Black Community News News and Commentary for Christians
Although the U.S. Supreme Court struck down the District of Columbia’s over three-decade ban on handguns in 2008, the city council has been fighting gun rights ever since.
The district required law-abiding residents who wanted to actually carry their handguns to provide a “good reason” for doing so — more arbitrary, bureaucratic meddling in what our U.S. Constitution guarantees.
But a federal court just dashed gun grabbers’ hopes. A three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit blocked (PDF) enforcement of the city’s restrictive concealed-carry law. From the Washington Times:
In rejecting the city’s law, the court ruled that while the Second Amendment allows for some limits on gun possession it does now allow for “bans on carrying in urban areas like D.C. or bans on carrying absent a special need for self-defense.”
“In fact, the Amendment’s core at a minimum shields the typically situated citizen’s ability to carry common arms generally,” wrote Circuit Judge Thomas B. Griffith in the majority opinion. “The District’s good-reason law is necessarily a total ban on exercises of that constitutional right for most D.C. residents. That’s enough to sink this law under Heller I.”
Judge Griffith was joined by Circuit Judge Stephen F. Williams in the opinion. Circuit Judge Karen LeCraft Henderson dissented.
The Second Amendment is an individual right not only to own and possess but to carry guns to protect the carrier and others whose lives are in danger. Excerpts of the decision:
“We pause to draw together all the pieces of our analysis: At the Second Amendment’s core lies the right of responsible citizens to carry firearms for personal self-defense beyond the home, subject to longstanding restrictions. These traditional limits include, for instance, licensing requirements, but not bans on carrying in urban areas like D.C. or bans on carrying absent a special need for self-defense. In fact, the Amendment’s core at a minimum shields the typically situated citizen’s ability to carry common arms generally. The District’s good-reason law is necessarily a total ban on exercises of that constitutional right for most D.C. residents. That’s enough to sink this law under Heller I.”
“….a “good reason” for doing so — ” “….that while the Second Amendment allows for some limits on gun possession….” My reading of that Amendment, and not being ‘reading comprehension deficient,’ I read NO licensing requirement, and definitely NO requirement to show ” a good reason!” My personal credo is, I will obey no man made law that would deny me my “God Given Right” to self-defense of myself or others, by ANY appropriate means ANYWHERE! 2nd Amendment is appreciated, but acknowledged or accepted by legislators or judges as Constitutional, is irrelevant in “my world!” I have not fully read that fairly recent SCOTUS ruling finding the Amendment grants “the people” the right to own arms, but still managed to input some ridiculous caveat as “in the home!” I laughed all the way to breakfast over that one!
Is it possible that because crime is so high in America’s inner cities, such residents’ lives are inherently “in danger”, therefore the need to openly carry a gun?
My thoughts exactly.