mooreshawnm
New member
I agree with EVERY word you wrote Steel. Every word.
Shawn
Shawn
The Heller Decision - Some Initial Analysis
The following really amounts to nothing more than educated guessing at this point, and simply represents one person's musings.
The Supreme Court limited the case to the following issue:
Whether the following provisions, D.C. Code §§ 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?
This is completely reading tea leaves, but the particular issue that they limited this case to is one sentence packed with four important points:
1. "...violate the Second Amendment Right of individuals..."
2. "...who are not affiliated with any state-regulated militia..."
3. "...handguns and other firearms..."
4. "...for private use in their homes."
1. It appears the court has already indicated the Second Amendment is an individual right, and will rule as such. This has always been my reading of the prior Miller decision. The collective rights view will be summarily dismissed and the court doesn't want a bunch of time spent on whether the Second Amendment is an individual right versus a collective right. Being highly educated men and women, if they wanted a generalist brief on whether the Second Amendment was a collective right or an individual right, they would have asked for it. Words such as "Is the Second Amendment an individual right or a collective right of the states?" would have been used. Instead, they asked for whether the dc gun ban violates "the Second Amendment Right of individuals." That portion of Second Amendment argument appears to have been decided in favor of the individual rights view.
2. Lord, here we go again with the Militia. Their Order seems to be worded as the court not wanting to waste time arguing about who is or isn't in a militia, which necessarily means they don't view this issue as controlling. By saying they want the argument limited to people who are not affiliated with a militia, they indicate the being in the militia or not is immaterial. This case will not be decided under some obscure section of law defining militia membership, the Court seems to want to resolve the issue independent of the militia being material to the right or not. i.e. they don't want to revisit the issue if the definition of the militia changes, militia statues are withdrawn or something similar.
3. It appears that the Court wants to talk about firearms in general. This is important, because DC has been trying to say "we can ban handguns so long as we let you own rifles or shotguns." This appears to me to indicate that they aren't going to get into a Miller-type of analysis, a firearm is a firearm for the purposes of this Second Amendment decision.
4. This is the most problematic point as far as getting a broad pro-gun decision, but honestly it is one that the Plaintiffs asked for and welcome. This ruling will be restricted to use of a firearm in your own home. This is probably the cleanest, easiest route home for gun proponents. We aren't going to have to talk about guns in schools, guns in bars or whatever other sort of horror show the Bradys want to dream up while trying to determine whether or not this is a right and what it protects. The threshold issue will be determined (is it a right or isn't it) in the cleanest environment possible. Homes have always enjoyed the strongest presumption of protection and privacy, and this is the most secure environment to get the right established. My GUESS is that there is a majority of justices who are willing to rule for pro-gun advocates, perhaps even a unanimous group, but only if it is strictly limited to inside the home for the first round decision. The hardcore group of pro-gun justices want the camels nose in the tent as strong as possible, so the compromise that was made was that this case would be limited to just a nice, clean issue of in your own home, which they can all agree upon.
Clearly, if laser guns that could kill someone from a thousand yards away were to come on the market (and they will), it would not be in the interest of protecting our law enforcement officials and citizens to allow such firearms to be sold to civilians
3. It appears that the Court wants to talk about firearms in general. This is important, because DC has been trying to say "we can ban handguns so long as we let you own rifles or shotguns." This appears to me to indicate that they aren't going to get into a Miller-type of analysis, a firearm is a firearm for the purposes of this Second Amendment decision.
It sometimes strikes me that we all would have been so much better off had the founding fathers simply said in The Second Amendment or elsewhere in The Constitution that "the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed", without mention of militia, well regulated or otherwise. They, unfortunately did not so state, leaving us where we are now.
George Mason said:That a well regulated militia, composed of the body of the people, trained to arms, is the proper, natural, and safe defense of a free state; that standing armies, in time of peace, should be avoided as dangerous to liberty; and that, in all cases, the military should be under strict subordination to, and be governed by, the civil power.