SCOTUS takes up oral arguments in the McDonald v. Chicago case today. I’m confident we’re going to win, it’s just a matter of by how much. The L.A. Times writes, “Justices signal they’re ready to make gun ownership a national right“:
“Most of the Supreme Court justices who two years ago said the 2nd Amendment protects individual gun rights signaled during arguments Tuesday that they are ready to extend this right nationwide and to use it to strike down some state and local gun regulations … All signs Tuesday were that five justices saw the right to “bear arms” as national in scope and not limited to laws passed in Washington. Justice Anthony M. Kennedy described the individual right to possess a gun as being of “fundamental character,” like the right to freedom of speech … Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. called it an “extremely important” right in the Constitution. Justices Antonin Scalia and Samuel A. Alito Jr. echoed the theme that the court had endorsed an individual, nationwide right in their decision two years ago. The fifth member of the majority, Justice Clarence Thomas, did not comment during the argument, but he had been a steady advocate of the 2nd Amendment … “
I would like to think it would be better than 5-4, but if that’s all we get, a win is still a win.
It’s also important to remember that incorporation won’t settled the gun control argument. It’s more like the beginning of a new phase that will play out over the next 5, 10, 20+ years.
“… Roberts all but forecast the court would issue an opinion that avoids deciding the harder questions about whether guns can be carried in public as well as kept at home. “We haven’t said anything about the content of the 2nd Amendment,” Roberts said at one point …”
Keep this in mind when the Sullivan Act doesn’t magically disappear immediately after McDonald is settled.
“… He added that the justices need not rule on whether there is a right to carry a “concealed” weapon …”
I have no problem with open carry.
Of course, the antis will never, ever go away either.
“… A lawyer for Chicago argued that there is a long American tradition of permitting states and cities to set gun regulations … Cities should be permitted to set “reasonable regulations of firearms,” he added, noting that Chicagoans are allowed to have rifles and shotguns in their homes …”
Reasonable regulations = gun bans. The court already said that’s a no-no.
“… he ran into stiff questioning from Scalia and his colleagues. At one during the argument, Justice John Paul Stevens suggested the right to bear arms could be limited to homes. A liberal who dissented in the earlier gun-rights case two years ago, Stevens said the court could rule for the Chicago home owners and say they had a right to a gun at home. At the same time, the court could say it is not “a right to parade around the street with a gun,” Stevens said. But that idea got no traction with the other justices …”
This is a good sign from the court. Is the right of free speech only allowed in the home? Is freedom of religion only allowed in church?
It’s going to be fun to watch the reaction from our politicians when New York State is forced to recognize there is an individual right to own guns.