Heller v. District of Columbia
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''District of Columbia v. Heller'', 554 U.S. 570 (2008), is a landmark decision of the
U.S. Supreme Court The Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) is the highest court in the federal judiciary of the United States. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all U.S. federal court cases, and over state court cases that involve a point o ...
ruling that the Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution protects an individual's right to keep and bear arms, unconnected with service in a
militia A militia () is generally an army or some other fighting organization of non-professional soldiers, citizens of a country, or subjects of a state, who may perform military service during a time of need, as opposed to a professional force of r ...
, for traditionally lawful purposes, such as
self-defense Self-defense (self-defence primarily in Commonwealth English) is a countermeasure that involves defending the health and well-being of oneself from harm. The use of the right of self-defense as a legal justification for the use of force ...
within the home, and that the
District of Columbia ) , image_skyline = , image_caption = Clockwise from top left: the Washington Monument and Lincoln Memorial on the National Mall, United States Capitol, Logan Circle, Jefferson Memorial, White House, Adams Morgan, ...
's handgun ban and requirement that lawfully owned rifles and shotguns be kept "unloaded and disassembled or bound by a
trigger lock Gun safety is the study and practice of using, transporting, storing and disposing of firearms and ammunition, including the training of gun users, the design of weapons, and formal and informal regulation of gun production, distribution, and u ...
" violated this guarantee. It also stated that the right to bear arms is not unlimited and that guns and gun ownership would continue to be regulated. It was the first Supreme Court case to decide whether the Second Amendment protects an individual right to keep and bear arms for self-defense or whether the right was only intended for state militias. Because of the District of Columbia's status as a
federal enclave In United States law, a federal enclave is a parcel of federal property within a state that is under the "Special Maritime and Territorial Jurisdiction of the United States". In 1960, the year of the latest comprehensive inquiry, 7% of federal p ...
(it is not in any
U.S. state In the United States, a state is a constituent political entity, of which there are 50. Bound together in a political union, each state holds governmental jurisdiction over a separate and defined geographic territory where it shares its sove ...
), the decision did not address the question of whether the Second Amendment's protections are incorporated by the Due Process Clause of the
Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution The Fourteenth Amendment (Amendment XIV) to the United States Constitution was adopted on July 9, 1868, as one of the Reconstruction Amendments. Often considered as one of the most consequential amendments, it addresses citizenship rights and e ...
against the states. This point was addressed two years later by '' McDonald v. City of Chicago'' (2010), in which it was found that they are. On June 26, 2008, the Supreme Court affirmed by a vote of 5 to 4 the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit in ''Heller v. District of Columbia''. The Supreme Court struck down provisions of the Firearms Control Regulations Act of 1975 as unconstitutional, determined that handguns are "arms" for the purposes of the Second Amendment, found that the Regulations Act was an unconstitutional ban, and struck down the portion of the Regulations Act that requires all firearms including rifles and shotguns be kept "unloaded and disassembled or bound by a trigger lock". Prior to this decision the Firearms Control Regulation Act of 1975 also restricted residents from owning handguns except for those registered prior to 1975.


Lower court background

In 2002, Robert A. Levy, a Senior Fellow at the
Cato Institute The Cato Institute is an American libertarian think tank headquartered in Washington, D.C. It was founded in 1977 by Ed Crane, Murray Rothbard, and Charles Koch, chairman of the board and chief executive officer of Koch Industries.Koch Ind ...
, began vetting plaintiffs with Clark M. Neily III, for a planned Second Amendment lawsuit that he would personally finance. Although he himself had never owned a gun, as a constitutional scholar he had an academic interest in the subject and wanted to model his campaign after the legal strategies of
Thurgood Marshall Thurgood Marshall (July 2, 1908 – January 24, 1993) was an American civil rights lawyer and jurist who served as an associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States from 1967 until 1991. He was the Supreme Court's first African-A ...
, who had successfully led the challenges that overturned
school segregation School segregation is the division of people into different groups in the education system by characteristics such as race, religion, or ethnicity. See also *'' D.H. and Others v. the Czech Republic'' *School segregation in the United States *Single ...
. They aimed for a group that would be diverse in terms of gender, race, economic background, and age, and selected six plaintiffs from their mid-20s to early 60s, three men and three women, four white and two black: ;Shelly Parker: A software designer and former nurse who had been active in trying to rid her neighborhood of drugs. Parker is a single woman whose life had been threatened on numerous occasions by drug dealers who had sometimes tried to break into her house. ; Tom G. Palmer: A colleague of Robert A. Levy at the Cato Institute and the only plaintiff that Levy knew before the case began. Palmer, who is gay, defended himself with a 9mm handgun in 1982. While walking with a friend in San Jose, California, he was accosted by a gang of about 20 young men who used profane language regarding his sexual orientation and threatened his life. When he produced his gun, the men fled. Palmer believes that the handgun saved his life. ; Gillian St. Lawrence: A mortgage broker who lives in the Georgetown section of D.C. and who owns several legally registered long guns which she uses for recreation in nearby
Chantilly, Virginia Chantilly is a census-designated place (CDP) in western Fairfax County, Virginia, Fairfax County, Virginia. The population was 24,301 as of the 2020 census. Chantilly is named after an early-19th-century mansion and farm, which in turn took the ...
. It had taken St. Lawrence two years to complete the registration process. She wanted to be able to use these guns to defend herself in her home and to be able to register a handgun. ; Tracey Ambeau (now Tracey Hanson): An employee of the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Originally from St. Gabriel, Louisiana, she lives in the Adams Morgan neighborhood of D.C. with her husband, Andrew Hanson, who is from Waterloo, Iowa. They live in a high-crime neighborhood near Union Station in D.C. She grew up around guns and wanted one to defend her home. ; George Lyon: A communications lawyer who had previously contacted the National Rifle Association (NRA) about filing a lawsuit to challenge the
gun laws in the District of Columbia Gun laws in the District of Columbia regulate the sale, possession, and use of firearms and ammunition in the U.S. federal district of District of Columbia. Summary table Concealed and open carry A license to carry a handgun is required to ...
. Lyon held D.C. licenses for a shotgun and a rifle, but wanted to have a handgun in his home. ; Dick Anthony Heller: A licensed special police officer for the District of Columbia. For his job, Heller carried a gun in federal office buildings, but was not allowed to have one in his home. Heller had lived in southeast D.C. near the Kentucky Courts public housing complex since 1970 and had seen the neighborhood "transformed from a child-friendly welfare complex to a drug haven". Heller had also approached the National Rifle Association about a lawsuit to overturn the D.C. gun ban, but the NRA declined. Previous federal case law pertaining to the question of an individual's right to bear arms included '' United States v. Emerson'', 270 F.3d 203 (
5th Cir. The United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit (in case citations, 5th Cir.) is a federal court with appellate jurisdiction over the district courts in the following federal judicial districts: * Eastern District of Louisiana * Mi ...
2001), which supported the right and '' Silveira v. Lockyer'', 312 F.3d 1052 ( 9th Cir. 2002), which opposed the right. The Supreme Court ruling in '' United States v. Miller'', 307 U.S. 174 (1939) was interpreted to support both sides of the issue.


