SCOTUS to rule on meaning of 2nd Amendment

[Falkenhayn]

+http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21901379/

Supreme Court to consider D.C. handgun ban
Case could make guns an issue in the 2008 elections
BREAKING NEWS
The Associated Press
updated 1:55 p.m. ET, Tues., Nov. 20, 2007

WASHINGTON - The Supreme Court said Tuesday it will decide whether the District of Columbia can ban handguns, a case that could produce the most in-depth examination of the constitutional right to "keep and bear arms" in nearly 70 years.

The justices' decision to hear the case could make the divisive debate over guns an issue in the 2008 presidential and congressional elections.

The government of Washington, D.C., is asking the court to uphold its 31-year ban on handgun ownership in the face of a federal appeals court ruling that struck down the ban as incompatible with the Second Amendment. Tuesday's announcement was widely expected, especially after both the District and the man who challenged the handgun ban asked for the high court review. A lower court struck down the ban as a violation of the Second Amendment rights of gun ownership.

Second Amendment consideration rare
Supreme Court justices have track records that make predicting their rulings on many topics more than a mere guess. Then there is the issue of the Second Amendment and guns, about which the court has said virtually nothing in nearly 70 years.

The prospect that the high court might define gun rights under the Constitution is making people on both sides of the issue nervous.

"I wouldn't be confident on either side," said Mark Tushnet, a Harvard Law School professor and author of a new book on the battle over guns in the United States.

Inidividual versus state right
The main issue before the justices is whether the Second Amendment protects an individual's right to own guns or instead spells out the collective right of states to maintain militias. The former interpretation would permit fewer restrictions on gun ownership.

The Second Amendment reads: "A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed."

The federal appeals court for the District of Columbia was the first federal panel to strike down a gun-control law based on individual rights. The court ruled in favor of Dick Anthony Heller, an armed security guard whose application to keep a handgun at home was denied by the district.

Most other U.S. courts have said the Second Amendment does not contain a right to have a gun for purely private purposes.

Chicago has a similar handgun ban,- but few other gun-control laws are as strict as the district's.

Four states - Hawaii, Illinois, Maryland and New York - urged the Supreme Court to take the case because broad application of the appeals court ruling would threaten "all federal and state laws restricting access to firearms."

The district said its law, passed in 1976, was enacted by local elected officials who believed it was a sensible way to save lives. The law also requires residents to keep shotguns and rifles unloaded and disassembled or fitted with trigger locks.

The city's appeal asks the court to look only at the handgun ban because local law allows possession of other firearms.

Critics say the law has done little to curb violence, mainly because guns obtained legally from the district or through illegal means still are readily available.

Although the city's homicide rate has declined dramatically since peaking in the early 1990s, it ranks among the nation's highest, with 169 killings in 2006.

Dangerous D.C.
Heller said Washington remains a dangerous place to live. "People need not stand by and die," he said in court papers.

He said the Second Amendment gives him the right to keep working guns, including handguns, in his home for his own protection.

The last time the court examined the meaning of the Second Amendment was in a 1939 case in which two men claimed the amendment gave them the right to have sawed-off shotguns. A unanimous court ruled against them.

Gun control advocates say the 1939 decision in U.S. v. Miller settled the issue in favor of a collective right. Gun rights proponents say the decision has been misconstrued.

Chief Justice John Roberts has said the question has not been resolved by the Supreme Court. The 1939 decision "sidestepped" the issue of whether the Second Amendment right is individual or collective, Roberts said at his confirmation hearing in 2005.

"That's still very much an open issue," Roberts said.

Both the district government and Heller want the high court to take the case. The split among the appeals courts and the importance of the issue make it likely that the justices will do so, Tushnet said.

The case is District of Columbia v. Heller, 07-290.

[Xisiqomelir]

USSC? If I said you were European, would I be right?

[Dartzap]

Funnily enough, there are Europeans on this site. I know its a fairly shocking revelation, what with a fair chunk of the mods and supermods being of European stock.....

USSC makes sense to me, heh.

[Drooling Iguana]

It sounds less like a part of the male anatomy than SCOTUS.

[Xisiqomelir]

Funnily enough, there are Europeans on this site. I know its a fairly shocking revelation, what with a fair chunk of the mods and supermods being of European stock.....

USSC makes sense to me, heh.

Are you claiming European-ness? Britons are automatically disqualified

[Dartzap]

Funnily enough, there are Europeans on this site. I know its a fairly shocking revelation, what with a fair chunk of the mods and supermods being of European stock.....

USSC makes sense to me, heh.

Are you claiming European-ness? Britons are automatically disqualified

I was going via the geographical definition, not the political one, so pfft at you

[CaptainChewbacca]

What if the Supreme Court decides that all people have a right to bear arms, provided they register as a part of a state-regulated militia? If there's a landslide, or a missing person, or some sort of civil disturbance, call out the local militia.

Stuart wrote a short story for his TBO universe about it, and I'm thinking some justice somewhere might've read it.

[Kanastrous]

I was going via the geographical definition, not the political one, so pfft at you

I usually think of England as Albion, and that chunk of land a few miles to the east, as Europe...

[Dartzap]

I was going via the geographical definition, not the political one, so pfft at you

I usually think of England as Albion, and that chunk of land a few miles to the east, as Europe...

You'd be amazed at the number of people who'd not have a clue what Albion referred to. Be thankful I know something of history

[Drooling Iguana]

I only know it since it was mentioned in King Lear.

[Admiral Valdemar]

I edited the title, because USSC bugged the hell out of me. I kept reading it as USSR for some reason.

[DavidEC]

This is it, right, the big showdown as far as gun rights are concerned, at least until the next one? Or will it be limited in scope and impact?

[Xisiqomelir]

I edited the title, because USSC bugged the hell out of me. I kept reading it as USSR for some reason.

Too good

[Adrian Laguna]

This is it, right, the big showdown as far as gun rights are concerned, at least until the next one? Or will it be limited in scope and impact?

Depends on whether the court decides to hear the case, and whether, after deciding to hear it, they decide to actually confront it head on. The Supreme Court can always simply sidestep the issue through mealy mouthed bullshit or due to a technicality.

[MKSheppard]

My god, they've finally agreed to do a 2nd A case?

[Androsphinx]

Ronald Dworkin had a piece in the NYRB back in September about "the Conservative Phalanx Ruling the Supreme Court", about how the court for entirely political reasons had recently trampled on several well-established precedents (for the lawyers, the cases included Hein, Grutter, Leegin, Frederick and Wisconson Right to Life), concluding "the worst is yet to come".

Nothing good can come of this.