and End of Civil Government", Chapter 18 "Of Tyranny", #207, originally published in England, 1690
"[W]henever the Legislators endeavor to take away, and destroy the Property of the People, or to reduce them to Slavery under Arbitrary Power, they put themselves into a state of War with the People, who are thereupon absolved from
any farther Obedience, and are left to the common Refuge, which God hath provided for all Men, against Force and Violence. Whensoever therefore the Legislative shall transgress this fundamental Rule of Society; and either by
Ambition, Fear, Folly or Corruption, endeavor to grasp themselves, or put into the hands of any other an Absolute Power over the Lives, Liberties, and Estates of the People; By this breach of Trust they forfeit the Power, the People had
put into their hands, for quite contrary ends, and it devolves to the people, who have a Right to resume their original Liberty and, by the Establishment of a new Legislative (such as they shall think fit) provide for their own Safety and Security, which is the end for which they are in Society."
John Locke (1632-1704) Second Treatise of Civil Government [1690], #222 (Lasslet Edition, Cambridge University Press, 1960), p. 460-461; French translation by David Mazel (1691): Traité de gouvernement civil (Paris: Garnier-Flammarion, 1984), pp. 348-349
"The rights of conscience, of bearing arms, of changing the government, are declared to be inherent in the people."
Fisher Ames (1758-1808), U.S. House Rep of Massachusetts Letter to F.R. Minoe, June 12, 1789
"The right of the people to keep and bear arms has been recognized by the General Government; but the best security of that right after all is, the military spirit, that taste for martial exercises, which has always distinguished the free citizens of these States....Such men form the best barrier to the liberties of America"
Gazette of the United States October 14, 1789
"To preserve liberty it is essential that the whole body of the people always possess arms, and be taught alike, especially when young, how to use them..."
Richard Henry Lee (1732-1794), Additional Letters From The Federal Farmer, 1788
"No free government was ever founded, or ever preserved its liberty, without uniting the characters of the citizen and soldier in those destined for the defense of the state...such area well-regulated militia, composed of the freeholders, citizen and husbandman, who take up arms to preserve their property, as individuals, and their rights as freemen."
Richard Henry Lee (1732-1894), State Gazette (Charleston), September 8, 1788
"The constitution ought to secure a genuine militia and guard against a select militia. ....all regulations tending to render this general militia useless and defenseless, by establishing select corps of militia, or distinct bodies of military men, not having permanent interests and attachments to the community ought to be avoided."
Richard Henry Lee (1732-1794)
False is the idea of utility that sacrifices a thousand real advantages for one imaginary or trifling inconvenience; that would take fire from men because it burns, and water because one may drown in it; that has no remedy for evils, except destruction. The laws that forbid the carrying of arms are laws of such a nature. They disarm those only who are neither inclined nor determined to commit crimes. Can it be supposed that those who have the courage to violate the most sacred laws of humanity, the most important of the code, will respect the less important and arbitrary ones, which can be violated with ease and impunity, and which, if so dear to the enlightened legislator and subject innocent persons to all the vexations that the guilty alone ought to suffer? Such laws make things worse for the assaulted and better for the assailants; they serve rather to encourage than to prevent homicides, for an unarmed man may be attacked with greater confidence than an armed man. They ought to be designated as laws not preventive but fearful of crimes, produced by the tumultuous impression of a few isolated facts, and not by thoughtful consideration of the inconveniences and advantages of a universal decree.
Cesare Beccaria (1735-1794) [Bonesana, Marchese di] Italian nobleman, criminologist, and penal reformer
Source: Dei delitti e delle pene, [On Crimes and Punishments] ch.38 (1764)
Translation is as quoted by Thomas Jefferson in his _Commonplace Book_, 314 (G. Chinard ed. 1926), which was "the source book and repertory of Jefferson's ideas on government." Id. at 4.
"Instances of the licentious and outrageous behavior of the military conservators of the peace still multiply upon us, some of which are of such nature and have been carried to so great lengths as must serve fully to evince that a late vote of this town, calling upon the inhabitants to provide themselves with arms for their defense, was a measure as prudent as it was legal. It is a natural right which the people have reserved to themselves, confirmed by the [English] Bill of Rights, to keep arms for their own defense, and as Mr. Blackstone observes it is to be made use of when the sanctions of society and law are found insufficient to restrain the violence of oppression."
From "A Journal of the Times", calling the citizens of Boston to arm themselves in response to British abuses of power, 1769
"No free government was ever founded or ever preserved its liberty, without uniting the characters of the citizen and soldier in those destined for the defense of the state.... Such are a well regulated militia, composed of the freeholders, citizen and husbandman, who take up arms to preserve their property, as individuals, and their rights as freemen."
