When proposing the Fourteenth Amendment to Congress in 1866, Senator Jacob Howard referred to “the personal rights guaranteed and secured by the first eight amendments of the Constitution; such as freedom of speech and of the press; … the right to keep and bear arms….” He averred that “the great object” of the amendment was “to restrain the power of the States and compel them at all times to respect these great fundamental guarantees.” The design was not to change the nature of the rights, but to prevent the states from violating them.
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