District Court

In February 2003, the six residents of the
District of Columbia ) , image_skyline = , image_caption = Clockwise from top left: the Washington Monument and Lincoln Memorial on the National Mall, United States Capitol, Logan Circle, Jefferson Memorial, White House, Adams Morgan, ...
filed a lawsuit in the
District Court for the District of Columbia The United States District Court for the District of Columbia (in case citations, D.D.C.) is a federal district court in the District of Columbia. It also occasionally handles (jointly with the United States District Court for the District ...
, challenging the constitutionality of provisions of the Firearms Control Regulations Act of 1975, a local law (part of the District of Columbia Code) enacted pursuant to
District of Columbia home rule District of Columbia home rule is Washington, D.C. residents' ability to govern their local affairs. As the federal capital, the Constitution grants the United States Congress exclusive jurisdiction over the District in "all cases whatsoever" ...
. This law restricted residents from owning handguns, excluding those grandfathered in by registration prior to 1975 and those possessed by active and retired law enforcement officers. The law also required that all firearms including rifles and shotguns be kept "unloaded and disassembled or bound by a trigger lock." They filed for an injunction pursuant to , 2202, and . District Court Judge Emmet G. Sullivan dismissed the lawsuit on March 31, 2004.


Court of Appeals

On appeal, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit reversed the dismissal in a 2–1 decision. The Court of Appeals struck down provisions of the Firearms Control Regulations Act as unconstitutional. Judges
Karen L. Henderson Karen LeCraft Henderson (born July 11, 1944) is a United States circuit judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit and a former United States District Judge of the United States District Court for the Distric ...
, Thomas B. Griffith and Laurence H. Silberman formed the Court of Appeals panel, with Senior Circuit Judge Silberman writing the court's opinion and Circuit Judge Henderson dissenting. The court's opinion first addressed whether appellants have
standing Standing, also referred to as orthostasis, is a position in which the body is held in an ''erect'' ("orthostatic") position and supported only by the feet. Although seemingly static, the body rocks slightly back and forth from the ankle in the s ...
to sue for declaratory and injunctive relief in section II ( slip opinion, at 5–12). The court concluded that of the six plaintiffs, only Heller – who applied for a handgun permit but was denied – had standing. The court then held that the Second Amendment "protects an individual right to keep and bear arms", that the "right existed prior to the formation of the new government under the Constitution", also stating that the right was "premised on the private use of arms for activities such as hunting and self-defense, the latter being understood as resistance to either private lawlessness or the depredations of a tyrannical government (or a threat from abroad)." They also noted that though the right to bear arms also helped preserve the citizen militia, "the activities he Amendmentprotects are not limited to militia service, nor is an individual's enjoyment of the right contingent upon his or her continued or intermittent enrollment in the militia." The court determined that handguns are "Arms" and concluded that thus they may not be banned by the District of Columbia. The court also struck down the portion of the law that requires all firearms including rifles and shotguns be kept "unloaded and disassembled or bound by a trigger lock." The District argued that there is an implicit self-defense exception to these provisions, but the D.C. Circuit rejected this view, saying that the requirement amounted to a complete ban on functional firearms and prohibition on use for self-defense: In her dissent, Circuit Judge Henderson stated that Second Amendment rights did not extend to residents of District of Columbia, writing: In April 2007, the District and Mayor
Adrian Fenty Adrian Malik Fenty (born December 6, 1970) is an American politician who served as the sixth mayor of the District of Columbia. He served one term, from 2007 to 2011, losing his bid for reelection at the primary level to Democrat Vincent C. Gra ...
petitioned for rehearing ''
en banc In law, an en banc session (; French for "in bench"; also known as ''in banc'', ''in banco'' or ''in bank'') is a session in which a case is heard before all the judges of a court (before the entire bench) rather than by one judge or a smaller p ...
'', arguing that the ruling created inter- and intra-jurisdictional conflict. On May 8, the Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit denied the request to rehear the case, by a 6–4 vote.


Supreme Court

The defendants petitioned the
United States Supreme Court The Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) is the highest court in the federal judiciary of the United States. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all U.S. federal court cases, and over state court cases that involve a point o ...
to hear the case. The Supreme Court granted certiorari on November 20, 2007. The court rephrased the question to be decided as follows: This represented the first time since the 1939 case '' United States v. Miller'' that the Supreme Court had directly addressed the scope of the Second Amendment.


