Supreme Court Will Decide Meaning of Second Amendment

The American People Already Know What the Second Amendment Means, So, Really We Will Find Out If the Supreme Court Is Still A Valid Institution or Has Been Bought!

On November 20, the Supreme Court announced that it would hear the case of District of Columbia v. Heller. Finally, the Court will decide whether the Second Amendment secures to individual citizens the right to keep and bear their private firearms or whether it merely recongizes that an individual may use firearms for the collective purpose of participating in a state-sponsored militia.

This day has been a long time coming. The last time the Supreme Court directly addressed the meaning of the Second Amendment was almost 70 years ago in the case of U.S. v. Miller, which resulted in a controversial opinion that raised more questions than it answered. The case hinged on whether a short-barreled shotgun was the type of weapon used for military purposes and thus protected by the Second Amendment. The Court never heard evidence on this issue and before it could, Mr. Miller was killed and the case died with him.

As a board member and officer of NRA, I’ve been a vocal critic of gun bans and the D.C. gun ban in particular. It’s not just because such laws violate our Constitution but also because 25 years ago, before I became a gun owner, I was almost the victim of a home invasion. I learned first hand that the right of self-defense means nothing unless you also have the means of self-defense.

When this case challenging the D.C. gun ban was filed in 2003, it was called Parker v. District of Columbia. Shelly Parker lived in a high crime area of D.C. She and five other plaintiffs sued to overturn the D.C. law because it deprived them of their right to keep operable firearms in their homes for self-protection.