In the Miller v. Texas case of 1893, Franklin P. Miller appealed to the U.S Supreme Court after being convicted for murder in a Texas court and sentenced to death. He argued that his Second Amendment right (right to bear arms) was violated when he was not allowed to carry a weapon for self-defense, and his Fourteenth Amendment rights were infringed upon because he wasn't given due process before being deprived of this constitutional right. The Supreme Court rejected these arguments stating that the Bill of Rights did not apply directly to state laws unless explicitly stated by Congress or incorporated through the Fourteenth Amendment's Due Process Clause - which at this time had only been applied selectively on a case-by-case basis by courts rather than universally across all states' legislation. Therefore, it upheld Miller’s conviction ruling that neither amendment was applicable since they do not restrain actions taken by individual states but only those taken by federal government.

In the dissenting opinion for Miller v. Texas, it was argued that the Second and Fourteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution should protect an individual's right to bear arms regardless of state laws. The dissenting justices believed that these amendments were designed specifically to limit states' powers over certain rights, including gun ownership. They contended that Mr. Miller had a constitutional right to carry his pistol and therefore could not be prosecuted under Texas law for doing so without a license. This interpretation would have set a precedent for federal protection of gun ownership rights against state regulation or restriction, but it did not prevail in this case.