''Amicus curiae'' briefs

Because of the controversial nature of the case, it garnered much attention from many groups on both sides of the gun rights issue. Many of those groups filed '' amicus curiae'' (friend of the court) briefs, about 47 urging the court to affirm the case and about 20 to remand it. A majority of the members of
Congress A congress is a formal meeting of the representatives of different countries, constituent states, organizations, trade unions, political parties, or other groups. The term originated in Late Middle English to denote an encounter (meeting of ...
signed the brief authored by
Stephen Halbrook Stephen P. Halbrook (born 12 September 1947) is a senior fellow at the Independent Institute and an author and lawyer known for his litigation on cases involving laws pertaining to firearms. He has written extensively about the original meanings o ...
advising that the case be affirmed overturning the ban on handguns not otherwise restricted by Congress.
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Dick Cheney joined in this brief, acting in his role as President of the United States Senate, and breaking with the
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administration's official position. Arizona Senator John McCain, Republican, also signed the brief. Then-Illinois Senator
Barack Obama Barack Hussein Obama II ( ; born August 4, 1961) is an American politician who served as the 44th president of the United States from 2009 to 2017. A member of the Democratic Party, Obama was the first African-American president of the ...
did not. A majority of the states signed the brief of
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Attorney General
Greg Abbott Gregory Wayne Abbott (born November 13, 1957) is an American politician, attorney, and former jurist serving as the 48th governor of Texas since 2015. A member of the Republican Party, he served as the 50th attorney general of Texas from 2002 ...
, authored by Abbott's solicitor general,
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, advising that the case be affirmed, while at the same time emphasizing that the states have a strong interest in maintaining each of the states' laws prohibiting and regulating firearms. Law enforcement organizations, including the
Fraternal Order of Police The Fraternal Order of Police (FOP) is a fraternal organization consisting of sworn law enforcement officers in the United States. It reports a membership of over 355,000 members organized in 2,100 local chapters (lodges), state lodges, and th ...
and the Southern States Police Benevolent Association, also filed a brief urging that the case be affirmed. A number of organizations signed friend of the court briefs advising that the case be remanded, including the
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and Attorneys General of New York,
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,
Maryland Maryland ( ) is a state in the Mid-Atlantic region of the United States. It shares borders with Virginia, West Virginia, and the District of Columbia to its south and west; Pennsylvania to its north; and Delaware and the Atlantic Ocean to ...
,
Massachusetts Massachusetts (Massachusett: ''Muhsachuweesut Massachusett_writing_systems.html" ;"title="nowiki/> məhswatʃəwiːsət.html" ;"title="Massachusett writing systems">məhswatʃəwiːsət">Massachusett writing systems">məhswatʃəwiːsət'' En ...
,
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, and
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. Additionally, friend of the court briefs to remand were filed by a spectrum of religious and anti-violence groups, a number of cities and mayors, and many police chiefs and law enforcement organizations. A collection of organizations and prominent scholars, represented by attorney Jeffrey Teichert, submitted an "errors brief" arguing that many of the common historical and factual "myths and misrepresentations" generally offered in favor of banning handguns were in error. Teichert's brief argued from a historical perspective that the Second Amendment protected an individual right to keep and bear arms.


Oral arguments

The Supreme Court heard
oral argument Oral arguments are spoken presentations to a judge or appellate court by a lawyer (or parties when representing themselves) of the legal reasons why they should prevail. Oral argument at the appellate level accompanies written briefs, which also a ...
s in the case on March 18, 2008. Both the transcript and the audio of the argument have been released. Each side was initially allotted 30 minutes to argue its case, with
U.S. Solicitor General The solicitor general of the United States is the fourth-highest-ranking official in the United States Department of Justice. Elizabeth Prelogar has been serving in the role since October 28, 2021. The United States solicitor general represent ...
Paul D. Clement allotted 15 minutes to present the federal government's views. During the argument, however, extra time was extended to the parties, and the argument ran 23 minutes over the allotted time. Walter E. Dellinger of the law firm O'Melveny & Myers, also a professor at
Duke University Law School Duke University School of Law (Duke Law School or Duke Law) is the law school of Duke University, a private research university in Durham, North Carolina. One of Duke's 10 schools and colleges, the School of Law is a constituent academic unit th ...
and former Acting Solicitor General, argued the District's side before the Supreme Court. Dellinger was assisted by Thomas Goldstein of
Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld LLP is an American multinational law firm headquartered in Washington, DC. It is the largest lobbying firm in the United States by revenue. Akin Gump has consistently been ranked as among the top law firms in the Un ...
, Robert Long of
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and D.C. Solicitor General Todd Kim. The law firms assisting the District worked '' pro bono''.
Alan Gura Alan Gura is an American litigator practicing in the areas of civil litigation, appellate litigation, and civil rights law at Gura P.L.L.C. Gura successfully argued two landmark constitutional cases before the United States Supreme Court involvin ...
, of the D.C.-based law firm Gura & Possessky, was lead counsel for Heller, and argued on his behalf before the Supreme Court. Robert Levy, a senior fellow at the
Cato Institute The Cato Institute is an American libertarian think tank headquartered in Washington, D.C. It was founded in 1977 by Ed Crane, Murray Rothbard, and Charles Koch, chairman of the board and chief executive officer of Koch Industries.Koch Ind ...
, and Clark Neily, a senior attorney at the
Institute for Justice The Institute for Justice (IJ) is a libertarian non-profit public interest law firm in the United States. It has litigated ten cases before the United States Supreme Court dealing with eminent domain, interstate commerce, public financing for ...
, were his co-counsel.


Decision

The Supreme Court held: :(1) The Second Amendment protects an individual right to possess a firearm unconnected with service in a militia, and to use that arm for traditionally lawful purposes, such as self-defense within the home. Pp. 2–53. ::(a) The Amendment's prefatory clause announces a purpose, but does not limit or expand the scope of the second part, the operative clause. The operative clause's text and history demonstrate that it connotes an individual right to keep and bear arms. Pp. 2–22. ::(b) The prefatory clause comports with the Court's interpretation of the operative clause. The "militia" comprised all males physically capable of acting in concert for the common defense. The Antifederalists feared that the Federal Government would disarm the people in order to disable this citizens' militia, enabling a politicized standing army or a select militia to rule. The response was to deny Congress power to abridge the ancient right of individuals to keep and bear arms, so that the ideal of a citizens' militia would be preserved. Pp. 22–28. ::(c) The Court's interpretation is confirmed by analogous arms-bearing rights in state constitutions that preceded and immediately followed the Second Amendment. Pp. 28–30. ::(d) The Second Amendment's drafting history, while of dubious interpretive worth, reveals three state Second Amendment proposals that unequivocally referred to an individual right to bear arms. Pp. 30–32. ::(e) Interpretation of the Second Amendment by scholars, courts and legislators, from immediately after its ratification through the late 19th century also supports the Court's conclusion. Pp. 32–47. ::(f) None of the Court's precedents forecloses the Court's interpretation. Neither '' United States v. Cruikshank'', 92 U.S. 542 (1876), nor ''
Presser v. Illinois ''Presser v. Illinois'', 116 U.S. 252 (1886), was a landmark decision of the Supreme Court of the United States that held, "Unless restrained by their own constitutions, state legislatures may enact statutes to control and regulate all organization ...
'', 116 U.S. 252 (1886), refutes the individual-rights interpretation. '' United States v. Miller'', 307 U.S. 174 (1939), does not limit the right to keep and bear arms to militia purposes, but rather limits the type of weapon to which the right applies to those used by the militia, i.e., those in common use for lawful purposes. :(2) Like most rights, the Second Amendment right is not unlimited. It is not a right to keep and carry any weapon whatsoever in any manner whatsoever and for whatever purpose: For example, concealed weapons prohibitions have been upheld under the Amendment or state analogues. The Court's opinion should not be taken to cast doubt on longstanding prohibitions on the possession of firearms by felons and the mentally ill, or 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. Miller's holding that the sorts of weapons protected are those "in common use at the time" finds support in the historical tradition of prohibiting the carrying of dangerous and unusual weapons. Pp. 54–56. :(3) The handgun ban and the trigger-lock requirement (as applied to self-defense) violate the Second Amendment. The District's total ban on handgun possession in the home amounts to a prohibition on an entire class of "arms" that Americans overwhelmingly choose for the lawful purpose of self-defense. Under any of the standards of scrutiny the Court has applied to enumerated constitutional rights, this prohibition – in the place where the importance of the lawful defense of self, family, and property is most acute – would fail constitutional muster. Similarly, the requirement that any lawful firearm in the home be disassembled or bound by a trigger lock makes it impossible for citizens to use arms for the core lawful purpose of self-defense and is hence unconstitutional. Because Heller conceded at oral argument that the D.C. licensing law is permissible if it is not enforced arbitrarily and capriciously, the Court assumes that a license will satisfy his prayer for relief and does not address the licensing requirement. Assuming he is not disqualified from exercising Second Amendment rights, the District must permit Heller to register his handgun and must issue him a license to carry it in the home. Pp. 56–64. The Opinion of the Court, delivered by Justice Scalia, was joined by Chief Justice John G. Roberts, Jr. and by Justices Anthony M. Kennedy,
Clarence Thomas Clarence Thomas (born June 23, 1948) is an American jurist who serves as an associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States. He was nominated by President George H. W. Bush to succeed Thurgood Marshall and has served since 1 ...
and Samuel Alito.


