Defining Dangerous and Unusual, Part II

[USAFNoDak]

2. Like most rights, the Second Amendment right is not unlimited.
It is not a right to keep and carry any weapon whatsoever in any
manner whatsoever and for whatever purpose: For example, concealed
weapons prohibitions have been upheld under the Amendment
or state analogues. The Court’s opinion should not be taken to cast
doubt on longstanding prohibitions on the possession of firearms by
felons and the mentally ill, or laws forbidding the carrying of firearms
in sensitive places such as schools and government buildings, or
laws imposing conditions and qualifications on the commercial sale of
arms. Miller’s holding that the sorts of weapons protected are those
“in common use at the time” finds support in the historical tradition
of prohibiting the carrying of dangerous and unusual weapons.
Pp. 54–56."

That emboldened phrase may be a hole in the line which can be exploited at some future point in time. It says nothing about "possessing, keeping, or owning" dangerous and unusual weapons. For now, however, we have to live with the Heller decision. As far as getting more of our rights protected, it's sort of like the Wicked Witch of the West trying to figure out how to get the ruby slippers away from Dorothy. She knew that she couldn't get the slippers from Dorothy as long as Dorothy was alive. But that wasn't what concerned her. It was how to do it (as in killing Dorothy). She said, "These things must be done delicately".

We must move with determination but with caution as well. We don't want to turn the apple cart over before we've pushed it all the way up the hill. Heller was not meant to be the last minute heroic shot that won the game for us. We've been in the game since 1934 and there's more game to be played. Heller was a victory in that it put a virtual bullet in the head of the group which used to argue for the collective rights theory. We can now move on to other targets, goals, and objectives. But Heller is not a doomsday weapon for us. It was a strategic win, and may help us to more victories, but it didn't end the battle. We must continue to fight to protect more of our RKBA. With states such as California, New Jersey, Illinois, etc, and many federal laws which infringe upon our rights, we've got plenty to do.

 

[Tennessee Gentleman]

But Heller is wrong. The 2nd says "arms", not just FIREarms. And the militia component of the 2nd is perhaps more important than the self-defense aspect that Heller focused upon...

I think all the courts today will rule that arms mean firearms. The militia that the 2A speaks of, is today, the National Guard. Heller was right in that it decoupled the RKBA from service in the militia. Linking them together would allow unlimited regulation to include bans on our private ownership of firearms.

Heller fixed that.