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Page Number: 107

40 

DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA v. HELLER 

STEVENS, J., dissenting 

bear arms.  But a conclusive answer to the contention 
that this amendment prohibits the legislation in ques­
tion lies in the fact that the amendment is a limitation 
only  upon  the  power  of  Congress  and  the  National
government, and not upon that of the States.”  Id., at 
264–265. 

And  in  discussing  the  Fourteenth  Amendment,  the  Court
explained: 

“The plaintiff in error was not a member of the organ­
ized  volunteer  militia  of  the  State  of  Illinois,  nor  did 
he belong to the troops of the United States or to any 
organization  under  the  militia  law  of  the  United 
States.  On  the  contrary,  the  fact  that  he  did  not  be­
long  to  the  organized  militia  or  the  troops  of  the
United  States  was  an  ingredient  in  the  offence  for
which he was convicted and sentenced.  The question 
is, therefore, had he a right as a citizen of the United 
States,  in  disobedience  of  the  State  law,  to  associate 
with  others  as  a  military  company,  and  to  drill  and 
parade with arms in the towns and cities of the State?
If the plaintiff in error has any such privilege he must 
be able to point to the provision of the Constitution or
statutes of the United States by which it is conferred.” 
Id., at 266.

  Presser,  therefore,  both  affirmed  Cruikshank’s  holding 
that  the  Second  Amendment  posed  no  obstacle  to  regula­
tion  by  state  governments,  and  suggested  that  in  any 
event  nothing  in  the  Constitution  protected  the  use  of
arms  outside  the  context  of  a  militia  “authorized  by  law”
and organized by the State or Federal Government.36 

—————— 

36 In another case the Court endorsed, albeit indirectly, the reading of 
Miller  that  has  been  well  settled  until  today.   In  Burton  v.  Sills,  394 
U. S.  812  (1969)  (per  curiam),  the  Court  dismissed  for  want  of  a  sub­
stantial  federal  question  an  appeal  from  a  decision  of  the  New  Jersey