construction of laws, demonstrates and explains the reasons why it would be unlawful so to keep arms or ammunition of any kind, as to endanger the lives or property of others; and it solves the supposed difficulty, that if there is no limitation or restriction of the power of keeping and bearing arms, then the State has no authority to disarm a criminal for any offence whatever. When a citizen breaks his covenant with his government, he forfeits the protection, of her laws; and of course this supersedes or destroys many of his municipal rights and political franchises, which he otherwise would be entitled to receive at her hands.
It is further contended that the right should be restricted, because it is given alone for the security of a free State, which means nothing more or less than the defence of public liberty. Now, what constitutes the security of a free State, or what is public liberty? Does the security of a free State consist alone in repelling foreign aggression, or quelling domestic insurrection? How is the public liberty of a State to be preserved, and what is it? These inquiries seem to me to lead to different results, as we view the subject from different points. The security of a free State, as I imagine, depends not only in upholding all its political institutions, but in sacredly performing all its legal and constitutional obligations, both to the Government and to the people. Public liberty can only be secured and perpetuated by preserving inviolable the personal franchises and immunities of the citizen, as well as guarding and protecting the sovereign attributes of the State. To suppose that public liberty cannot be in danger, except from a foreign foe or internal disorder, is virtually to deny the importance and necessity of written constitutions. If there was no fear of our own rulers, why impose restraints upon them, and why commit the guardianship and care of the great principles of civil and religious liberty to separate and independent departments of the Government, and bind each, by the most solemn injunctions, to preserve and defend them? And why trust the Constitution, in the last resort, to the interpretation of the Courts, to expound its meaning and declare its will? For this plain and obvious reason: because the Judiciary has few temptations to err, and possesses neither patronage or power, to make it popular or dangerous. I cannot separate the political freedom of the State
