In a landmark 5-4 decision the United States Supreme court has overturned the DC handgun ban upholding that the Second Amendment does in fact allow US Citizens the right to own firearms for personal use. You can read about the ruling at the SCOTUS Blog.
Tom Goldstein offers his succinct bottom-line opinion of the ruling.
The 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals has dismissed the case of City of New York v. Beretta U.S.A. Corp. The case before the court was a ridiculous attempt by the City of New York to hold a gun manufacturer liable for the illegal use of guns. The city attempted to bypass the legislative process and the will of the people with an appeal to what would have amounted to the worst type of judicial activism an attack against the Bill of Rights.
Given its absurdity, this case should have never been heard. If the court would have found in favor of the city, the real losers would have been the responsible owners of hand guns that have every right to secure and defend their property and loved ones with lethal force when under attack. How would such a win actually curtail crime? The attempt to transfer the responsibility for a criminal act from the criminal to the manufacturer dodges the real societal problems and instead looked for a convenient target — the gun manufacturer. Who would ever protect the gun manufacturer? Thankfully, this court did, and resisted the city’s urging for judicial activism.
Phyllis Schlafly covers the decision over at Townhall. She writes the following:
The lawsuit cited the harm from gun sales while ignoring evidence that the benefits far outweigh the harm. The trial court sided with Bloomberg, but the appellate court said “no” and put an end to the nonsense.
Congress had legislated the basis for this decision by passing the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act in 2005. The PLCAA protects against a “qualified civil liability action,” defined broadly to include almost any lawsuit brought against a gun manufacturer or seller based on “the criminal or unlawful misuse” of a firearm distributed in interstate commerce. On the day it was signed into law by President George W. Bush, gun manufacturers moved to dismiss this case, and the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals has now enforced the law.
The appellate court rejected an argument that this law denied access to the courts. New York City can and does sue all the time, but Congress properly rejected the ridiculous notion that the city could sue businesses over a typically beneficial product that was later used illegally.
Should General Motors Corp. and Ford Motor Co. be held liable for crimes committed by drunk drivers, or baseball bat suppliers be sued for criminal beatings inflicted with their products? Of course not. It was an outrage that courts even entertained such actions against gun manufacturers and suppliers.
If Congress had not effectively withdrawn jurisdiction, gun manufacturers would be reluctant to produce guns and many might go out of business. This intimidation would deter the lawful sale of guns.
That’s exactly what gun-control advocates have long wanted: legislation from the bench that they could not persuade real legislatures to pass. A majority of legislators, who are elected, see the absurdity of gun control and recognize the valuable self-defense function of guns.
The Supreme Court of the United is currently considering the the case of the “District of Columbia v. Heller.” This will be a landmark decision rendered by the court on the Second Amendment. The Second Amendment simply states:
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.
According to the SCOTUS Blog in November, this is the first time that the Supreme Court will rule on a Second Amendment case in nearly 70 years:
After a hiatus of 68 years, the Supreme Court on Tuesday agreed to rule on the meaning of the Second Amendment — the hotly contested part of the Constitution that guarantees “a right to keep and bear arms.” Not since 1939 has the Court heard a case directly testing the Amendment’s scope — and there is a debate about whether it actually decided anything in that earlier ruling. In a sense, the Court may well be writing on a clean slate if, in the end, it decides the ultimate question: does the Second Amendment guarantee an individual right to have a gun for private use, or does it only guarantee a collective right to have guns in an organized military force such as a state National Guard unit?
But exactly what is being challenged in the case?
In 1975, the District of Columbia passed the “Firearms Control Regulations Act of 1975″ banning the ownership of handguns by most residents and placing restrictions on the storage and access of other guns in residents homes effectively rendering the useless for the purpose of home defense. Wikipedia has the following summary:
The Firearms Control Regulations Act of 1975 was passed by the District of Columbia city council on June 26, 1976.[1] The law banned residents from owning handguns, automatic firearms, and high-capacity semi-automatic firearms, as well as prohibited possession of unregistered firearms. Exceptions to the ban were allowed for police officers and guns registered before 1976. The law also required firearms kept in the home to be “unloaded, disassembled, or bound by a trigger lock or similar device”[2], thus amounting to a prohibition on the use of firearms for self-defense in the home.[3]
Portions of this law were struck down by United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit in the case District of Columbia v. Parker. This ruling has been stayed pending appeal with the United States Supreme Court.
On March 9, 2007, the United States Court of Appeals ruled that the “Firearms Control Regulations Act of 1975″ violated the residents Second Amendment Rights. The opinion of the court can be read in it’s entirety here.
The Supreme Court is now reviewing the case to determine if the striking down of the law is justified on constitutional grounds. According the SCOTUS Blog, the justices have decided to frame the constitutional question themselves as follows:
The Justices chose to write out for themselves the constitutional question they will undertake to answer in Heller. Both sides had urged the Court to hear the city’s case, but they had disagreed over how to frame the Second Amendment issue.
Here is the way the Court phrased the granted issue:
“Whether the following provisions — D.C. Code secs. 7-2502.02(a)(4), 22-4504(a), and 7-2507.02 — violate the Second Amendment rights of individuals who are not affiliated with any state-regulated militia, but who wish to keep handguns and other firearms for private use in their homes?”
The arguments on the case were heard by the justices on March 18, 2008. The entire transcript of those hearings is available from the Supreme Court here. The arguments can be heard here.
For all Originalists, this is will be a ruling that will be watched with great scrutiny. In my opinion, the Second Amendment is quite clear on the rights of US citizens to own and utilize guns and that right shall NOT be infringed! It would be a terrible travesty if the court were to uphold DC’s “Firearms Control Regulations Act of 1975.”
