"Free men have arms; slaves do not"

Blackstone links the capacity to bear arms with the condition of liberty, presenting weapons as both a practical safeguard and a symbol of civic status. In his legal scheme, the right to have arms is an auxiliary right: it protects the primary rights of personal security, liberty, and property by giving individuals the last-resort means to resist unlawful force, whether from private aggressors or from power wielded without right.

Calling those who lack arms slaves distills a historical reality. Enslaved and subjugated classes have typically been disarmed by law, not merely to reduce violence, but to disable political agency. To be unarmed under compulsion is to depend entirely on the will of another for one’s safety; to be armed within the law is to possess a share of the community’s means of coercion, and thus a share of citizenship. The distinction is not about love of weaponry; it is about whether a person is trusted to exercise judgment and force in defense of legitimate interests.

Yet Blackstone also situates the right within legal bounds, “as allowed by law”, signaling that the liberty of the armed citizen is inseparable from discipline, responsibility, and accountability. A free commonwealth does not abandon the regulation of force; it disperses it among citizens while binding it with rules, education, and public duties such as militia service. The contrast is not free men with arms versus chaos, but citizens entrusted with arms versus subjects denied them.

The maxim continues to resonate because it poses a test of political order: does a government empower those it serves to secure their own rights, or does it demand passivity for the sake of control? For Blackstone, the presence of arms among citizens is evidence that liberty is not a gift from rulers but a capacity owned and maintained by the people.