Posted on 11/27/2007 9:36:38 AM PST by pabianice
On November 20, 2007, the Supreme Court of the United States agreed to hear an appeal of DC vs. Heller, a decision that made good liberals run for the airsickness bag. In Heller, the DC Court of Appeals had ruled that the District of Columbias prohibition on handgun ownership and its requirement that long guns be disassembled was a violation of the 2nd Amendment to the U.S. Constitution: A well-regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed. The court ruled that the 2nd Amendment was indeed an individual right, as are all others expressed in the Bill of Rights, and not a right of the state.
This case had been brought by, among others, a DC resident who carried a pistol on his job as a security guard but was prohibited from taking it home for his own defense in case such force was needed to protect his life while off-duty in one of the US most violent and dangerous cities. The courts judgment resulted in a hysterical reaction from the countrys liberals, including DC Mayor Fenty, who ordered his government to appeal the decision.
Reaction from the countrys failing liberal newspapers was quick and predictable in their big city irrational hatred of self-defense. The Boston Globe (whose circulation is tanking, along with its parent, the NY Times) contributed the following in an alleged news article on the case, full of its usual bias (itals added):
The Supreme Court announced yesterday that it would decide whether the Constitution grants individuals the right to keep guns in their homes for private use, plunging the justices into a divisive and long-running debate over how to interpret the Second Amendment's guarantee of the "right of the people to keep and bear arms." The court accepted a case on the District of Columbia's 31-year-old prohibition on the ownership of handguns. In adding the case to its calendar, for argument in March with a decision possibly in June, the court not only raised the temperature of its current term, but also inevitably injected the issue of gun control into the presidential campaign. The federal appeals court here, breaking with the great majority of federal courts to have examined the issue over the decades, ruled last March that the Second Amendment right was an individual one, not tied to service in a militia, and that the District of Columbia's categorical ban on handguns was unconstitutional
Heller was one of six plaintiffs recruited by a wealthy libertarian lawyer, Robert A. Levy, who created and financed the lawsuit for the purpose of getting a Second Amendment case before the Supreme Court...
The Supreme Court last looked at the Second Amendment nearly 70 years ago in United States v. Miller, a 1939 decision that suggested, without explicitly deciding, that the right should be understood in connection with service in a militia...(this is just a plain lie, but what we've come to expect from the Globe)
The District of Columbia, of course, is not a state, and one of the arguments its lawyers are making in their appeal is that the Second Amendment simply does not apply to "legislation enacted exclusively for the District of Columbia...
ping
They should stick with this argument before the SCOTUS. They are in effect saying that the Constitution does not apply to DC.
This fellow may have let his ideology run away with his brain.
Years ago, I was involved in a case that struck down the City of Atlanta's "assault weapon ban" (which of course didn't ban a single assault weapon.) The mayor very prudently decided not to appeal, because under Georgia law we had a cast iron case and an appeal would have made the case precedential, whereas unappealed it was just another superior court order and not binding on anybody except the City fathers.
Thank goodness for “wealthy libertarian lawyers.”
Uh, which party to this action filed the appeal?
Heller, et al, or the good liberal trash of DC?
“Reaction from the countrys failing liberal newspapers was quick and predictable...”
I really like the sound of that.
Agreed. So that also means the thirteenth amendment does not apply in D>C> So slavery is legal in D.C.!
Oops. D>C> s.b. D.C.
"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus
Heh. That would totally desirable, now wouldn't it?
Aside from divorcing DC from Constitutional protections, in toto we could set up a Gitmo style facility right there without ever again having to hear legal arguments for the prisoners or their treatment.
Woo-hoo, waterboarding for Dem senators. Well, except for Fat Ted who has proven that he can escape from near drownings.
If you think the Boston Globe story is skewed, get a load of this insipid editorial in the Newsday:
http://www.newsday.com/news/opinion/ny-vpgun265476853nov26,0,551861.story
Brutal. Squishy, touchy feely lefty editors on display.....
I wonder how the SCOTUS decision will affect if at all the right for felons to own guns.
"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus
Don’t confuse them. They want to prevent the country from being “awash” with guns. Its for the children, don’t ya know....
They should be in a panic. Next summer, all their utopian dreams of gun control will be washed away, and activists will be carrying their sidearms openly in downtown Boston.
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