High court agrees to hear gun rights case
“The US Supreme Court has agreed to examine one of the most disputed provisions of the Constitution — the Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms,” the Christian Science Monitor reports:
On Tuesday, the justices announced they will take up an appeal involving the constitutionality of a Washington, D.C., law that bans the use or possession of all handguns.
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A .45 Glock Model 30: There are many like it, but this one is mine. |
The case is District of Columbia v. Heller, and the Court limited its grant of certiorari to this question:
Whether the following provisions — D.C. Code ยงยง 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?
According to Lyle Denniston at SCOTUSBlog, “The first listed section bars registration of pistols if not registered before Sept. 24, 1976; the second bars carrying an unlicensed pistol, and the third requires that any gun kept at home must be unloaded and disassembled or bound by a lock, such as one that prevents the trigger from operating.”
As in other high-octane cases, Justice Anthony Kennedy’s vote may prove pivotal. If so, law professor Orin Kerr predicts a win, sort of, for gun owners:
… I looked into my SCOTUS 330CLe Model Crystal Ball (patent pending, with optional GPS system), and it’s predicting that Justice Kennedy will conclude that the Second Amendment does in fact create an individual right. It also tells me that Kennedy will endorse a relatively deferential standard of review that will end up allowing a great deal of gun regulation.
Liberal law professor Jack Balkin concurs:
… let me offer a prediction on the result: I predict that the Court will hold (1) that the 2nd amendment protects an individual right, (2) that this right applies against laws in federal territories like the District of Columbia, (3) that a relatively deferential standard of reasonableness applies, and (4) that, even under this relatively deferential statute at least one part of the D.C. gun control law is unconstitutional. That is to say, I predict a decision that tries to split the difference and is aimed roughly at the middle of public opinion, even if not the exact center.
Arizona lawyer and Second Amendment scholar David Hardy is cheered by the Court’s diction:
The reference to “Second Amendment rights of individuals who are not affiliated with any state-regulated militia…” is good. Implicit in that is that the old collective right theory (that Second Amendment rights are rights of states only) is off the table. We’re down to sophisticated collective rights vs. individual rights. And I might even venture a guess that the Court is showing favor for individual rights here. The sentence presupposes that there are “Second Amendment rights of individuals.” There’s no “if any” language in there. Read literally, it presupposes that individuals not in such a militia do have second amendment rights… the only question is whether the laws violate those rights. But that may be reading too much into the wording… then again, it was probably the result of some careful thinking, and negotiation.
The decision of the court below, where the case was styled Parker v. District of Columbia, is available in pdf.
Fingers crossed.
ADDED —
According to the New York Times, the Court will hear argument in March and render a decision by June.