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Page Number: 31

28 

DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA v. HELLER 

Opinion of the Court 

ratification  of  the  Bill  of  Rights. 
  Two  of  them— 
Pennsylvania  and  Vermont—clearly  adopted  individual
rights  unconnected  to  militia  service.    Pennsylvania’s
Declaration of Rights of 1776 said: “That the people have a
right  to  bear  arms  for  the  defence  of  themselves,  and  the 
state . . . .”    §XIII,  in  5  Thorpe  3082,  3083  (emphasis 
added).  In 1777, Vermont adopted the identical provision, 
except  for  inconsequential  differences  in  punctuation  and 
capitalization.  See Vt. Const., ch. 1, §15, in 6 id., at 3741. 

North  Carolina  also  codified  a  right  to  bear  arms  in 
1776:  “That  the  people  have  a  right  to  bear  arms,  for  the 
defence of the State . . . .”  Declaration of Rights §XVII, in 
id., at 2787, 2788.  This could plausibly be read to support 
only a right to bear arms in a militia—but that is a pecu­
liar way to make the point in a constitution that elsewhere
repeatedly  mentions  the  militia  explicitly.    See  §§14,  18, 
35,  in  5  id.,  2789,  2791,  2793.    Many  colonial  statutes
required  individual  arms-bearing  for  public-safety  rea-
sons—such as the 1770 Georgia law that “for the security 
and  defence  of  this  province  from  internal  dangers  and 
insurrections” required those men who qualified for militia
duty  individually  “to  carry  fire  arms”  “to  places  of  public
worship.”  19 Colonial Records of the State of Georgia 137–
139  (A.  Candler  ed.  1911  (pt.  2))  (emphasis added).    That 
broad  public-safety  understanding  was  the  connotation
given to the North Carolina right by that State’s Supreme 
Court in 1843.  See State v. Huntly, 3 Ired. 418, 422–423. 

The 1780 Massachusetts Constitution presented another
variation  on  the  theme:  “The  people  have  a  right  to  keep 
and  to  bear  arms  for  the  common  defence. . . .”    Pt.  First, 
Art.  XVII,  in  3  Thorpe  1888,  1892.    Once  again,  if  one 
gives  narrow  meaning  to  the  phrase  “common  defence” 
this  can  be  thought  to  limit  the  right  to  the  bearing  of 
arms  in  a  state-organized  military  force.    But  once  again
the  State’s  highest  court  thought  otherwise.    Writing  for
the court in an 1825 libel case, Chief Justice Parker wrote: