< Back to the Main Site

Author Topic: It's official - SCOTUS rules in favor of McDonald  (Read 1720 times)

Offline Bill

  • NFOA Full Member
  • **
  • Join Date: Feb 2010
  • Posts: 154
It's official - SCOTUS rules in favor of McDonald
« on: June 28, 2010, 09:16:27 AM »
It hasn't hit the news sites yet, but the Supreme Court ruled in favor of McDonald in McDonald vs. Chicago and struck down the handgun ban as unconstitutional on a 5-4 vote.

You can download the ruling here:  http://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/09pdf/08-1521.pdf

Offline Mudinyeri

  • God, save us!
  • NFOA Full Member
  • **
  • Join Date: May 2010
  • Location: Omaha
  • Posts: 3965
  • Run for the Hills
Re: It's official - SCOTUS rules in favor of McDonald
« Reply #1 on: June 28, 2010, 09:21:08 AM »
Chalk one up for the good guys!  ;D


Offline Greybeard

  • Bronze Benefactor
  • ***
  • Join Date: Mar 2010
  • Location: Papillion, NE
  • Posts: 405
  • Live Free or Die!!
Re: It's official - SCOTUS rules in favor of McDonald
« Reply #3 on: June 28, 2010, 10:54:29 AM »
It is a good thing that the current court composition ruled on this. It won't be long before Liberals will be writing the majority opinions.
WØCHF

Offline Mudinyeri

  • God, save us!
  • NFOA Full Member
  • **
  • Join Date: May 2010
  • Location: Omaha
  • Posts: 3965
  • Run for the Hills
Re: It's official - SCOTUS rules in favor of McDonald
« Reply #4 on: June 28, 2010, 11:06:43 AM »
It is a good thing that the current court composition ruled on this. It won't be long before Liberals will be writing the majority opinions.

Agreed.

Interesting reading if you're into it: http://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/09pdf/08-1521.pdf

Offline Greybeard

  • Bronze Benefactor
  • ***
  • Join Date: Mar 2010
  • Location: Papillion, NE
  • Posts: 405
  • Live Free or Die!!
Re: It's official - SCOTUS rules in favor of McDonald
« Reply #5 on: June 28, 2010, 11:21:23 AM »
That is going to take a while to get through. The question then becomes, "Will I understand what I have read?"
WØCHF

Offline SBarry

  • Former BOD, NFOA Volunteer , NFOA Firearm Rights Champion Award Winner
  • NFOA Full Member
  • **
  • Join Date: Apr 2009
  • Location: Kearney
  • Posts: 1107
Re: It's official - SCOTUS rules in favor of McDonald
« Reply #6 on: June 28, 2010, 11:51:24 AM »
SotoMayor was in the dissent? Wierd, Ben assured me in that email that Sotomayor would not be an activist judge. Someone email that bastard and rub it in, he won't respond to me anymore.

This is a great day!
The sheep don't like this sheepdog until the wolves start working the flock.

Offline Mudinyeri

  • God, save us!
  • NFOA Full Member
  • **
  • Join Date: May 2010
  • Location: Omaha
  • Posts: 3965
  • Run for the Hills
Re: It's official - SCOTUS rules in favor of McDonald
« Reply #7 on: June 28, 2010, 12:52:06 PM »
That is going to take a while to get through. The question then becomes, "Will I understand what I have read?"

It's actually not bad.  If you ignore all the cited cases, etc. you can read through the summary in a few minutes.

Offline HuskerXDM

  • 2014 NFOA Firearms Rights Champion
  • Powder Benefactor
  • *
  • Join Date: Jun 2010
  • Location: Lincoln, NE
  • Posts: 948
Re: It's official - SCOTUS rules in favor of McDonald
« Reply #8 on: June 28, 2010, 02:36:13 PM »
Great news!
The master has failed more than the beginner has even tried.

Offline Greybeard

  • Bronze Benefactor
  • ***
  • Join Date: Mar 2010
  • Location: Papillion, NE
  • Posts: 405
  • Live Free or Die!!
Re: It's official - SCOTUS rules in favor of McDonald
« Reply #9 on: June 28, 2010, 03:05:07 PM »
SotoMayor will have more company shortly in the person of Kagan. Not going to be a pretty sight!!
WØCHF

Offline quixnet

  • NFOA Full Member
  • **
  • Join Date: Dec 2008
  • Posts: 30
    • Apex Critical Defense
Re: It's official - SCOTUS rules in favor of McDonald
« Reply #10 on: June 28, 2010, 04:05:34 PM »
June 28, 2010 - 10:07 AM | by: Lee Ross

http://liveshots.blogs.foxnews.com/2010/06/28/high-courts-big-ruling-for-gun-rights/

June 28, 2010 - 10:07 AM | by: Lee Ross

In its second major ruling on gun rights in three years, the Supreme Court Monday extended the federally protected right to keep and bear arms to all 50 states. The decision will be hailed by gun rights advocates and comes over the opposition of gun control groups, the city of Chicago and four justices.

