D.C. v Heller: SCOTUS scores

In a long overdue ruling,
the Supreme Court struck down a Washington D.C. gun ban as being in direct conflict with the Second Amendment. This 5-4 ruling will be viewed as controversial because of the touchiness of the subject, but there is nothing controversial about the outcome, other than the tardiness of it and the paper-thin dissent that will probably not stand up to additional challenges coming (e.g., SF, Chicago).

First, the gun ban. Most of us would easily admit the gun issue in America is a difficult subject to broach. It's certainly a gray area, with a broad spectrum of valid opinion that involves law, emotion, experience, tradition, statistics and huge amounts of hypotheticals. But I think that makes it even more important to talk about, and if extremes can be found, those extremes should give us solid footing to move back towards the other direction. The D.C. gun ban was so strict that citizens could not even keep a handgun in their own house -- not unloaded, not locked, not disassembled, not nothing.

Fittingly second, the Second Amendment. "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." Apparently, there is some debate over the punctuation in the sentence, but those are the words. Is that statement utterly dense or impenetrable? I'm not saying we all read it the same, but it's not rocket science. You don't need to have a degree in constitutional law to get it. In fact, it reminds me of Animal Farm (if my memory could be accurately stirred), where the Pigs gradually take control of the laws and make them more and more complicated and confusing until the Horses and all the animals can't make sense of them or remember what they had all agreed to in the first place. Well let's not say it's complicated when it's not. That writing has remained unchanged and on the same wall for over 200 years.

Third, the arguments for the D.C. gun ban. 1) The second amendment only protects members of state militias, 2) The ban is OK because it allows rifles and shotguns, 3) Washington D.C. (not a state) is like a state, and the second amendment doesn't apply to states, 4) handgun bans in general save lives.

So although this ruling may stir a lot of debate in a lot of areas of our country, the problem as I have laid it out is purely legal. It is also purely straightforward in this rare case of extremism. One at a time, I will address these arguments with no net below me -- I have no legal background yet feel qualified nonetheless, and you should too.

The second amendment only protects members of state militias. I'm not a historian either, but I'm pretty sure state militias were raised to protect towns, counties and states themselves whenever threats were apparent. Who made up these militias? Well, the People did. And, although the amendment clearly says the word "militia", it only describes them as being necessary and regulated. Clearly, it links the "People" (not the militias) to the right to "keep and bear arms".

The ban is OK because while banning all handguns, it allows rifles and shotguns. Well, it's interesting to pick this one apart and maybe even a little tricky. The ban does allow people to keep unloaded rifles and shotguns in their home either disassembled or with trigger locks. Say nothing of the connotation of "keep" somehow referring to private property, with "bear" somehow referring to public commons, this ban has not only squashed "bear" but has infringed upon "keep". And so, is it right for the city or state to construct a law that infringes so deeply into personal property rights that civil rights have been bulldozed all the way into a locked closet? This is not a ban on how people should behave in public, this is a ban on how people should behave in private.

Washington D.C. (not a state) is like a state, and the second amendment doesn't apply to states. This argument is bizarre. I almost don't even get it. My impression of the Bill of Rights is that it is designed to protect individuals from any sort of legal coercion, local, state or federal. The legal standing of Washington D.C. is moot in this case, since it is the aggressor against all citizens within. Imagine if there were a similar ban on certain types of speech that you could or couldn't have within your own house within Washington D.C. If it were the state of South Dakota enforcing the law, would that make the law more valid?

Handgun bans in general save lives. This one is an extremely important one to handle well, because the implication of the validity itself of this argument is extremely dangerous. First, let me ruin my own logic by entertaining the argument directly. In my experience, I have seen absolutely no credible evidence to show that gun bans increase or decrease the amount of gun violence or violence in general. I'm sure there are studies out there of "before and after" statistics showing both cases to be true. However, chasing this argument is both distracting to point and dilutive to the foundational importance of having three, separate branches of government. Unlike what some of our SCOTUS members may vainly think, the squaring of questionable laws to the Constitution and precedent must not take into account the social outcomes of those laws but rather only the direct coherent interpretation of the validity of said law to the Constitution. This may break Souter's Harvard heart, but he is not allowed to consider the effects of the laws on the People as such. Those effects are for the People to notice to serve as reasons to elect officials to then change such laws if undesirable. The Supreme Court does not reserve the right to imbue written laws with personal, political or social meanings through rulings, only to strike them down on legal standing; Warren Courts be damned.

That is the way I see it. I know there is plenty of room to disagree, as apparently four of our Justices did. However, their dissent was so weak, I believe it was offered only symbolically so as not to freak the nation out too badly. Imagine the message a 9-0 ruling would have sent, regardless of the legal soundness of it. But, is John Paul Stevens truly demented enough to write, that he doubts "that over 200 years ago, the Framers made a choice to limit the tools available to elected officials wishing to regulate civilian uses of weapons." That sounds the same as when a person loses an argument on merit and resorts to meta-arguing over the debate just had. It also sounds as if at least one member of SCOTUS believes that it is more important to protect the tools of politicians to make laws than it is to protect the tools citizens need to protect themselves, both physically and legally.

Debate on: be civil! Suggested reading, The Tempting of America by Robert Bork.