Second Amendment findings and reasoning

The Illinois Supreme Court in '' People v. Aguilar'' (2013), summed up the ''Heller''s findings and reasoning:


Issues addressed by the majority

The core holding in ''D.C. v. Heller'' is that the right to keep and bear arms is an individual right intimately tied to the
natural right Some philosophers distinguish two types of rights, natural rights and legal rights. * Natural rights are those that are not dependent on the laws or customs of any particular culture or government, and so are ''universal'', '' fundamental'' an ...
of self-defense. The Scalia majority invokes much historical material to support its finding that the right to keep and bear arms belongs to individuals; more precisely, Scalia asserts in the Court's opinion that the "people" to whom the Second Amendment right is accorded are the same "people" who enjoy First and Fourth Amendment protection: "' The Constitution was written to be understood by the voters; its words and phrases were used in their normal and ordinary as distinguished from technical meaning. ''United States v. Sprague'', 282 U.S. 716, 731 (1931); see also ''Gibbons v. Ogden'', 9 Wheat. 1, 188 (1824). Normal meaning may, of course, include an idiomatic meaning, but it excludes secret or technical meanings ... ." With that finding as an anchor, the Court ruled a total ban on operative handguns in the home is unconstitutional, as the ban runs afoul of both the self-defense purpose of the Second Amendment – a purpose not previously articulated by the Court – and the "in common use at the time" prong of the '' Miller'' decision: Since handguns are in common use, their ownership is protected. The Court applies as the remedy that " suming that Heller is not disqualified from the exercise of Second Amendment rights, the District must permit him to register his handgun and must issue him a license to carry it in the home." The Court, additionally, hinted that other remedy might be available in the form of eliminating the license requirement for carrying in the home, but that no such relief had been requested: "Respondent conceded at oral argument that he does not 'have a problem with ... licensing' and that the District's law is permissible so long as it is 'not enforced in an arbitrary and capricious manner.' Tr. of Oral Arg. 74–75. We, therefore, assume that petitioners' issuance of a license will satisfy respondent's prayer for relief and do not address the licensing requirement." In regard to the scope of the right, the Court wrote, in an ''
obiter dictum ''Obiter dictum'' (usually used in the plural, ''obiter dicta'') is a Latin phrase meaning "other things said",''Black's Law Dictionary'', p. 967 (5th ed. 1979). that is, a remark in a legal opinion that is "said in passing" by any judge or arbit ...
'', "Although we do not undertake an exhaustive historical analysis today of the full scope of the Second Amendment, nothing in our opinion should be taken to cast doubt on longstanding prohibitions on the possession of firearms by felons and the mentally ill, or 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." The Court also added dicta regarding the private ownership of machine guns. In doing so, it suggested the elevation of the "in common use at the time" prong of the ''Miller'' decision, which by itself protects handguns, over the first prong (protecting arms that "have some reasonable relationship to the preservation or efficiency of a well regulated militia"), which may not by itself protect machine guns: "It may be objected that if weapons that are most useful in military service –
M16 rifle The M16 rifle (officially designated Rifle, Caliber 5.56 mm, M16) is a family of military rifles adapted from the ArmaLite AR-15 rifle for the United States military. The original M16 rifle was a 5.56×45mm automatic rifle with a 20-ro ...
s and the like – may be banned, then the Second Amendment right is completely detached from the prefatory clause. But as we have said, the conception of the militia at the time of the Second Amendment's ratification was the body of all citizens capable of military service, who would bring the sorts of lawful weapons that they possessed at home." The Court did not address which level of
judicial review Judicial review is a process under which executive, legislative and administrative actions are subject to review by the judiciary. A court with authority for judicial review may invalidate laws, acts and governmental actions that are incomp ...
should be used by lower courts in deciding future cases claiming infringement of the right to keep and bear arms: " nce this case represents this Court's first in-depth examination of the Second Amendment, one should not expect it to clarify the entire field." The Court states, "If all that was required to overcome the right to keep and bear arms was a rational basis, the Second Amendment would be redundant with the separate constitutional prohibitions on irrational laws, and would have no effect." Heller Opinion, ''Opinion of the Court'', pp. 56–57. Also, regarding Justice Breyer's proposal of a "judge-empowering 'interest-balancing inquiry'," the Court states, "We know of no other enumerated constitutional right whose core protection has been subjected to a freestanding 'interest-balancing' approach."


