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Page Number: 77.0

10 

DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA v. HELLER 

STEVENS, J., dissenting 

Framers  used  the  phrase  “the  people”  in  these  constitu­
tional  provisions.    In  the  First  Amendment,  no  words 
define the class of individuals entitled to speak, to publish,
or  to  worship;  in  that  Amendment  it  is  only  the  right
peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for
a redress of grievances, that is described as a right of “the 
people.”  These rights contemplate collective action.  While 
the  right  peaceably  to  assemble  protects  the  individual 
rights  of  those  persons  participating  in  the  assembly,  its 
concern is with action engaged in by members of a group, 
rather than any single individual.  Likewise, although the 
act  of  petitioning  the  Government  is  a  right  that  can  be 
exercised  by  individuals,  it  is  primarily  collective  in  na­
ture.  For if they are to be effective, petitions must involve
groups of individuals acting in concert.

Similarly, the words “the people” in the Second Amend­
ment  refer  back  to  the  object  announced  in  the  Amend­
ment’s preamble.  They remind us that it is the collective
action of individuals having a duty to serve in the militia
that  the  text  directly  protects  and,  perhaps  more  impor­
tantly,  that  the  ultimate  purpose  of  the  Amendment  was 
to  protect  the  States’  share  of  the  divided  sovereignty 
created by the Constitution. 

As  used  in  the  Fourth  Amendment,  “the  people”  de­
scribes  the  class  of  persons  protected  from  unreasonable 
searches and seizures by Government officials.  It  is  true 
that  the  Fourth  Amendment  describes  a  right  that  need
not be exercised in any collective sense.  But that observa­
tion does not settle the meaning of the phrase “the people” 
when  used  in  the  Second  Amendment.    For,  as  we  have 
seen,  the  phrase  means  something  quite  different  in  the 
Petition  and  Assembly  Clauses  of  the  First  Amendment. 
Although the abstract definition of the phrase “the people” 
could  carry  the  same  meaning  in  the  Second  Amendment 
as in the Fourth Amendment, the preamble of the Second
Amendment  suggests  that  the  uses  of  the  phrase  in  the