aid down.

Let us now look at some of the provisions of the constitution, and see
what crimes might be held to be authorized by them, if their meaning
were not to be ascertained and restricted by such rules of
interpretation as apply to all other legal instruments.

The second amendment to the constitution declares that "the right of the
people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed."

This right "to keep and bear arms," implies the right to use them--as
much as a provision securing to the people the right to buy and keep
food, would imply their right also to eat it. But this implied right to
use arms, is only a right to use them in a manner consistent with
natural rights--as, for example, in defence of life, liberty, chastity,
&c. Here is an innocent and just meaning, of which the words are
susceptible; and such is therefore the _extent_ of their legal meaning.
If courts could go beyond the innocent and necessary meaning of the
words, and imply or infer from them an authority for anything contrary
to natural right, they could imply a constitutional authority in the
people to use arms, not merely for the just and innocent purposes of
defence, but also for the criminal purposes of aggression--for purposes
of murder, robbery, or any other acts of wrong to which arms are capable
of being applied. The mere _verbal_ implication would as much authorize
the people to use arms for unjust, as for just, purposes. But the
_legal_ implication gives only an authority for their innocent use. And
why? Simply because justice is the end of all law--the legitimate end of
all compacts of government. It is itself law; and there is no right or
power among men to destroy its obligation.

Take another case. The constitution declares that "Congress shall have
power to _regulate commerce_ with foreign nations, and among the several
states, and with the Indian tribes."

This power has been held by the supreme court to be an exclusive one in
the general government--and one that cannot be controlled by the states.
Yet it gives congress no constitutional authority to legalize any
commerce inconsistent with natural justice between man and man; although
the _mere_ verbal import of the words, if stretched to their utmost
tension in favor of the wrong, would authorize congress to legalize a
commerce in poisons and deadly weapons, for the express purpose of
having them used in a manner inconsistent with natural right--as for the
purposes of m