Dissenting opinions

In a
dissenting opinion A dissenting opinion (or dissent) is an opinion in a legal case in certain legal systems written by one or more judges expressing disagreement with the majority opinion of the court which gives rise to its judgment. Dissenting opinions are norm ...
, Justice John Paul Stevens stated that the court's judgment was "a strained and unpersuasive reading" which overturned longstanding
precedent A precedent is a principle or rule established in a previous legal case that is either binding on or persuasive for a court or other tribunal when deciding subsequent cases with similar issues or facts. Common-law legal systems place great valu ...
, and that the court had "bestowed a dramatic upheaval in the law". Stevens also stated that the amendment was notable for the "omission of any statement of purpose related to the right to use firearms for hunting or personal self-defense" which was present in the Declarations of Rights of
Pennsylvania Pennsylvania (; ( Pennsylvania Dutch: )), officially the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, is a state spanning the Mid-Atlantic, Northeastern, Appalachian, and Great Lakes regions of the United States. It borders Delaware to its southeast, ...
and
Vermont Vermont () is a state in the northeast New England region of the United States. Vermont is bordered by the states of Massachusetts to the south, New Hampshire to the east, and New York to the west, and the Canadian province of Quebec to ...
. The Stevens dissent seems to rest on four main points of disagreement: that the Founders would have made the individual right aspect of the Second Amendment express if that was what was intended; that the "militia" preamble and exact phrase "to keep and bear arms" demands the conclusion that the Second Amendment touches on state militia service only; that many lower courts' later "collective-right" reading of the Miller decision constitutes '' stare decisis'', which may only be overturned at great peril; and that the Court has not considered gun-control laws (e.g., the
National Firearms Act The National Firearms Act (NFA), 73rd Congress, Sess. 2, ch. 757, was enacted on June 26, 1934, and currently codified and amended as . The law is an Act of Congress in the United States that, in general, imposes an excise tax on the manufact ...
) unconstitutional. The dissent concludes, "The Court would have us believe 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.... I could not possibly conclude that the Framers made such a choice." Justice Stevens's dissent was joined by Justices
David Souter David Hackett Souter ( ; born September 17, 1939) is an American lawyer and jurist who served as an associate justice of the U.S. Supreme Court from 1990 until his retirement in 2009. Appointed by President George H. W. Bush to fill the seat ...
,
Ruth Bader Ginsburg Joan Ruth Bader Ginsburg ( ; ; March 15, 1933September 18, 2020) was an American lawyer and jurist who served as an associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States from 1993 until her death in 2020. She was nominated by Presiden ...
, and Stephen Breyer. Justice Breyer filed a separate dissenting opinion, joined by the same dissenting Justices, which sought to demonstrate that, starting from the premise of an individual-rights view, the District of Columbia's handgun ban and trigger lock requirement would nevertheless be permissible limitations on the right. The Breyer dissent looks to early municipal fire-safety laws that forbade the storage of gunpowder (and in
Boston Boston (), officially the City of Boston, is the state capital and most populous city of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, as well as the cultural and financial center of the New England region of the United States. It is the 24th- mo ...
the carrying of loaded arms into certain buildings), and on nuisance laws providing fines or loss of firearm for imprudent usage, as demonstrating the Second Amendment has been understood to have no impact on the regulation of civilian firearms. The dissent argues the public safety necessity of gun-control laws, quoting that "guns were responsible for 69 deaths in this country each day.'" With these two supports, the Breyer dissent goes on to conclude, "there simply is no untouchable constitutional right guaranteed by the Second Amendment to keep loaded handguns in the house in crime-ridden urban areas." It proposes that firearms laws be reviewed by balancing the interests (i.e., "'interest-balancing' approach") of Second Amendment protections against the government's compelling interest of preventing crime. The Breyer dissent also objected to the "common use" distinction used by the majority to distinguish handguns from machine guns: "But what sense does this approach make? According to the majority's reasoning, if Congress and the States lift restrictions on the possession and use of machineguns, and people buy machineguns to protect their homes, the Court will have to reverse course and find that the Second Amendment does, in fact, protect the individual self-defense-related right to possess a machine-gun...There is no basis for believing that the Framers intended such circular reasoning."


Non-party involvement


National Rifle Association (NRA)

Attorney Alan Gura, in a 2003 filing, used the term "sham litigation" to describe the NRA's attempts to have ''Parker (aka Heller)'' consolidated with its own case challenging the D.C. law. Gura also stated that "the NRA was adamant about not wanting the Supreme Court to hear the case". These concerns were based on NRA lawyers' assessment that the justices at the time the case was filed might reach an unfavorable decision.
Cato Institute The Cato Institute is an American libertarian think tank headquartered in Washington, D.C. It was founded in 1977 by Ed Crane, Murray Rothbard, and Charles Koch, chairman of the board and chief executive officer of Koch Industries.Koch Ind ...
senior fellow Robert Levy, co-counsel to the ''Parker'' plaintiffs, has stated that the ''Parker'' plaintiffs "faced repeated attempts by the NRA to derail the litigation." He also stated that "The N.R.A.'s interference in this process set us back and almost killed the case. It was a very acrimonious relationship."
Wayne LaPierre Wayne Robert LaPierre Jr. (born November 8, 1949) is an American gun rights lobbyist who is CEO and executive vice president of the National Rifle Association (NRA), a position he has held since 1991. Personal background Wayne Robert LaPierr ...
, the NRA's chief executive officer, confirmed the NRA's misgivings. "There was a real dispute on our side among the constitutional scholars about whether there was a majority of justices on the Supreme Court who would support the Constitution as written," Mr. LaPierre said. Both Levy and LaPierre said the NRA and Mr. Levy's team were now on good terms. Elaine McArdle wrote in the ''Harvard Law Bulletin'': "If Parker is the long-awaited "clean" case, one reason may be that proponents of the individual-rights view of the Second Amendment – including the National Rifle Association, which filed an amicus brief in the case – have learned from earlier defeats, and crafted strategies to maximize the chances of Supreme Court review." The NRA did eventually support the litigation by filing an
amicus brief An ''amicus curiae'' (; ) is an individual or organization who is not a party to a legal case, but who is permitted to assist a court by offering information, expertise, or insight that has a bearing on the issues in the case. The decision on ...
with the Court arguing that the plaintiffs in ''Parker'' had standing to sue and that the D.C. ban was unconstitutional under the Second Amendment. Chris Cox, executive director of the NRA's Institute for Legislative Action, had indicated support of federal legislation which would repeal the D.C. gun ban. Opponents of the legislation argued that this would have rendered the Parker case moot, and would have effectively eliminated the possibility that the case would be heard by the Supreme Court. Immediately after the Supreme Court's ruling, the NRA filed a lawsuit against the city of Chicago over its handgun ban, followed the next day by a lawsuit against the city of San Francisco over its ban of handguns in public housing.


Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence

The Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence opposed the arguments made by the plaintiffs in ''Parker'', and filed amicus curiae against those arguments in both the District and Circuit courts. Paul Helmke, the president of the Brady Campaign, suggested to D.C. before the Court granted certiorari that it modify its gun laws rather than appeal to the Supreme Court. Helmke has written that if the Supreme Court upholds the Circuit court ruling, it "could lead to all current and proposed firearms laws being called into question." After the ruling, Paul Helmke stated that, "the classic 'slippery slope' argument", "that even modest gun control would lead down the path to a complete ban on gun ownership", "is now gone." Helmke added that, "The Court also rejected the absolutist misreading of the Second Amendment that some use to argue 'any gun, any time for anyone,' which many politicians have used as an excuse to do nothing about the scourge of gun violence in our country and to block passage of common sense gun laws."


Reactions


To the lower court rulings

Various experts expressed opinions on the D.C. Circuit's decision. Harvard Law School professor
Laurence Tribe Laurence Henry Tribe (born October 10, 1941) is an American legal scholar who is a University Professor Emeritus at Harvard University. He previously served as the Carl M. Loeb University Professor at Harvard Law School. A constitutional law sc ...
contended that the Second Amendment protects an individual right, and predicted that if ''Parker'' is reviewed by the Supreme Court "there's a really quite decent chance that it will be affirmed." However, Professor Tribe has also argued that the District's ban on one class of weapons does not violate the Second Amendment even under an individual rights view. Erwin Chemerinsky, then of
Duke Law School Duke University School of Law (Duke Law School or Duke Law) is the law school of Duke University, a private research university in Durham, North Carolina. One of Duke's 10 schools and colleges, the School of Law is a constituent academic unit th ...
and now dean of the
University of California, Berkeley School of Law The University of California, Berkeley, School of Law (commonly known as Berkeley Law or UC Berkeley School of Law) is the law school of the University of California, Berkeley, a public research university in Berkeley, California. It is one of 1 ...
, argued that the District of Columbia's handgun laws, even assuming an "individual rights" interpretation of the Second Amendment, could be justified as reasonable regulations and thus upheld as constitutional. Professor Chemerinsky believes that the regulation of guns should be analyzed in the same way "as other regulation of property under modern constitutional law" and "be allowed so long as it is rationally related to achieving a legitimate government purpose." However, the dicta in ''Heller'' suggests that applying a mere rational basis analysis is an incorrect reading of the Constitution and would, in fact, defeat the entire purpose of the Second Amendment.


To the Supreme Court rulings

Cato Institute senior fellow Robert Levy, co-counsel to the ''Parker'' plaintiffs, agreed with the court's ruling but describes that his interpretation of the Second Amendment would not preclude all governmental regulation of private ownership of weapons: Clark Neily, an attorney for Dick Heller in this case, has said regarding ''Heller'':
Richard Posner Richard Allen Posner (; born January 11, 1939) is an American jurist and legal scholar who served as a federal appellate judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit from 1981 to 2017. A senior lecturer at the University of Chic ...
, judge for the
United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit The United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit (in case citations, 7th Cir.) is the U.S. federal court with appellate jurisdiction over the courts in the following districts: * Central District of Illinois * Northern District of ...
, compares ''Heller'' to ''
Roe v. Wade ''Roe v. Wade'', 410 U.S. 113 (1973),. was a landmark decision of the U.S. Supreme Court in which the Court ruled that the Constitution of the United States conferred the right to have an abortion. The decision struck down many federal and s ...
'', stating that it created a federal constitutional right that did not previously exist, and he asserts that the originalist method – to which Justice Antonin Scalia claimed to adhere – would have yielded the opposite result of the majority opinion. J. Harvie Wilkinson III, chief judge of
United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit The United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit (in case citations, 4th Cir.) is a federal court located in Richmond, Virginia, with appellate jurisdiction over the district courts in the following districts: * District of Maryland ...
, consents to Posner's analysis, stating that ''Heller'' "encourages Americans to do what conservative jurists warned for years they should not do: bypass the ballot and seek to press their political agenda in the courts."
Alan Gura Alan Gura is an American litigator practicing in the areas of civil litigation, appellate litigation, and civil rights law at Gura P.L.L.C. Gura successfully argued two landmark constitutional cases before the United States Supreme Court involvin ...
, Lead Counsel for Respondent in ''Heller'' rejects Wilkinson's criticism, stating that "Rather, the Court affirmed the Second Amendment's original public meaning, as confirmed by its plain text. Having determined the Amendment's meaning, the Court showed the proper level of deference to the D.C. City Council's outright repudiation of the constitutional text: none."


Post-ruling impacts

Since the June 2008 ruling, over 80 different cases have been heard in lower federal courts on the constitutionality of a wide variety of gun control laws. These courts have heard lawsuits in regard to bans of firearm possession by felons, drug addicts, illegal aliens, and individuals convicted of domestic violence misdemeanors. Also, cases have been heard on the constitutionality of laws prohibiting certain types of weapons, such as machine guns, sawed-off shotguns and/or specific types of weapons attachments. In addition, courts have heard challenges to laws barring guns in post offices and near schools and laws outlawing "straw" purchases, carrying of concealed weapons, types of ammunition and possession of unregistered firearms. There have been as of May 2019 more than 1,370 Second Amendment cases nationwide which challenged restrictive gun laws of various kinds since the Supreme Court issued its decision in ''Heller''. In most cases the gun safety law or criminal conviction at issue has been however upheld by the lower courts. Provided with only minimum guidance from the Supreme Court in ''Heller'' the lower courts were tasked with defining the scope of the Second Amendment rights and the proper standard of review for evaluating Second Amendment claims in the aforementioned cases. The courts have upheld most of the above-mentioned laws as being constitutional. The basis for the lower court rulings is the dicta in the paragraph near the end of the Heller ruling that states: Consistently since the Heller ruling, the lower federal courts have ruled that almost all gun control measures as presently legislated are lawful and that according to UCLA professor of constitutional law Adam Winkler: "What gun rights advocates are discovering is that the vast majority of gun control laws fit within these categories." Robert Levy, the executive director of the Cato Institute who funded the Heller litigation has commented on this passage describing constitutionally acceptable forms of prohibitions of firearms: "I would have preferred that that not have been there," and that this paragraph in Scalia's opinion "created more confusion than light." Similar to the lifting of gun bans mentioned previously in the settlements of lawsuits filed post-''Heller'', in ''US v. Arzberger'', also decided post-''Heller'', it was noted:


District of Columbia

The D.C. government indicated it would continue to use zoning ordinances to prevent firearms dealers from operating and selling to citizens residing in the District, meaning it would continue to be difficult for residents to legally purchase guns in the District.. Additionally, the District enacted new firearms restrictions in an effort to cure the constitutional defects in the ordinance that the Supreme Court had identified in ''Heller''. The new provisions were: (1) the firearms registration procedures; (2) the prohibition on assault weapons; and (3) the prohibition on large capacity ammunition feeding devices. In response, Dick Heller challenged these new restrictions filing a civil suit named ''Heller v. District of Columbia'' (Civil Action No. 08-1289 (RMU), No. 23., 25) where he requested a summary judgment to vacate the new prohibitions. On March 26, 2010, the D.C. District Judge Ricardo M. Urbina denied Dick Heller's request and granted the cross motion, stating that the court ''"concludes that the regulatory provisions that the plaintiffs challenge permissibly regulate the exercise of the core Second Amendment right to use arms for the purpose of self-defense in the home."'' Dick Heller's application to register his semi-automatic pistol was rejected because the gun was a bottom-loading weapon, and according to the District's interpretation, all bottom-loading guns, including magazine-fed non-assault-style rifles, are outlawed because they are grouped with
machine gun A machine gun is a fully automatic, rifled autoloading firearm designed for sustained direct fire with rifle cartridges. Other automatic firearms such as automatic shotguns and automatic rifles (including assault rifles and battle rifles) ar ...
s. Revolvers will likely not fall under such a ban. On December 16, 2008, the D.C. Council unanimously passed the Firearms Registration Emergency Amendment Act of 2008 which addresses the issues raised in the Heller Supreme Court decision, and also puts in place a number of registration requirements to update and strengthen the District's gun laws. Justice Antonin Scalia's opinion for the majority provided Second Amendment protection for commonly used and popular handguns but not for atypical arms or arms used for unlawful purposes, such as short-barreled shotguns. Scalia stated: "Whatever the reason, handguns are the most popular weapon chosen by Americans for self-defense in the home, and a complete prohibition of their use is invalid." "We think that Miller's "ordinary military equipment" language must be read in tandem with what comes after: " dinarily when called for ilitiaservice ble-bodiedmen were expected to appear bearing arms supplied by themselves and of the kind in common use at the time." 307 U. S., at 179." "We therefore read Miller to say only that the Second Amendment does not protect those weapons not typically possessed by law-abiding citizens for lawful purposes, such as short-barreled shotguns." "It may be objected that if weapons that are most useful in military service – M-16 rifles and the like – may be banned, then the Second Amendment right is completely detached from the prefatory clause. But as we have said, the conception of the militia at the time of the Second Amendment's ratification was the body of all citizens capable of military service, who would bring the sorts of lawful weapons that they possessed at home to militia duty." On July 24, 2014, the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia ruled, in ''Palmer v. District of Columbia'', that the District's total ban on the public carrying of ready-to-use handguns is unconstitutional. In its decision, the Court stated: "
. . . The ellipsis (, also known informally as dot dot dot) is a series of dots that indicates an intentional omission of a word, sentence, or whole section from a text without altering its original meaning. The plural is ellipses. The term origin ...
the Court finds that the District of Columbia's complete ban on the carrying of handguns in public is unconstitutional. Accordingly, the Court grants Plaintiffs' motion for summary judgment and enjoins Defendants from enforcing the home limitations o
D.C. Code § 7-2502.02(a)(4)
and enforcin

unless and until such time as the District of Columbia adopts a licensing mechanism consistent with constitutional standards enabling people to exercise their Second Amendment right to bear arms. Furthermore, this injunction prohibits the District from completely banning the carrying of handguns in public for self-defense by otherwise qualified non-residents based solely on the fact that they are not residents of the District."


New York

Mayor of New York City Michael Bloomberg said that "all of the laws on the books in New York State and New York City" would be allowed by the ruling as "reasonable regulation." Robert Levy has stated that the current New York City gun laws are "not much different" from the D.C. ban that has been overturned. The National Rifle Association and other gun-rights advocates have not ruled out suing New York City, especially over the definition of "reasonable regulation". Southern District of New York Magistrate Judge James Francis has said that, prior to ''Heller'', it would not have been considered unreasonable to require a defendant to surrender a firearm as a condition of pretrial release. Specifically, according to Judge Francis: ''Maloney v. Rice'' (a.k.a. ''Maloney v. Cuomo'' and ''Maloney v. Spitzer''), originally held that the 2nd Amendment does not apply to the states in the Second Circuit. The case involved a state ban on
Nunchaku is a traditional Okinawan martial arts weapon consisting of two sticks (traditionally made of wood), connected to each other at their ends by a short metal chain or a rope. It is approximately 30 cm (sticks) and 1 inch (rope). A person w ...
sticks (a martial arts weapon) in New York. In a memorandum opinion dated June 29, 2010, the Supreme Court vacated the Second Circuit decision in ''Maloney'' and remanded for further consideration in light of the holding in '' McDonald v. City of Chicago'' that the Second Amendment ''does'' apply to the states. The Second Circuit has remanded the case to the trial court.


