In 1686, New Jersey enacted An Act Against Wearing Swords, & c., which prohibited "wearing Swords, Daggers, Pistols, Dirks, Stilladoes,
Skeines, or any other unusual and unlawful Weapons" because, among other things, people are "put in great [f]ear." (143) Similarly, a 1790s Massachusetts law gave justices of the peace the authority to arrest "such as shall ride or go armed offensively, to the fear or terror of the good citizens." (144)