Justice Samuel Alito wrote for the five justice majority saying "the right to keep and bear arms must be regarded as a substantive guarantee, not a prohibition that could be ignored so long as the States legislated in an evenhanded manner."

The ruling builds upon the Court's 2008 decision in D.C. v. Heller that invalidated the handgun ban in the nation's capital. More importantly, that decision held that the Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms was a right the Founders specifically delegated to individuals. The justices affirmed that decision and extended its reach to the 50 states. Today's ruling also invalidates Chicago's handgun ban.

Backgrounder:

WASHINGTON -- The Supreme Court appears poised to issue a ruling that will expand to the states the high court's historic 2008 ruling that individuals have a federally protected right to keep and bear arms, following an hour-long argument Tuesday. If so, the decision would mark another hallmark victory for gun rights advocates and likely strike down Chicago's handgun ban that is similar to the Washington D.C. law already invalidated by the justices.

Tuesday's lively arguments featured lawyer Alan Gura, the same man who argued and won D.C. v. Heller in 2008. He now represents Otis McDonald who believes Chicago's handgun ban doesn't allow him to adequately protect himself. Gura argued the Heller decision which only applied to Washington D.C. and other areas of federal control should equally apply to Chicago and the rest of the country.

"In 1868, our nation made a promise to the McDonald family that they and their descendants would henceforth be American citizens, and with American citizenship came the guarantee enshrined in our Constitution that no State could make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of American citizenship," Gura told the Court.

He argued the language of the Constitution's 14th Amendment forces the states to protect the rights guaranteed by the Second Amendment. The Bill of Rights, which was adopted in the late 18th Century, was then commonly viewed as only offering protections from the federal government.

It wasn't until after the Civil War that the Supreme Court in a piecemeal fashion began to apply--or incorporate--parts of the Bill of Rights to the states. It has used the 14th Amendment's Due Process Clause to incorporate most of the Constitution's first amendments but has not yet done so for the Second Amendment. Gura argued that another part of the 14th Amendment would be a better vehicle for the justices to make their ruling but there didn't appear to be enough support from the bench on that front.

Chief Justice John Roberts was the most vocal advocate of using the Due Process Clause to extend the Second Amendment rights to the states. "I don't see how you can read -- I don't see how you can read Heller and not take away from it the notion that the Second Amendment...was extremely important to the framers in their view of what liberty meant."

The discussion over "liberty" was a major philosophical theme of the arguments. Gura and National Rifle Association lawyer Paul Clement argued that the rights articulated in the Second Amendment are fundamental freedoms and would exist to all Americans even if there was no law specifically saying so.

James Feldman, lawyer for the City of Chicago, defended his city's handgun ban and argued why the Heller decision's Second Amendment guarantee doesn't comport with the view that it represents a vital protection of liberty that needs to be expanded to the states.

"[T]he right it protects is not implicit in the concept of ordered liberty," Feldman said. "States and local governments have been the primary locus of firearms regulation in this country for the last 220 years. Firearms unlike anything else that is the subject of a provision of the Bill of Rights are designed to injure and kill."

Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg dissented in Heller and wondered why the right to bear arms was necessary to extend to the states. "f the notion is that these are principles that any free society would adopt, well, a lot of free societies have rejected the right to keep and bear arms."

Later in the arguments Roberts disputed that notion. "I do think the focus is our system of ordered liberty, not any abstract system of ordered liberty. You can say Japan is a free country, but it doesn't have the right to trial by -- by jury."

Roberts was part of the five member majority in Heller and there's a good chance Tuesday's case will result in a similar 5-4 outcome. All of the members of the Heller majority are still on the Court and at least one of them would have to rule against extending the Second Amendment protection in order for the opposing side to prevail.

Offline DanClrk51

  • NFOA Full Member
  • **
  • Join Date: Mar 2009
  • Location: Bellevue
  • Posts: 1128
Re: It's official - SCOTUS rules in favor of McDonald
« Reply #11 on: June 29, 2010, 04:48:59 AM »
Make no mistake about it! The fascist Democrats will try to overturn this ruling as soon as they get control of the court. We can forget precedent here because Democrats don't pay respect to any legal doctrine nor the constitution for that matter, and they will argue that the court's 5-4 decision was a weak one and a review would be warranted.

We all need to write our Senators demanding that Kagan be filibustered as her record speaks for itself. She is clearly NOT qualified to be on the court as she has 0 judicial experience. She is a political activist for the extreme left wing and her views on a wide range of topics are shocking and downright scary! She thinks free speech needs to be redistributed, and has basically said that it's fine if the law bans books because the government won't really enforce it!

