WP Editorial on Overturning DC Gun Ban, and Your Opinion?

[Sparkly]

Poll question: WP Editorial on Overturning DC Gun Ban, and Your Opinion?

Dangerous Ruling
An appeals court ruling would put handguns back in D.C. homes.

Saturday, March 10, 2007; Page A18

IN OVERTURNING the District of Columbia's long-standing ban on handguns yesterday, a federal appeals court turned its back on nearly 70 years of Supreme Court precedent to give a new and dangerous meaning to the Second Amendment. If allowed to stand, this radical ruling will inevitably mean more people killed and wounded as keeping guns out of the city becomes harder. Moreover, if the legal principles used in the decision are applied nationally, every gun control law on the books would be imperiled.

The 2 to 1 decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit struck down sections of a 1976 law that bans city residents from having handguns in their homes. The court also overturned the law's requirement that shotguns and rifles be stored disassembled or with trigger locks. The court grounded its unprecedented ruling in the finding that the Second Amendment right to bear arms extends beyond militias to individuals. The activities the Second Amendment protects, the judges wrote, "are not limited to militia service, nor is an individual's enjoyment of the right contingent upon his or continued intermittent enrollment in the militia."

Never before has a law been struck down on that basis. The Supreme Court, in its landmark 1939 decision United States v. Miller, stated that the Second Amendment was adopted "with obvious purpose" of protecting the ability of states to organize militias and "must be interpreted and applied with that end in view." Nearly every other federal court of appeals has concurred in that finding. The dissenting judge in yesterday's opinion, Karen LeCraft Henderson, a Republican appointee like the other two judges on the panel, rightly lambasted the majority for its willful disregard of Supreme Court precedent.

While the ruling caught observers off guard, it was not completely unexpected, given the unconscionable campaign, led by the National Rife Association and abetted by the Bush administration, to broadly reinterpret the Constitution so as to give individuals Second Amendment rights. Indeed, the D.C. lawsuit, by six residents assisted by the Cato Institute, was filed in 2003, just months after then-Attorney General John D. Ashcroft said gun bans are unconstitutional.

The NRA predictably welcomed yesterday's ruling. According to its myth, only criminals have had guns in the city and now law-abiding citizens will be able to arm themselves for protection. Mayor Adrian M. Fenty (D) counters that argument with the sad record of what results from a proliferation of guns. As he points out, more guns mean only more violence, and the city already has too much of both. It is important to note that the ban on handguns will stay in effect while the city considers whether to appeal.

That is likely, Mr. Fenty announced. The risk here is that an appeal could lead to an unfavorable Supreme Court ruling, and a legal principle that now applies only to the residents of the nation's capital would extend to the entire nation. Yet doing nothing wouldn't serve the best interests of the city and its public safety. Nor, for that matter, would it serve the nation's interest to leave this dangerous ruling unchallenged. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/03/09/AR2007030901794.html

[originalpckelly]

1. How are we any different from the Republicans who'd take our freedoms away just for safety?

"Those who would give up Essential Liberty to purchase a little Temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety."

Life is a risk, and quite frankly there will be no other effect than to keep guns out of the hands of a law abiding citizen. If we want to reduce crime, the time would be better spent working with the youth of D.C. to give them a hopeful future.

[BootinUp]

3. loaded handguns proliferating in a city makes it a lot riskier. n/t

Whats wrong with requiring citizens to own the other weapons the law allowed?

[Solo_in_MD]

6. Which weapons were comprable in effectiveness to a handgun and would allow a woman to

defend herself effectively against a large thug?

[BootinUp]

9. I would probably favor the right to carry a handgun in a city

if the person was licensed and trained to use it and met other criteria from a background check.

But I do not favor loose regulation. Anyways the court decision is effectively saying a community cannot decide how to regulate guns in their own community. I disagree with that.

[Solo_in_MD]

10. DC bans any new owernship which is clearly overbroad

Its also not going to be wide open, Federal laws remain in place and not even the NRA opposes background checks.

As for the community being able to totally abolish a right (which is what the struckdown DC law effectively did), substitute black for guns, and see what you get.

[BootinUp]

11. I don't agree with your interpretation

of the right you say was struck down.

[Solo_in_MD]

12. Try to move into DC and legally own a handgun...under the law it was not possible

[BootinUp]

13. Sure, but thats not contradicting my previous post. n/t

[Solo_in_MD]

14. DC eliminated the right to own new/additional guns...if they have that power

they could just as easily ban new gays/blacks/or women

Localities can not over ride the Bill of Rights etc. Otherwise abortion would not be legal in parts of the US

[BootinUp]

15. you mean new handguns?

