The Second Amendment to the Constitution of the United States envisages the right of the citizens to bear arms. This Amendment has attracted a lot of controversy since its inception.
The Firearms Control Regulation Act, 1975 was passed in the District of Columbia. This Act restricted the owning of handguns (by prohibiting the registration of handguns) by residents post 1975. The Act also laid down that all firearms of registered users had to kept unloaded, disassembled or secured with a trigger lock. The complainant filed the case on the grounds that the preceding stated provisions of the Act violated his right under the Second Amendment to the Constitution.
Issue before the court:
The regulatory issue before the court was; whether the requirement of the Act to keep firearms unloaded and the denial of registration to residents violated the Second Amendment to the Constitution, i.e. the right to bear arms?
Dick Anthony Heller
The complainant was a special police officer who was denied registration for a handgun that he wished to keep at home. The district court found no merit in the case and dismissed the complaint. The US court of appeals, however, ruled on favor of the complainant.
Decision; Reasoning:
The court held that the term ‘militia’ in the Second Amendment was not restricted to military personnel. In fact, the wordings of the Second Amendment must be given a wide interpretation, as the spirit of the Amendment is to give people the right to defend themselves during a confrontation. With respect to the requirement to keep the firearms unloaded, the court ruled that this violated the right of the people to defend themselves. As such the Regulation was held to be unconstitutional as it prevented people from owning handguns for even legitimate purposes like self-defense.
Precedent:
This was the first case to include the right to self-defense within the ambit of the Second amendment. This case gave a strong interpretation of the Second Amendment by making the right to own a handgun for self-defense a constitutional right. The court also recognized that the Second Amendment was not without limitations and stated that stated that the ruling would have no effect on the Regulations that restrict the possession of firearms by convicts or mentally ill persons or any restriction on the use of firearms in schools, government buildings and the like. Thus Regulations that restrict the preceding mentioned categories continue to be in place. What this case did was to prevent any arbitrary ban on the right to bear arms and settled the controversy by affirming that the right to bear arms for legitimate purposes is in fact a constitutional right.
Political analysis:
On the political front, it was up to the Congress to give effect to the judgment by passing legislation regulating the process of registration for firearms. However, the continued restriction on the sale of firearms in DC can be attributed to the political outlook. President Obama (then Senator) had supported gun ban. In contrast Senator John McCain was opposed to any ban on firearms. Barack Obama was voted into power. As such, the Regulations that banned firearms remained in place and the question raised by the court in this case were not acted upon. (Levy, 2008)
References
Levy Robert. (2008). District of Columbia v. Heller: What’s Next? Retrieved from
http://www.cato-unbound.org/2008/07/14/robert-levy/district-columbia-v-heller-whats-next