Offline DanClrk51

  • NFOA Full Member
  • **
  • Join Date: Mar 2009
  • Location: Bellevue
  • Posts: 1128
Re: It's official - SCOTUS rules in favor of McDonald
« Reply #12 on: June 29, 2010, 08:29:47 AM »
Here's another story:

http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/Supreme_Court/supreme-court-affirms-gun-handguns-home/story?id=10727952&page=1

Supreme Court Affirms Right to Keep Handguns in Home
Justices Narrowly Vote to Challenge Chicago's Strict Ban on Handguns
By ARIANE de VOGUE
WASHINGTON, June 28, 2010?
A narrowly divided Supreme Court today ruled that the Second Amendment's right to bear arms is applicable to all states and municipalities. The ruling will most likely overturn Chicago's strict ban on handguns.
"It is clear that the framers and ratifiers of the Fourteenth Amendment counted the right to keep and bear arms among those fundamental rights necessary to our system of ordered liberty," wrote Justice Samuel Alito for the five-four majority.
In 2008, the Court issued a landmark decision in the case District of Columbia v. Heller that established for the first time an individual's constitutional right to have a gun in his house, striking down Washington D.C.'s, strict handgun ban. The ruling, however, applied only to federal enclaves.
Today's ruling applies to states and cities, such as Chicago, that have similar bans.
"We hold that the Second Amendment right is fully applicable to the states," wrote Alito in the 45-page decision.
But Alito was also careful to note that in some instances the right to bear arms can be limited.
"It is important to keep in mind that Heller, while striking down a law that prohibited the possession of handguns in the home, recognized that the right to keep and bear arms is not a right to keep and carry any weapon whatsoever in any manner whatsoever and for whatever purpose," he wrote.
"We made it clear in Heller that our holding did not cast doubt on such longstanding regulatory measures as prohibitions on the possession of firearms by felons and the mentally ill, 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."
Still, Justice John Paul Stevens disagreed with the majority decision. He was joined by Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Stephen Breyer and Sonia Sotomayor.
"The fact that the right to keep and bear arms appears in the Constitution should not obscure the novelty of the Court's decision to enforce that right against the States," wrote Stevens.
Justice Breyer, in a separate dissent, worried that today's decision will cause havoc in the Courts. "Consider," he wrote, "that countless gun regulations of many shapes and sizes are in place in every state and in many local communities. Does the right to possess weapons for self-defense extend outside the home? In the car to work? What sort of guns are necessary for self-defense?"
Otis McDonald, 76, brought the case to the Court. He feared for his life in his crime-saturated Chicago neighborhood and wanted his city's strict ban on handguns in the home overturned.
"Self defense in America has been validated today," McDonald said praising the court's decision. "Today the playing field will be level and I don't have to be concerned about the gang bangers in my neighborhood. They will now think twice. And I hope others in my position will be safer."
For nearly 30 years, Chicago banned possession of handguns and automatic weapons inside city limits, one of the most stringent gun laws in the country.
Chicago's Strict Handgun Ordinance Stemmed From Gang and Firearm Violence
"It makes me feel like the city cares more for the thugs than they do me, and I'm the one paying taxes," McDonald said of being barred from owning a gun in his own house.
It was in 1982 that Chicago imposed the strict gun ordinance to help combat rampant gang and firearm violence that plagued the city.
In court papers, lawyers for the city of Chicago pointed out that 402 of the 412 firearm homicides occurred with the use of handguns in 2008.
"Handguns are used to kill in the United States more than all other weapons, firearms and otherwise, combined," Chicago Corporation Counsel Mara S. Georges wrote.
She argued that the Court should leave it up to the states and cities to regulate handguns.
"The genius of our federal system ordinarily leaves this type of social problem to be worked out by state and local governments, without a nationally imposed solution excluding one choice or the other," Georges wrote.
Paul Helmke, of the Brady Campaign, called today's opinion "not a surprise" and took comfort in the fact that Alito ruled that the Second Amendment is not unlimited.
Copyright ? 2010 ABC News Internet Ventures


This is the part that scares me:

But Alito was also careful to note that in some instances the right to bear arms can be limited.

"It is important to keep in mind that Heller, while striking down a law that prohibited the possession of handguns in the home, recognized that the right to keep and bear arms is not a right to keep and carry any weapon whatsoever in any manner whatsoever and for whatever purpose," he (Alito) wrote.

.....So does this mean now that government is going to dictate that we can only own and carry certain weapons such as only revolvers (no semi-autos or "assault weapons"), or in what manner we carry them (such as a special/expensive type of holsters from which only the owner of the gun can draw the gun from), or have to prove a "valid" need to own or carry them?!

This sets a dangerous precedent, one that may allow any and all restrictive ordinances, which are only designed to significantly discourage and limit gun ownership, in DC to stand.
The court should have also explicitly struck down Chicago's Handgun ban instead of sending it back to the lower court.