If You Got ‘Em, Pack ‘Em

Today was perhaps the closest we have come to seeing the complete disregard for the Bill of Rights by the Supreme Court. However, by one slim vote, it was affirmed in D.C. v. Heller:

1. The Second Amendment protects an individual right to possess a firearm unconnected with service in a militia, and to use that arm for traditionally lawful purposes, such as self-defense within the home.Pp. 2–53.
(a) The Amendment’s prefatory clause announces a purpose, but does not limit or expand the scope of the second part, the operativeclause. The operative clause’s text and history demonstrate that it connotes an individual right to keep and bear arms. Pp. 2–22.
(b) The prefatory clause comports with the Court’s interpretation of the operative clause. The “militia” comprised all males physically capable of acting in concert for the common defense. The Antifederalists feared that the Federal Government would disarm the people in order to disable this citizens’ militia, enabling a politicized standing army or a select militia to rule. The response was to deny Congress power to abridge the ancient right of individuals to keep and bear arms, so that the ideal of a citizens’ militia would be preserved. Pp. 22–28.
(c) The Court’s interpretation is confirmed by analogous arms-bearing rights in state constitutions that preceded and immediately followed the Second Amendment. Pp. 28–30.
(d) The Second Amendment’s drafting history, while of dubious interpretive worth, reveals three state Second Amendment proposals that unequivocally referred to an individual right to bear arms. Pp. 30–32.

Although I notice the Court seems to have left intact some infringements on Second Amendment rights, for the most part one man (or woman) could have voted to destroy those rights entirely. Think about it, ONE vote could have led this Nation down the path to Civil War.

Of course some don’t agree:

Personally, I think Scalia got it wrong and Stevens got it right, but I also recognize that this is largely just a matter of opinion. In fact, I’ve long believed that we ought to rewrite the Second Amendment so that everyone is clear on exactly what it says, even if doing so means giving individuals a broader right to own fire arms than the courts are currently comfortable with. Constitutional ambiguity is bad.

But that is exactly the reason that Scalia’s opinion is poorly written: because Constitutional ambiguity is bad. The problem comes because at least three different networks (CNN, FOX, and TRU–formerly Court TV) this afternoon are reporting the Supreme Court decision as saying that individuals have the constitutional right to own guns for the purposes of self-defense and hunting. – Left Fielder

But then again even a moron has First Amendment rights. Others are like me, seeing the decision as good, but still shaky.

The 5-4 ruling was the first ever to directly address the meaning of the Second Amendment’s ambiguous text, but the decision left open the possibility that less restrictive state laws were permissible. – New York Librarian

None-the-less, it could have been worse, much worse.