Illinois

The NRA has filed five related lawsuits since the ''Heller'' decision. In four Illinois lawsuits, the NRA sought to have the Second Amendment incorporated by the Fourteenth Amendment, causing the Second Amendment to apply to state and local jurisdictions and not just to the federal government. Three Illinois lawsuits have been negotiated and settled out of court involving agreements that repeal gun ban ordinances and did not result in incorporation of the Second Amendment to state and local jurisdictions. The fourth NRA lawsuit against Chicago was rejected. The NRA appealed the case to the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals. On June 2, 2009, the Court of Appeals affirmed the district court's decision, based on the theory that Heller applied only to the Federal Government (including the District of Columbia), and not to states or their subordinate jurisdictions. This opinion directly conflicts with the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals' earlier decision, holding that ''Heller'' applies to states as well. On June 28, 2010, the Supreme Court reversed the Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit's decision in '' McDonald v. City of Chicago'' and remanded it back to Seventh Circuit to resolve conflicts between certain Chicago gun restrictions and the
Second Amendment The second (symbol: s) is the unit of time in the International System of Units (SI), historically defined as of a day – this factor derived from the division of the day first into 24 hours, then to 60 minutes and finally to 60 seconds each ...
. Chicago's handgun law was likened to the D.C. handgun ban by Justice Breyer. Similarly, three Illinois municipalities with gun control measures on the books that previously had banned all handguns have rescinded their handgun bans. These cities were
Morton Grove, Illinois Morton Grove is a village in Cook County, Illinois. Per the 2020 census, the population was 25,297. The village is named after former United States Vice President Levi Parsons Morton, who helped finance the Chicago, Milwaukee and St. Paul Railr ...
,
Wilmette Wilmette is a village in New Trier Township, Cook County, Illinois, United States. Bordering Lake Michigan and Evanston, Illinois, it is located north of Chicago's downtown district. Wilmette had a population of 27,087 at the 2010 census. The ...
, another Illinois village, and
Evanston, Illinois Evanston ( ) is a city, suburb of Chicago. Located in Cook County, Illinois, United States, it is situated on the North Shore along Lake Michigan. Evanston is north of Downtown Chicago, bordered by Chicago to the south, Skokie to the west, ...
which enacted a partial repeal of its handgun ban. In ''Ezell v. Chicago'', decided July 6, 2011, the
Seventh Circuit The United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit (in case citations, 7th Cir.) is the U.S. federal court with appellate jurisdiction over the courts in the following districts: * Central District of Illinois * Northern District of Ill ...
reversed a district court decision that the post-''McDonald'' measures adopted by the City of Chicago were constitutional. The Chicago law required firearms training in a shooting range in order to obtain a gun permit, but also banned shooting ranges within the City of Chicago. The city had argued that applicants could obtain their training at gun ranges in the suburbs. The opinion noted that Chicago could not infringe Second Amendment rights on the grounds that they could be exercised elsewhere, any more than it could infringe the right to freedom of speech on the grounds that citizens could speak elsewhere.


California

On January 14, 2009, in ''
Guy Montag Doe v. San Francisco Housing Authority ''Guy Montag Doe v. San Francisco Housing Authority'' is a lawsuit filed by the National Rifle Association the day after the United States Supreme Court decided in '' District of Columbia v. Heller'' that the Second Amendment to the United States ...
'', the San Francisco Housing Authority reached a settlement out of court with the NRA, which allows residents to possess legal firearms within a SFHA apartment building. The San Francisco lawsuit resulted in the elimination of the gun ban from the SF Housing Authority residential lease terms. Tim Larsen speaking for the Housing Authority said that they never intended to enforce its 2005 housing lease gun ban against law-abiding gun owners and have never done so.


Idaho

On January 10, 2014, in ''Morris v. U.S. Army Corps of Engineers'', the District Court struck down a Corps of Engineers regulation barring possession of loaded guns in recreation areas surrounding Corps dams. The court held that tents are akin to homes, and under ''Heller'', Second Amendment rights are protected.


Legacy

The decision in '' McDonald v. City of Chicago'', which was brought in response to Heller and decided in 2010, did invalidate much of Chicago's gun purchase and registration laws, and has called into question many other state and local laws restricting purchase, possession, and carry of firearms. Justice Stevens later called the decision "unquestionably the most clearly incorrect decision that the Supreme Court announced during my tenure on the bench" and called for a Constitutional amendment overruling it".
Stephen Halbrook Stephen P. Halbrook (born 12 September 1947) is a senior fellow at the Independent Institute and an author and lawyer known for his litigation on cases involving laws pertaining to firearms. He has written extensively about the original meanings o ...
, a lawyer and Second Amendment analyst who successfully argued three firearms-related cases before the Supreme Court, concluded the majority's opinion in Heller "relied on text, history, and tradition." Halbrook asserted that the individual right to bear arms was not an invention of gun rights activists in the preceding few decades, but was in fact a textualist interpretation confirmed by the historical context of the Second Amendment. This included the English Declaration of Rights of 1689, as well as "post-ratification commentary, antebellum judicial opinions, Reconstruction legislation, and post-Civil War commentary." The Court's statement that the right secured by the Second Amendment is limited has been widely discussed by lower courts and the media. According to Justice John Paul Stevens, he was able to persuade Justice Anthony M. Kennedy to ask for “some important changes” to Justice Scalia’s opinion, so that the final version of ''Heller'' “should not be taken to cast doubt” on the many gun laws existing in the United States.


See also

*
List of United States Supreme Court cases, volume 554 This is a list of all the United States Supreme Court cases from volume 554 of the ''United States Reports The ''United States Reports'' () are the official record ( law reports) of the Supreme Court of the United States. They include rulings, ...
*
List of United States Supreme Court cases This page serves as an index of lists of United States Supreme Court cases. The United States Supreme Court is the highest federal court of the United States. By Chief Justice Court historians and other legal scholars consider each Chief J ...
*
Firearm case law in the United States A firearm is any type of gun designed to be readily carried and used by an individual. The term is legally defined further in different countries (see Legal definitions). The first firearms originated in 10th-century China, when bamboo tubes ...
* Gun politics in the United States * Incorporation (Bill of Rights)#Amendment II * Second Amendment to the United States Constitution


References


Sources

* * * *, *,


External links

* *
Archive of case pleadings, orders, and opinions. Maintained by Gura & Possessky P.L.L.C., plaintiff's counsel.United States Department of Justice Solicitor General 1-11-2008 ''amicus curiae'' briefAudio commentary by Appellant's Attorney Clark Neily regarding his views on the Second Amendment, dated January 17, 2008Audio/visual recording of the arguments (RealMedia)Audio recording of the arguments (MP3)Harvard Law Review forum: Heller is a "Second Amendment Revolution"
in the ''
Harvard Law Record The ''Harvard Law Record'' is an independent student-edited newspaper based at Harvard Law School. Founded in 1946, it is the oldest law school newspaper in the United States. Characteristics The ''Record'', a print and online publication, includ ...
''
CRS Report for Congress: "''District of Columbia v. Heller'': The Supreme Court and the Second Amendment"
(public domain – can be copied into article with citations)

{{DEFAULTSORT:District Of Columbia v. Heller United States Supreme Court cases United States Second Amendment case law United States Supreme Court cases of the Roberts Court District of Columbia law 2008 in United States case law Legal history of the District of Columbia Gun politics in the United States