AMENDMENT 2
BEARING ARMS
Amendment 2
A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms shall not be infringed.
The protection afforded by this amendment prevents infringement by Congress of the right to bear arms for a lawful purpose, but does not apply to such infringement by private citizens. For this reason an indictment under the Enforcement Act of 1870,[1] charging a conspiracy to prevent Negroes from bearing arms for lawful purposes was held defective.[2] A State statute which forbids bodies of men to associate together as military organizations, or to drill or parade with arms in cities and towns unless authorized by law, does not abridge the right of the people to keep and bear arms.[3] In the absence of evidence tending to show that possession or use of a shotgun having a barrel of less than 18 inches in length has some reasonable relationship to the preservation or efficiency of a well regulated militia, the Court refused to hold invalid a provision in the National Firearms Act[4] against the transportation of unregistered shotguns in interstate commerce.[5]
Notes
[1] 16 Stat. 140 (1870).