Important Quotes which Validate Our Rights to Keep and Bear Arms:
"And that the said Constitution be never construed to authorize Congress … to prevent the people of the United States, who are peaceable citizens, from keeping their own arms…" - Philadelphia Independent Gazetteer, August 20, 1789
"To preserve liberty it is essential that the whole body of the people always possess arms and be taught alike, especially when young, how to use them …" - Richard Henry Lee writing in Letters from the Federal Farmer to the Republic (1787-1788)
"On every question of construction (of the Constitution) let us carry ourselves back to the time when the Constitution was adopted, recollect the spirit manifested in the debates, and instead of trying what meaning may be squeezed out of the text, or invented against it, conform to the probable one in which it was passed." - Thomas Jefferson, letter to William Johnson, June 12, 1823, The Complete Jefferson, p 322
"The right of the people to keep and bear arms has been recognized by the General Government; but the best security of that right after all is, the military spirit, that taste for martial exercises, which has always distinguished the free citizens of these States … Such men form the best barrier to the liberties of America." - Gazette of the United States, October 14, 1789
"The whole of the Bill [of Rights] is a declaration of the right of the people at large or considered as individuals … It establishes some rights of the individual as unalienable and which consequently, no majority has a right to deprive them of." - Albert Gallatin of the New York Historical Society, October 7, 1789
"… the people have a right to keep and bear arms." - Patrick Henry and George Mason, Elliot, Debates at 185
"No Free man shall ever be debarred the use of arms." - Thomas Jefferson, Proposal Virginia Constitution, 1 T. Jefferson Papers, 334 (C. J. Boyd, Ed., 1950)
"As civil rulers, not having their duty to the people duly before them, may attempt to tyrannize, and as the military forces which must be occasionally raised to defend our country, might pervert their power to the injury of their fellow citizens, the people are confirmed by the article in their right to keep and bear their private arms." - Tench Coxe in "Remarks on the First Part of the Amendments to the Federal Constitution." Under the pseudonym "A Pennsylvanian" in the Philadelphia Federal Gazette, June 18, 1789 at 2 col. 1
"The Constitution shall never be construed … to prevent the people of the United States who are peaceable citizens from keeping their own arms." - Samuel Adams, Debates & Proceedings in the Convention of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, 86-87
"The people are not to be disarmed of their weapons. They are left in full possession of them." - Zachariah Johnson, 3 Elliot, Debates at 646
"A free people ought … to be armed …" - George Washington, speech of January 7, 1790 in the Boston Independent Chronicle, January 14, 1790
"Before a standing army can rule, the people must be disarmed; as they are in almost every kingdom of Europe. The supreme power in America cannot enforce unjust laws by the sword; because the whole body of the people are armed, and constitute a force superior to any bands of regular troops…" - Noah Webster, "An Examination into the Leading Principles of the Federal Constitution" (1787) in Pamphlets on the Constitution of the United States (P. Ford, 1888)
"To disarm the people [is] the best and most effectual way to enslave them …" - George Mason, 3 Elliot, Debates at 380
"Americans have the right and advantage of being armed - unlike the citizens of other countries whose governments are afraid to trust the people with arms." - James Madison, The Federalist Papers # 46 at 243-244
"The best we can hope for concerning the people at large is that they be properly armed." - Alexander Hamilton, The Federalist Papers at 184-8
"The great object is that every man be armed. Everyone who is able might have a gun." - Patrick Henry, 3 Elliott, Debates at 386
"A strong body makes the mind strong. As to the species of exercises, I advise the gun. While this gives moderate exercise to the body, it gives boldness, enterprise and independence to the mind. Games played with the ball and others of that nature, are too violent for the body and stamp no character on the mind. Let your gun therefore be the constant companion of your walks." - Thomas Jefferson, Encyclopedia of T. Jefferson, 318 (Foley, Ed., reissued 1967)
"The supposed quietude of a good man allures the ruffian; while on the other hand, arms like laws discourage and keep the invader and the plunderer in awe, and preserve order in the world as well as property. The same balance would be preserved were all the world destitute of arms, for all would be alike; but since some will not, others dare not lay them aside … Horrid mischief would ensue were one half the world deprived of the use of them …" - Thomas Paine, I Writings of Thomas Paine at 56 (1894)
"Arms in the hands of citizens [may] be used at individual discretion… in private self-defense …" - John Adams, A Defense of the Constitutions of the Government of the USA, 471 (1788)
"A militia, when properly formed, are in fact the people themselves … and include all men capable of bearing arms." - Richard Henry Lee, Additional Letters from the Federal Farmer (1788) at 169
"What, sir, is the use of a militia? It is to prevent the establishment of a standing army, the bane of liberty." - Rep. Elbridge Gerry of Massachusetts, I Annals of Congress at 750 (August 17, 1789)
"I ask, sir, what is the militia? It is the whole people, except for a few public officials." - George Mason, 3 Elliott, Debates at 425-426
"The right of the people to keep and bear … arms shall not be infringed. A well-regulated militia, composed of the people, trained to arms, is the best and most natural defense of a free country …" - James Madison, I Annals of Congress 434 (June 8, 1789)
"We will preach the truth to a new generation: The doorway to all freedoms is framed with muskets. It's time the apologists step aside and let freedom's followers lead the way." - Charlton Heston, President, National Rifle Association
The actual quote is,
"No freeman shall be debarred the use of arms (within his own lands or tenements)."
(Thomas Jefferson: Draft Virginia Constitution (with his note added), 1776. Papers 1:353)
A better reference would be Section 13 of the VA Declaration of Rights, authored by Jefferson and George Mason - and I ask any eavesdropping Stanford (or otherwise) scholars, does it get much clearer than this?
SEC. 13. That a well-regulated militia, composed of the body of the people, trained to arms, is the proper, natural, and safe defense of a free state; that standing armies, in time of peace, should be avoided as dangerous to liberty; and that in all cases the military should be under strict subordination to, and governed by, the civil power.
According to the "learned" ones among us, though, when time to draft the US Constitution, the founding fathers had something else in mind regarding the right to keep and bear arms.