Second Amendment & the Right to Keep and Bear Arms
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 Second Amendment protects the right of the people to keep and bear arms for defense of life and liberty.
In U.S. v. Cruikshank (1876), Presser v. Illinois (1886), Miller v. Texas (1894) and U.S. v. Miller (1939), the Supreme Court recognized that the amendment protects an individual right. It has never taken a different view. However, in Salina v. Blaksley (1905), the Kansas Supreme Court invented the idea that the amendment instead protected a “right” of a person to keep and bear arms only while serving in a state militia, and in U.S. v. Tot (1942), the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit advanced the idea that the amendment protects the “right” of a state to have a militia.
In District of Columbia v. Heller (2008), the Supreme Court heard its first case specifically centered on whether the amendment protects an individual right to arms. Gun control supporters advanced essentially the "Salina" argument, but the Court, consistent with its previous rulings in Second Amendment-related cases, ruled that the amendment protects an individual right to keep arms and to bear arms "in case of confrontation," without regard to a person’s relationship to a militia.
In McDonald v. Chicago (2010), the court extended the Second Amendment's protection nationwide.
Tuesday, November 28, 2017
The justices in the past have passed up the chance to hear challenges to similar laws in a ...
Friday, November 17, 2017
“We have some folks in this room who believe it is a privilege and we have some folks ...
Wednesday, November 15, 2017
The Northern Marianas governor has passed a law banning handguns in the territory - but it can't be ...
Monday, October 30, 2017
And Dafi Griffiths, Head Boy at Newent, was able to ask Mrs Clinton:“Did you share Barack Obama’s views ...
Monday, October 23, 2017
Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom has asked the courts to lift an order that blocks California’s ban on large-capacity ...
Monday, October 23, 2017
If your dream of owning a stun gun has been thwarted by the state’s decades-long ban, you’re in ...
Friday, October 13, 2017
What happens to the 400 million or so firearms already in private hands? How does society actually benefit ...
Monday, October 9, 2017
His column is not a rigorous one. Indeed, it is barely a column so much as it is ...
Thursday, October 5, 2017
District officials will not appeal a court order blocking enforcement of the city’s restrictions on the carrying of ...
Thursday, October 5, 2017
“I have never understood the conservative fetish for the Second Amendment,” New York Times columnist Bret Stephens opens ...