Cite as: 504 U. S. 505 (1992)
Opinion of Souter, J.
of a firearm, or with an aggregation having no ostensible utility except to convert a gun into such a weapon. There is, to be sure, one resemblance to the latter example in the sale of the Contender with the converter kit, for packaging the two has no apparent object except to convert the pistol into something else at some point. But the resemblance ends with the fact that the unregulated Contender pistol can be converted not only into a short-barreled rifle, which is a regulated firearm, but also into a long-barreled rifle, which is not. The packaging of pistol and kit has an obvious utility for those who want both a pistol and a regular rifle, and the question is whether the mere possibility of their use to assemble a regulated firearm is enough to place their combined packaging within the scope of "making" one.6
1
Neither the statute's language nor its structure provides any definitive guidance. Thompson/Center suggests guidance may be found in some subsections of the statute governing other types of weapons by language that expressly covers combinations of parts. The definition of "machine-gun," for example, was amended by the Gun Control Act of
6 Thompson/Center suggests that further enquiry could be avoided when it contends that the Contender and carbine kit do not amount to a "rifle" of any kind because, until assembled into a rifle, they are not " 'made' and 'intended to be fired from the shoulder.' " Brief for Respondent 8. From what we have said thus far, however, it is apparent that, though disassembled, the parts included when the Contender and its carbine kit are packaged together have been "made" into a rifle. The inclusion of the rifle stock in the package brings the Contender and carbine kit within the "intended to be fired from the shoulder" language contained in the definition of rifle in the statute. See 26 U. S. C. § 5845(c). The only question is whether this combination of parts constitutes a short-barreled rifle. Surely Justice Scalia's argument would take us over the line between lenity and credulity when he suggests that one who makes what would otherwise be a short-barreled rifle could escape liability by carving a warning into the shoulder stock. See post, at 523 (Scalia, J., concurring in judgment).
513
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