State Gazette (Charleston), September 8, 1788
"It's the misfortune of all Countries, that they sometimes lie under a unhappy necessity to defend themselves by Arms against the ambition of their Governors, and to fight for what's their own. If those in government are heedless of reason, the people must patiently submit to Bondage, or stand upon their own Defence; which if they are enabled to do, they shall never be put upon it, but their Swords may grow rusty in their hands; for that Nation is surest to live in Peace, that is most capable of making War; and a Man that hath a Sword by his side, shall have least occasion to make use of it."
John Trenchard (1662-1723)
Source: and Walter Moyle (1672-1721), "An Argument, shewing; that a standing Army is Inconsistent with a Free Government and Absolutely Destructive to the Constitution of the English Monarchy," (London, 1697)
"Those, who have the command of the arms in a country are masters of the state, and have it in their power to make what revolutions they please. [Thus,] there is no end to observations on the difference between the measures likely to be pursued by a minister backed by a standing army, and those of a court awed by the fear of an armed people."
John Trenchard (1662-1723)
Source: and Walter Moyle (1672-1721), "An Argument, shewing; that a standing Army is Inconsistent with a Free Government and Absolutely Destructive to the Constitution of the English Monarchy," (London, 1697)
"Under every government the dernier [Fr. last, or final] resort of the people, is an appeal to the sword; whether to defend themselves against the open attacks of a foreign enemy, or to check the insidious encroachments of domestic foes. Whenever a people... entrust the defence of their country to a regular, standing army, composed of mercenaries, the power of that country will remain under the direction of the most wealthy citizens."
A Framer Anonymous 'framer' of the US Constitution Source: Independent Gazetteer, January 29, 1791
"No kingdom can be secured otherwise than by arming the people. The possession of arms is the distinction between a freeman and a slave. He, who has nothing, and who himself belongs to another, must be defended by him, whose property he is, and needs no arms. But he, who thinks he is his own master, and has what he can call his own, ought to have arms to defend himself, and what he possesses; else he lives precariously, and at discretion."
James Burgh (1714-1775) was an English Whig politician
Source: "Political Disquisitions: Or, an Enquiry into Public Errors, Defects, and Abuses" (London, 1774-1775)
"The people are not to be disarmed of their weapons. They are left in full possession of them."
Zachariah Johnson Source: June 25, 1788, Virginia Constitutional Ratification Convention. Debates in the Several State Conventions on the Adoption of the Federal
Constitution, Jonathan Elliot, ed., v.3 p.646 (Philadelphia, 1836)
"The prohibition is general. No clause in the Constitution could by any rule of construction be conceived to give to congress a power to disarm the people. Such a flagitious attempt could only be made under some general pretence by a state legislature. But if in any blind pursuit of inordinate power, either should attempt it, this amendment (Second Amendment) may be appealed to as a restraint on both."
William Rawle (1759-1836) American Lawyer Mr. Rawle had been asked several times by George Washington to serve as United States Attorney General
Source: commenting on the Second Amendment, A VIEW OF THE CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES 125-26, 1829 (2nd ed.) reprinted in THE FOUNDERS CONSTITUTION Volume Five (Amendments I-XII) p. 214 (Univ. of Chicago Press).
"For we may not think ever to keep that people in subjection which hath always lived in liberty, if they be not disarmed."
Jean Bodin (1530-1596) French Jurist and Political Philosopher, in Six Books of a Commonweale, 1606 AD (R. Knolles translation, pg. 615, 1606)
"Some princes, so as to hold securely the state, have disarmed their subjects.... But when you disarm them, you commence to offend them and show that you distrust them either through cowardice or lack of confidence, and both of these opinions generate hatred against you. And because the government cannot remain unarmed, it follows that the government turns to hired police. Therefore a wise prince has always distributed arms to the general population."
Nicolo Machiavelli (1469-1527) Philosopher, Politician and Writer, The Prince, Chapter 20 (L. Ricci translation, pg. 105, 1952)
"The possession of arms is the distinction between a freeman and a slave. He who has nothing, and belongs to another, must be defended by him, and needs no arms: but he who thinks he is his own master, and has anything he may call his own, ought to have arms to defend himself and what he possesses, or else he lives precariously and at discretion. And though for a while those who have the sword in their power abstain from doing him injury; yet, by degrees, he will be awed into submission to every arbitrary command. Our ancestors, by being always armed, and frequently in action, defended themselves against the Romans, Danes and English; and maintained their liberty against encroachments of their own princes."
Andrew Fletcher (1653-1716) Scottish Writer and Politician in A Discourse of Government with Relation to Militias in Political Works 6, 1749 AD (London, 1798, pg. 221)
"Self-defense is a part of the law of nature; nor can it be denied the community, even against the king himself."
William Barclay (1546-1608, Scottish jurist)