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Page Number: 93

26 

DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA v. HELLER 

STEVENS, J., dissenting 

removed,  do  not  survive,  the  arguments  raised  in  the 
House illuminate the perceived problems with the clause: 
Specifically, there was concern that Congress “can declare
who  are  those  religiously  scrupulous,  and  prevent  them 
from bearing arms.”25  The ultimate removal of the clause, 
therefore,  only  serves  to  confirm  the  purpose  of  the
Amendment—to  protect  against  congressional  disarma­
ment, by whatever means, of the States’ militias. 

The Court also contends that because “Quakers opposed 
the  use  of  arms  not  just  for  militia  service,  but  for  any 
violent purpose whatsoever,” ante, at 17, the inclusion of a 
conscientious-objector  clause  in  the  original  draft  of  the
Amendment  does  not  support  the  conclusion  that  the 
phrase  “bear  arms”  was  military  in  meaning.    But  that 
claim cannot be squared with the record.  In the proposals
cited  supra,  at  21–22,  both  Virginia  and  North  Carolina 
included  the  following  language:  “That  any  person  relig­
iously  scrupulous  of  bearing  arms  ought  to  be  exempted, 
upon  payment  of  an  equivalent  to  employ  another  to  bear 
arms in his stead” (emphasis added).26  There is no plausi­
ble  argument  that  the  use  of  “bear  arms”  in  those  provi­
sions was not unequivocally and exclusively military: The 
State simply does not compel its citizens to carry arms for
the  purpose  of  private  “confrontation,”  ante,  at  10,  or  for 
self-defense. 

The  history  of  the  adoption  of  the  Amendment  thus 
describes an overriding concern about the potential threat
to  state  sovereignty  that  a  federal  standing  army  would 

—————— 

25 Veit  182.    This  was  the  objection  voiced  by  Elbridge  Gerry,  who
went on to remark, in the next breath: “What, sir, is the use of a mili­
tia?  It is to prevent the establishment of a standing army, the bane of 
liberty. . ..  Whenever  government  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.”  Ibid. 

26 The  failed  Maryland  proposals  contained  similar  language.    See 

supra, at 23.