Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/07pdf/07-290.pdf
Page Number: 52

Cite as:  554 U. S. ____ (2008) 

49 

Opinion of the Court 

Presser  said  nothing  about  the  Second  Amendment’s 
meaning or scope, beyond the fact that it does not prevent 
the prohibition of private paramilitary organizations. 

JUSTICE  STEVENS  places  overwhelming  reliance  upon 
this  Court’s  decision  in  United  States  v.  Miller,  307  U. S. 
“[H]undreds  of  judges,”  we  are  told,  “have 
174  (1939). 
relied  on  the  view  of  the  amendment  we  endorsed  there,” 
post,  at  2,  and  “[e]ven  if  the  textual  and  historical  argu­
ments  on  both  sides  of  the  issue  were  evenly  balanced, 
respect for the well-settled views of all of our predecessors 
on  this  Court,  and  for  the  rule  of  law  itself  . . .  would 
prevent  most  jurists  from  endorsing  such  a  dramatic 
upheaval in the law,” post, at 4.  And what is, according to 
JUSTICE  STEVENS,  the  holding  of  Miller  that  demands 
such  obeisance?  That  the  Second  Amendment  “protects
the  right  to  keep  and  bear  arms  for  certain  military  pur­
poses, but that it does not curtail the legislature’s power to 
regulate  the  nonmilitary  use  and  ownership  of  weapons.” 
Post, at 2. 

Nothing  so  clearly  demonstrates  the  weakness  of 
JUSTICE  STEVENS’  case.  Miller  did  not  hold  that  and 
cannot possibly be read to have held that.  The judgment
in the case upheld against a Second Amendment challenge 
two men’s federal indictment for transporting an unregis­
tered  short-barreled  shotgun  in  interstate  commerce,  in 
violation of the National Firearms Act, 48 Stat. 1236.  It is 
entirely  clear  that  the  Court’s  basis  for  saying  that  the 
Second Amendment did not apply was not that the defen­
dants were “bear[ing] arms” not “for . . . military purposes” 
but  for  “nonmilitary  use,”  post,  at  2.  Rather,  it  was  that 
the  type  of  weapon  at  issue  was  not  eligible  for  Second 
Amendment  protection:  “In  the  absence  of  any  evidence 
tending  to  show  that  the  possession  or  use  of  a  [short­
barreled  shotgun]  at  this  time  has  some  reasonable  rela­
tionship  to  the  preservation  or  efficiency  of  a  well  regu­
lated  militia,  we  cannot  say  that  the  Second  Amendment