My friends and countrymen... the powers of the sword are in the hands of the yeomanry of America from sixteen to sixty.
The militia of these free commonwealths, entitled and accustomed to their arms, when compared with any possible army, must be tremendous and irresistible.
Who are the militia? Are they not ourselves? Is it feared then, that we shall turn our arms each man against his own bosom?
Congress have no right to disarm the militia. Their swords, and every other terrible implement of the soldier, are the birth-right of an American....
The unlimited power of the sword is not in the hands of either the federal or the state governments, but where I trust in God it will ever remain, in the hands of the people."
Tench Coxe, delegate to the Continental Congress in the Pennsylvania Gazette, February 20, 1788
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