If “bear arms” means, as we think, simply the carrying of arms, a modifier can limit the purpose of the carriage (“for the purpose of selfdefense” or “to make war against the King”). But if “bear arms” means, as the petitioners and the dissent think, the carrying of arms only for military purposes, one simply cannot add “for the purpose of killing game.” The right “to carry arms in the militia for the purpose of killing game” is worthy of the mad hatter. Thus, these purposive qualifying phrases positively establish that “to bear arms” is not limited to military use.

Justice Antonin Scalia
June 26, 2008
District of Columbia, et al., petitioners v. Dick Anthony Heller
No. 07-290
Pages 15,16
[Words mean what they mean. Not what someone wants them to mean. Hence those that wish to twist the meaning of the Second Amendment deserve our scorn and contempt and were justly slapped down by the Heller decision. Mad Hatters does describe many of the anti-gun people. –Joe]