Chris, there is much to be said about Heller. The primary point in relation to what you posted is that for nearly 150 years prior to Heller, the Courts consistently interpreted the right to be a collective one, and not an individual one. Heller was a revolutionary departure from that. The nonsense that Larry and others here spout about this being some long standing right is simply incorrect. No one seriously believed the right was individual and not collective until the NRA started pushing that idea in the 70s.
And the conservative Chief Justice at the time said the following in response to that:
"The NRA's interpretation of the 2nd Amendment is the greatest constitutional fraud ever prepretated on the American people." CJ Warren Burger.
Beyond that, Larry and crowd are selective in their reading of Heller. Well, that's being charitable because they've never read it.
In Heller, Scalia himself stated the following:
Like most rights, the right secured by the Second Amendment is not unlimited [I.E. this shows that 90% of Larry's bs above is wrong]. From Blackstone through the 19th-century cases, commentators and courts routinely explained that the right was not a right to keep and carry any weapon whatsoever in any manner whatsoever and for whatever purpose. See, e.g., Sheldon, in 5 Blume 346; Rawle 123; Pomeroy 152–153; Abbott333. For example, the majority of the 19th-century courts to consider the question held that prohibitions on carrying concealed weapons were lawful under the Second Amendment or state analogues. See, e.g., State v. Chandler, 5 La. Ann., at 489–490; Nunn v. State, 1 Ga., at 251; see generally 2 Kent *340, n. 2; The American Students’ Blackstone 84, n. 11 (G. Chase ed. 1884). 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.26
We also recognize another important limitation on the right to keep and carry arms. Miller said, as we have explained, that the sorts of weapons protected were those “in common use at the time.” 307 U. S., at 179. We think that limitation is fairly supported by the historical tradition of prohibiting the carrying of “dangerous and unusual weapons.” See 4 Blackstone 148–149 (1769); 3 B. Wilson, Works of the Honourable James Wilson 79 (1804); J. Dunlap, The New-York Justice 8 (1815); C. Humphreys, A Compendium of the Common Law in Force in Kentucky 482 (1822); 1 W. Russell, A Treatise on Crimes and Indictable Misdemeanors 271–272 (1831); H. Stephen, Summary of the Criminal Law 48 (1840); E. Lewis, An Abridgment of the Criminal Law of the United States 64 (1847); F. Wharton, A Treatise on the Criminal Law of the United States 726 (1852). See also State v. Langford, 10 N. C. 381, 383–384 (1824); O’Neill v. State, 16Ala. 65, 67 (1849); English v. State, 35Tex. 473, 476 (1871); State v. Lanier, 71 N. C. 288, 289 (1874).
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. It may well be true today that a militia, to be as effective as militias in the 18th century, would require sophisticated arms that are highly unusual in society at large. Indeed, it may be true that no amount of small arms could be useful against modern-day bombers and tanks. But the fact that modern developments have limited the degree of fit between the prefatory clause and the protected right cannot change our interpretation of the right
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So, what do we have here? We have Scalia interpreting the 2nd Amendment to mean reasonable regulation is ok. Felons can't own guns. The mentally infirm can't own guns. There can be gun free zones. There can be restrictions on the commercial sale of guns. And....ta da...the individual right to own guns is limited "to those in common use" at the time of the adoption of the Constitution. "Dangerous and unusual weapons" can be prohibited.
Scalia then goes on in the NEXT SENTENCE to effectively acknowledge an assault weapons ban would be constitutional, specifically calling out M-16s and noting they could be banned.
It would be wonderful if the gun nuts of the world would take 5 minutes and actually read Heller. They might not be as happy about as they are now, having on learned about it via what Sean Hannity says it says.
('mean it)
