Posted on 10/25/2007 3:02:18 PM PDT by neverdem
The recent Second Amendment symposium at the George Mason University School of Law brought scholars and activists on both sides of the gun debate together to talk about what will happen to gun rights in the next few years. The consensus was that while no one knows exactly what will happen, it may well be historic.
On Oct. 17, the Law School hosted the Annual Symposium of the George Mason University Civil Rights Law Journal, entitled "The Second Amendment and Twenty-First Century Jurisprudence." I spoke along with a number of other well-known figures in the gun debate, both pro-gun and anti-gun. (By way of full disclosure, I should mention that I am on the board of advisers of the law school.)
There were three panels, each covering a different topic. One panel discussed whether the Second Amendment guarantees to private citizens like you and me the right to own and possess firearms – the collective vs. individual rights debate. The issue was discussed in the context of the widespread gun confiscation by the city of New Orleans in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. Another panel focused on government prohibition of firearm possession on public property. A third panel examined the D.C. gun ban case that is being offered to the Supreme Court, District of Columbia v. Heller, in which the District's 30-year-old prohibition against having a handgun in your home for self-defense is being challenged.
The panels were hard-hitting debates, discussing these important issues openly and honestly. And in January, the GMU Civil Rights Law Journal will be publishing research articles written by many of the speakers...
(Excerpt) Read more at worldnetdaily.com ...
Justices to consider gun case Nov. 9 (D.C. v. Heller nee Parker)
Uh, that's a safe bet.
For later. . .
...at the risk of sound like a broken record lately. People should read the State Constitutions of the original 13 States to get a clear and unmistakable idea of what the 2nd Amendment means.
Don't have to.
I know that the words "the right of the people" in the 2nd mean the very same thing in the 1st 4th 9th and 10th.
SCOTUS can abbregate them all or confirm what I already know as fact.
Not likely..... supreme court will probably ignore the situation like it has for the last 80 so years.....
Yay, GMU! I love my current and future alma mater.
Was David Schum one of the speakers? He is a prof in math AND law.
1. SCOTUS decides to let the 2nd circuit decision stand. (win for the good guys. History for the lawyers, but nice quiet history.)
2. SCOTUS decides to hear the case which has two likely outcomes:
a. They decide that the 2nd is an "individual right" (duh), but that DC simply crossed the line, and that the right to arms may be heavily regulated. More boo-hooing from the good guys, and from the bad guys, and more "quiet history...)
b. The court says it's a collective right, or no right at all... Somewhere between 25-30% of the adult population will take this very personally, and there will be some very LOUD history made.
There was a great line in the book, “Johnny Tremaine.” Based loosely on comments from Dr. warren of the time when discussing the turning over of American weapons and munitions.
Something to the affect, and I of course paraphrase (Please correct my statement at any time): I cannot turn over the rights of free men to fight against tyranny.
Something to that effect. It was a good line, anyway.
They could, but then the Parker v D.C. decision nullifies the applicable D.C. laws on handguns and long gun storage as well as leaving different decisions between the D.C. Circuit Court and the other Circuit Courts save dicta from the Fifth Circuit in the Emerson Case, IIRC.
I could see them refusing to grant cert if this case had some ambiguites, but I don't see any. And it would leave folks in D.C. with more Second Amendment rights than folks in the rest of the country save Alaska and Vermont.
How would I know?
Sorry, I thought maybe you had been there.
Red Army Dreams - You’re getting colder.
A Tale of Two Cult Classics The Al Qaeda Reader and Mein Kampf
Media myths about the Jena 6 (A local journalist tells the story you haven't heard)
From time to time, I’ll ping on noteworthy articles about politics, foreign and military affairs. FReepmail me if you want on or off my list.
How come I still don’t get a warm and fuzzy feeling here???
I’m all for the ruling to be established as an “individual” or “inalienable” right...Which is what the original intent was to be...
Your “right” to be secure in a “Free state” is a personal one, and not as some may think that the “Free state” means the “state” (Country, state, government)...
If the opinion from the SCOTUS becomes fuzzy, and allows some wiggle room that includes the wording to the effect of the right is a “fundamental” right, we will have made ZERO headway to where the issue needs to be...It may even damage the effort to establish the true “individual” meaning...And seeings how it took them this long to get to the point where they are going to have to review this issue...
We will all be dead and gone by the time they decide to look at it again...If they ever do...
The other thing that bothers me is this whole idea behind applying or interpreting this Amendment through the template of 21st Century Jurisprudence...
I prefer a traditional “wash-cycle” for this issue, instead of some “delicate” cycle thats not going to make the opinion a “hard” nut to crack in the future with a potential liberal/socialist SCOTUS...
I don’t know about y’all, but I am not impressed with that idea...Call me all the dirty names you want, but I am concerned that the SCOTUS however you feel it might NOT go our way anyway, it is not a lock in our favor...
Be wary of what you wish for...
This is just my opinion...
Of course this could all be taken care of if we had Eaker, neverdem, Dave Lone Ranger, myself, Squantos and a few other FReepers on the court...
A lot of things could be resolved with that line-up...
Thank God for George Mason, one of the last bastions of free thought in the sea of madness known as academia!
Jo, your daughter done good! Any chance she’ll continue on to law school? ;-)
A popular misconception is that if SCOTUS does not take the case, the whole thing kinda just goes away, with DC reformulating its overturned bans into almost-but-not-quite NYC-style mostly-bans. Hardly.
As the case stands now, and literally WHERE the case stands now, we have an enormous win. As the seat of federal government, and as the ruling is profoundly pro-individual-RKBA, we now have grounds to tear down 922(o), any future AWB, Brady, Yellow Forms, NICS, and most of any other federal arms control laws. DC is "home" to all federal gun control laws, and is where the Parker ruling prevails (if SCOTUS declines the case).
2a. ...may be heavily regulated
"Shall not be infringed." Even SCOTUS will have a tough time squeezing that one - especially in light of the extreme latitude granted other rights.
If they DO rule "individual" with limits (as indicated in Miller), the anti-gun crowd will have a stroke while the delighted pro-gun crowd races out to buy - at fair market value - their nifty new M16s, M2s, howitzers, and other serious military arms. Ya see, the only sane line to draw (IF it can be drawn) is to ban/restrict anything that is NOT plainly of common modern military use. Had Mr. Miller shown up to court with competent counsel, he easily would have won and SCOTUS decreed anyone (at least of draftable countenance) could have without restriction any arms suitable for militia use.
2b. The court says it's a collective right, or no right at all
Two words: unintended consequences.
It's not so much what I wish for, but the D.C. Circuit Court crossed the Rubicon with Parker, the horses already left the barn or whatever metaphor you please. That train left the station last March, and two liberals are on record that the Second Amendment means more than mere soldiering. Here's Parker and the relevant citation.
Parker v. Washington D.C. in HTML courtesy of zeugma.
We also note that at least three current members (and one former member) of the Supreme Court have read "bear Arms" in the Second Amendment to have meaning beyond mere soldiering: "Surely a most familiar meaning [of 'carries a firearm'] is, as the Constitution's Second Amendment ('keepand bear Arms') and Black's Law Dictionary . . . indicate: 'wear, bear, or carry . . . upon the person or in the clothing or in a pocket, for the purpose . . . of being armed and ready for offensive or defensive action in a case of conflict with another person." Muscarello v. United States, 524 U.S. 125, 143 (1998) (Ginsburg, J., dissenting, joined by Rehnquist, C.J., Scalia, J.,and Souter, J.) (emphasis in original). Based on the foregoing, we think the operative clause includes a private meaning for"bear Arms."
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.