cognized as a common law right, when
the ancient and genuine trial by jury was in force, is not only proved
by the nature of the trial itself, but is acknowledged by history.[4]

This right of resistance is recognized by the constitution of the United
States, as a strictly legal and constitutional right. It is so
recognized, first by the provision that "the trial of all crimes, except
in cases of impeachment, shall be by jury"--that is, by the country--and
not by the government; secondly, by the provision that "the right of the
people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed." This
constitutional security for "the right to keep and bear arms," implies
the right to use them--as much as a constitutional security for the
right to buy and keep food would have implied the right to eat it. The
constitution, therefore, takes it for granted that the people will
judge of the conduct of the government, and that, as they have the
right, they will also have the sense, to use arms, whenever the
necessity of the case justifies it. And it is a sufficient and _legal_
defence for a person accused of using arms against the government, if he
can show, to the satisfaction of a jury, _or even any one of a jury_,
that the law he resisted was an unjust one.

In the American _State_ constitutions also, this right of resistance to
the oppressions of the government is recognized, in various ways, as a
natural, legal, and constitutional right. In the first place, it is so
recognized by provisions establishing the trial by jury; thus requiring
that accused persons shall be tried by "the country," instead of the
government. In the second place, it is recognized by many of them, as,
for example, those of Massachusetts, Maine, Vermont, Connecticut,
Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, Michigan, Kentucky, Tennessee, Arkansas,
Mississippi, Alabama, and Florida, by provisions expressly declaring
that the people shall have the right to bear arms. In many of them also,
as, for example, those of Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts,
New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Florida,
Iowa, and Arkansas, by provisions, in their bills of rights, declaring
that men have a natural, inherent, and inalienable right of "_defending_
their lives and liberties." This, of course, means that they have a
right to defend them against any injustice _on the part of the
government_, and not merely on the part of private individuals; because
the objec