[sp332]

But the Leviathan is a construction of the people. The Leviathan can't take or be anything that the people didn't have to begin with. So if the Leviathan might have the power of, say, capital punishment, one must first allow that the people had the power of capital punishment first, in their "natural state", and then gave it to the Leviathan. Every power the government has - owning guns, levying taxes and fines, imprisoning criminals, printing money - is a power that individuals used to have, that have been given up (in varying degrees) to the Leviathan.

The right to bear arms seems to be something that is expressly protected by the Bill of Rights, and this is definitely an aspect of the relationship of the government with the people, not of people to each other. I'm sure Jefferson and Madison didn't want people to go around threatening each other with guns, but they still wanted the government to be afraid of people with guns.