The point I was trying to make was that there is no constitutional right for every citizen to own a particular type of gun.

[Solo_in_MD]

17. See post #16...the ban on private functional firearms in the district was almost absolute

and newcomers were completly locked out from the ownership of defensive firearms.

[Warren Stupidity]

2. The ruling is both correct and stupid.

Yes of course the 2nd is about the right of citizens to keep and bear arms, in their homes as they see fit without government regulation. The 'arms' referred to are clearly intended to include those weapons appropriate to the equipment of a citizens militia, which would mean all sorts of military class light and heavy weaponry and not 'stuff you might hunt deer (or in DC rat) with'. The '39 decision was a deliberate rewriting of the 2nd by the courts without their having to bother with an actual amendment. It was wrong to do that. It was also the correct thing to do, ignoring the fact that the amendment process would have been more honest, given the reality of the situation. Military technology, even back in '39, has made the idea behind the 2nd amendment: that the armed citizens would be the last bulwark against tyranny, quaint, which is to say obsolete. How are the armed citizenry supposed to resist today's military technology? Do we keep tactical nukes? SAMs? Anti-tank weapons?

Before somebody observes that the people of Iraq have resisted our occupation let me point out that we are a foreign occupying army there and are somewhat constrained in our suppression of the resistance by that fact. Saddam had no problem keeping order. Nor would our state feel constrained at all in dealing with a domestic threat to its existence.

Instead of dealing with the reality of the technological superiority of the modern military, we have a false debate over handguns and hunting. We are stuck with a state that has conventional firepower beyond the scope of a citizens militia and on top of that unconventional weaponry such as nuclear devices, that render the original intent of the 2nd amendment irrelevant.

The city of Washington DC, regardless of 2nd amendment issues, should of course be able to regulate the possesion of firearms.

[SteveM]

8. Even in the face of the Fourteenth Amendment?

Reasonable regulation of firearms is not prohibited by 2A (or any of the other BOR amendments). The same kind of test for what is reasonable would presumably apply. But 14A prevents states/localities from abridging the rights held by U.S. citizens. It may seem ironic to some that the Fourteenth Amendment -- so long the workhorse of modern civil rights advances -- can very well be used to ensure the Second Amendment. But the irony fades once you realize that 2A is a CIVIL RIGHT held by individuals. Once that is conceded, 14A comes into play big-time; in fact, much of the reasoning behind this Reconstruction Era amendment was to protect the civil rights of blacks threatened with disarmament by (Southern) governments, gangs and the KKK.

The "original intent" of 2A was to recognize the individual's right to self-defense -- even in the face of "state" power -- not guarantee a win over a "state that has conventional firepower beyond the scope of a citizens militia..." Mention of militias in 2A was only the most instant supporting rationale for this greater right of self-defense. I will not be presumptuous enough to predict who would "win" in a battle between citizens & citizens' militias on the one hand and (presumably) the federal government on the other, but I rather suspect the outcome will hinge less on the technicals of guns than with the greater resourcefulness of an unbound, intelligent and creative citizenry.

By the way, there is some constitutional scholarship which argues that "state" in 2A refers to a general notion of government and not to individual states.

[Joe Bacon]

4. I don't want Neocons taking my gun away from me.

I support the ruling. The last thing I want is the Republic Party taking my gun away from me.

[BOSSHOG]

5. It was the founding fathers intention

that all citizens should arm themselves in case they got pissed at their neighbor and needed to settle a dispute. Or if you did not have enough money to buy a six pack of beer then you should just take it as you point your constitutionally allowed hand gun on the proprietor. Love the militia angle. Armed militias in Washington DC? For what purpose? Founding fathers intent? That's exactly what they intended when they wrote, (a well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free) "gated community" or a "six pack."

Lets all arm ourselves to the hilt and ensure freedom regardless of who gets hurt. Because there is no way that can be achieved with gun control.

[Solo_in_MD]

7. It was telling that the minority opinion did not support the anti-2nd amendment stance of DC

and focused on that DC was not a state.

Hopefully the other racist gun control laws in Illinois and elsewhere will fall soon.

[benEzra]

16. AFAIK, DC made it illegal to have an assembled shotgun INSIDE YOUR OWN HOME...

not to mention the de facto absolute ban on handguns, unless you are at least 52 years old and have lived in the District since 1976.

Under current DC law, you are not allowed to keep any gun (even an 1800's style side by side shotgun) in your own home for self-defense purposes. Business owners can have weapons, as can hired security (so the wealthy in their gated communities weren't disarmed), but not regular homeowners.