Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/07pdf/07-290.pdf
Page Number: 53.0

50 

DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA v. HELLER 

Opinion of the Court 

guarantees  the  right  to  keep  and  bear  such  an  instru-
ment.”    307  U. S.,  at  178  (emphasis  added).    “Certainly,”
the  Court  continued,  “it  is  not  within  judicial  notice  that
this  weapon  is  any  part  of  the  ordinary  military  equip­
ment  or  that  its  use  could  contribute  to  the  common  de­
fense.”  Ibid.  Beyond that, the opinion provided no expla­
nation of the content of the right.

This  holding  is  not  only  consistent  with,  but  positively 

suggests, that the Second Amendment confers an individ­
ual  right  to  keep  and  bear  arms  (though  only  arms  that 
“have some reasonable relationship to the preservation or 
efficiency  of  a  well  regulated  militia”).  Had  the  Court 
believed  that  the  Second  Amendment  protects  only  those 
serving in the militia, it would have been odd to examine 
the character of the weapon rather than simply note that
the two crooks were not militiamen.  JUSTICE STEVENS can 
say  again  and  again  that  Miller  did  “not  turn  on  the  dif­
ference  between  muskets  and  sawed-off  shotguns,  it
turned,  rather,  on  the  basic  difference  between  the  mili­
tary and nonmilitary use and possession of guns,” post, at 
42–43, but the words of the opinion prove otherwise.  The 
most  JUSTICE  STEVENS  can  plausibly  claim  for  Miller  is 
that  it  declined  to  decide  the  nature  of  the  Second 
Amendment  right,  despite  the  Solicitor  General’s  argu­
ment  (made  in  the  alternative)  that  the  right  was  collec­
tive,  see  Brief  for  United  States,  O. T.  1938,  No.  696, 
pp. 4–5.  Miller  stands  only  for  the  proposition  that  the
Second  Amendment  right,  whatever  its  nature,  extends 
only to certain types of weapons.

It  is  particularly  wrongheaded  to  read  Miller  for  more 
than what it said, because the case did not even purport to 
be  a  thorough  examination  of  the  Second  Amendment.
JUSTICE  STEVENS  claims,  post,  at  42,  that  the  opinion
reached its conclusion “[a]fter reviewing many of the same 
sources  that  are  discussed  at  greater  length  by  the  Court 
today.”    Not  many,  which  was  not  entirely  the  Court’s