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28  NEW YORK STATE RIFLE & PISTOL ASSN., INC. v. BRUEN 

Opinion of the Court 

obviously cannot overcome or alter that text.”  Heller, 670 
F. 3d, at 1274, n. 6 (Kavanaugh, J., dissenting); see also Es-
pinoza  v.  Montana  Dept.  of  Revenue,  591  U. S.  ___,  ___ 
(2020) (slip op., at 15). 

As we recognized in Heller itself, because post-Civil War 
discussions of the right to keep and bear arms “took place
75  years  after  the  ratification  of  the  Second  Amendment,
they do not provide as much insight into its original mean-
ing as earlier sources.”  554 U. S., at 614; cf. Sprint Com-
munications Co., 554 U. S., at 312 (ROBERTS, C. J., dissenting) 
(“The belated innovations of the mid- to late-19th-century
courts come too late to provide insight into the meaning of 
[the Constitution in 1787]”).  And we made clear in Gamble 
that Heller’s interest in mid- to late-19th-century commen-
tary was secondary.  Heller considered this evidence “only 
after surveying what it regarded  as a wealth of authority 
for  its  reading—including  the  text  of  the  Second  Amend-
ment  and  state  constitutions.”  Gamble,  587  U. S.,  at  ___ 
(majority  opinion)  (slip  op.,  at  23).  In  other  words,  this 
19th-century evidence was “treated as mere confirmation of 
what  the  Court  thought  had  already  been  established.” 
Ibid. 

A final word on historical method: Strictly speaking, New 
York is bound to respect the right to keep and bear arms
because  of  the  Fourteenth  Amendment,  not  the  Second. 
See,  e.g.,  Barron  ex rel.  Tiernan  v.  Mayor  of  Baltimore,  7 
Pet. 243, 250–251 (1833) (Bill of Rights applies only to the 
Federal  Government).  Nonetheless,  we  have  made  clear 
that individual rights enumerated in the Bill of Rights and 
made applicable against the States through the Fourteenth
Amendment  have  the  same  scope  as  against  the  Federal 
Government.  See, e.g., Ramos v. Louisiana, 590 U. S. ___, 
___ (2020) (slip op., at 7); Timbs v. Indiana, 586 U. S. ___, 
___–___ (2019) (slip op., at 2–3); Malloy v. Hogan, 378 U. S. 
1, 10–11 (1964).  And we have generally assumed that the