Good News! Court Rules Second Amendment Protects Individual Right to Bear Arms

Posted on June 26, 2008

I’m very late on this so I will be brief and do a link roundup to others. This one should have been a no-brainer anyway, but who knew what to expect after the last two horrible decisions the Supreme Court just made. At least we now know the final defense of our rights is still intact. However, I’m sure it has upset the ACLU who have long held the belief the second amendment only extends to state militias. The decision was 5-4 once again having Kennedy as the deciding vote. As Emperor Misha so nicely puts it:

Heller’s in, and it looks like the Supreme Court wisely chose to not start a second Civil War (or a second Revolution, if you prefer) by applying their usual “emanations” and “penumbras” so’s to make up, out of whole cloth, new laws and prohibitions in keeping with their own liberal agenda.

Thank Heavens.

Here is the beef:

The court’s 5-4 ruling strikes down the District of Columbia’s 32-year-old ban on handguns as incompatible with gun rights under the Second Amendment. The decision goes further than even the Bush administration wanted, but probably leaves most firearms laws intact.

Here is the opinion:

Like most rights, the right secured by the Second Amendment is not unlimited. From Blackstone through the 19th-century cases, commentators and courts routinely explained that the right was not a right to keep and carry any weapon whatsoever in any manner whatsoever and for whatever purpose… For example, the majority of the 19th-century courts to consider the question held that prohibitions on carrying concealed weapons were lawful under the Second Amendment or state analogues… Although we do not undertake an exhaustive historical analysis today of the full scope of the Second Amendment, nothing in our opinion should be taken to cast doubt on longstanding prohibitions on the possession of firearms by felons and the mentally ill, or laws forbidding the carrying of firearms in sensitive places such as schools and government buildings, or laws imposing conditions and qualifications on the commercial sale of arms.
We also recognize another important limitation on the right to keep and carry arms. Miller said, as we have explained, that the sorts of weapons protected were those “in common use at the time.”… We think that limitation is fairly supported by the historical tradition of prohibiting the carrying of “dangerous and unusual weapons.”… It may be objected that if weapons that are most useful in military service—M-16 rifles and the like—may be banned, then the Second Amendment right is completely detached from the prefatory clause. But as we have said, the conception of the militia at the time of the Second Amendment’s ratification was the body of all citizens capable of military service, who would bring the sorts of lawful weapons that they possessed at home to militia duty. It may well be true today that a militia, to be as effective as militias in the 18th century, would require sophisticated arms that are highly unusual in society at large. Indeed, it may be true that no amount of small arms could be useful against modern-day bombers and tanks. But the fact that modern developments have limited the degree of fit between the prefatory clause and the protected right cannot change our interpretation of the right.

Hot Air has a great roundup.
So does Pirate’s Cove.

McCain appluads!

U.S. Senator John McCain today issued the following statement regarding today’s United States Supreme Court ruling on District of Columbia v. Heller:

Today’s decision is a landmark victory for Second Amendment freedom in the United States. For this first time in the history of our Republic, the U.S. Supreme Court affirmed that the Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms was and is an individual right as intended by our Founding Fathers. I applaud this decision as well as the overturning of the District of Columbia’s ban on handguns and limitations on the ability to use firearms for self-defense.

Unlike Senator Obama, who refused to join me in signing a bipartisan amicus brief, I was pleased to express my support and call for the ruling issued today. Today’s ruling in District of Columbia v. Heller makes clear that other municipalities like Chicago that have banned handguns have infringed on the constitutional rights of Americans. Unlike the elitist view that believes Americans cling to guns out of bitterness, today’s ruling recognizes that gun ownership is a fundamental right- sacred, just as the right to free speech and assembly.

This ruling does not mark the end of our struggle against those who seek to limit the rights of law-abiding citizens. We must always remain vigilant in defense of our freedoms. But today, the Supreme Court ended forever the specious argument that the Second Amendment did not confer an individual right to keep and bear arms.

Obama flips and flops. He was for it after he was against it. Interesting.

Jimmi at the Sundries Shack:

Well, finally, after two of the most brainless decisions I have ever seen come out of the Supreme Court, they finally got one right. Today, the SCOTUS decided that the Second Amendment isn’t going to be raed in the most pedantic way possible but that it means what most of us thought it meant when we first read it back in elementary school.

Also see: Michelle Malkin

» Filed Under 2nd Amendment, ACLU, News, Supreme Court, Uncategorized

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Comments

3 Responses to “Good News! Court Rules Second Amendment Protects Individual Right to Bear Arms”

rudy7 on June 26th, 2008 5:35 pm

Wow!! So basically, the Washington DC law said that someone could break into your house, kill your family, and then you might be able to assemble your shotgun in time to do what?? Shoot as the crackheads leave?

In Louisiana, is is the legal to shoot anyone who breaks into your home or tries to carjack you. Louisiana rightly decided not to put the burden of proving self-defense on the home owner. If a crackhead comes in your house, then just blown the MF away. And, I agree. Home invasions and carjacking in New Orleans are of course one of the last crimes a crackhead commits (since he is usually killed!). We have got lots of crackheads.
MarkJ on June 26th, 2008 10:43 pm

You hear that popping sound tonight….? That’s not gunfire; it’s the sound of liberal heads exploding after today’s SCOTUS decision. Doubly so now that the Senate has also just passed the war funding bill.

Be sure to wear a raincoat and hip waders if McCain beats His Obamajesty in November: all that putrid moonbat brain matter lying in the streets after Election Day will make them messier than a Gallagher show.
curtismo on June 27th, 2008 12:20 am

two words jury nullification, if you dont like a law,, or don’t believe in the case you are sitting thru jury duty on, vote not guilty ,this is your greatest power and you do not have to explain yourself to no one for the way you vote