Promising Arguments in McDonald v. Chicago 2nd Amendment Case
By Jeff Knox – The Firearms Coalition
Washington, DC –-(AmmoLand.com)- The Supreme Court has concluded hearing oral arguments in the case of McDonald v. Chicago, the Second Amendment Foundation’s challenge to Chicago’s gun ban.
As expected, the Justices gave strong indications that they intend to “incorporate” the Second Amendment to apply it against the states and declare Chicago’s gun ban unconstitutional.
That will of course be followed by Chicago Mayor Daley trying to loosen the law to the absolute minimum for compliance with the Court’s order just like Washington, DC did.
I expect to see at least two more lawsuits against Chicago before an average citizen will be able to purchase and possess a handgun in their home. One of the big questions in this case is whether the Court will use the “privileges or immunities” clause or the “equal protection” [“due process.”] clause to apply the Second Amendment to the states.
From their questions and comments, it sounded like they were not inclined to overturn previous bad precedents in order to use the “privileges or immunities” clause so it is likely they will stick with the tried and true (if somewhat convoluted) method of incorporation under the “equal protection” clause. None of that really matters as far as application of the Second Amendment is concerned though.
What really matters is whether the Justices include more superfluous BS in the decision like they did in Heller. Scalia’s assertions and assumptions in his written opinion in Heller have been predictably used to abuse the rights of gun owners. For now things look very good for a favorable ruling though. We can expect that to come out sometime in late June. As always, we’ll keep you posted.
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Yours for the Second Amendment, Jeff Knox www.FirearmsCoalition.org www.GunVoter.orgAbout:
The Firearms Coalition is a loose-knit coalition of individual Second Amendment activists, clubs and civil rights organizations. Founded by Neal Knox in 1984, the organization provides support to grassroots activists in the form of education, analysis of current issues, and with a historical perspective of the gun rights movement. The Firearms Coalition is a project of Neal Knox Associates, Manassas, VA. Visit: www.FirearmsCoalition.org
I was about to correct the article as well, but Steve in CO got to it first. The petitioners are not trying to incorporate the second amendment through the equal protection clause, they are trying to do it through the 14th amend Due Process and Privileges and Immunities clauses.
For more accurate rundown on the constitutionality, see:
https://volokh.com/2009/11/17/nra-brief-in-mcdonal…
The “equal protection” clause?? Don’t you mean the “due process” clause? That is the phrase that appeared repeatedly in the argument transcripts. There was brief mention of fundamental rights incorporation using the “Liberty” clause. Don’t know for sure what mechanics will be used, but the sense is incorporation is inevitable. Another issue was to what degree incorporation could occur. The justices seem willing to incorporate the second amendment fully and not follow the bad precedent set with juries and the sixth amendment. This is important because otherwise, a DC resident would have more constitutional rights than a Montanan! The conservative… Read more »