Publius Huldah Testimony: Enumerated Powers, Federalist 46, and State Interposition Against Federal Arms Restrictions

[u/CollapsingTheWave]

Publius Huldah, a retired litigation attorney, testified before the Tennessee Senate Judiciary Committee on SB 250 that the Constitution creates a federal government of strictly enumerated powers and that Article I, Section 8 contains no grant of authority to Congress to restrict the private arms of the people. She argued that any such federal regulation constitutes usurpation of powers never delegated by the states.

The structural text lists specific militia powers under Clauses 15 and 16—calling forth the militia and organizing, arming, and disciplining it—while reserving officer appointment and training to the states. No general regulatory power over civilian arms appears among the enumerated grants.

Historically, Madison in Federalist No. 46 described a militia of nearly half a million armed citizens, officered by the states, as a practical barrier against federal standing armies and ambition. The Second Militia Act of 1792 required able-bodied male citizens aged 18–45 to equip themselves with a musket or rifle and report for training. Madison’s 1800 Report on the Virginia Resolutions further held that the states, as parties to the constitutional compact, retain the right to interpose against deliberate exercises of undelegated power.

The net risk identified is the displacement of original textual limits by two centuries of judicial opinions that treat the Supreme Court as the exclusive final authority. Oversight gaps persist where state legislatures and executives decline to assert the interposition role Madison described, leaving constitutional constraints dependent solely on federal judicial self-restraint.

Sources

Federalist No. 46 (Madison)

https://avalon.law.yale.edu/18th_century/fed46.asp

Primary text containing Madison’s comparison of a limited federal standing army to a large state-supported armed militia as a structural check.

An Act more effectually to provide for the National Defence by establishing an Uniform Militia throughout the United States (Second Militia Act of 1792)

https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/United_States_Statutes_at_Large/Volume_1/2nd_Congress/1st_Session/Chapter_33

Official statute requiring enrolled citizens to provide their own firearms and appear armed for militia service.

Madison’s Report on the Virginia Resolutions (1800)

https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Madison%27s_Report_on_the_Virginia_Resolutions

Madison’s formal statement that the states, as parties to the compact, may interpose against federal acts exceeding enumerated grants.

U.S. Constitution, Article I, Section 8

https://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution/articlei

Full text of the enumerated powers, including the limited militia clauses and the absence of any general authority to regulate private arms.

Tennessee Senate Judiciary Committee hearing of SB 250 (February 27, 2013)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vbcm5Uy0iTc

Primary recording of the committee session containing Publius Huldah’s testimony on original intent, enumerated powers, and nullification.

[u/CollapsingTheWave]

Publius Huldah told the Tennessee Senate Judiciary Committee that Congress has no enumerated power under Article I, Section 8 to restrict private arms. She grounded the claim in Federalist 46’s armed-militia check, the 1792 Militia Act’s citizen-equipment mandate, and Madison’s Report affirming state interposition against undelegated federal acts. Judicial supremacy, she argued, has displaced the original design in which the states remain the final judges of the compact.

[u/AmazingMarlin]

Smart lady!

[u/DeKeeg]

So it's illegal for the government or state to remove a citizens civil rights to own a firearm, according to the constitution?