WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court held Monday that Americans have the right to own a gun for self-defense anywhere they live.
By a 5-4 vote, the justices cast doubt on handgun bans in the Chicago area, but signaled that some limitations on the Constitution’s “right to keep and bear arms” could survive legal challenges.
The ruling was likely the most awaited in a flurry of decisions released Monday, the last day for retiring Justice John Paul Stevens.
Justice Samuel Alito, writing for the court, said that the Second Amendment right “applies equally to the federal government and the states.” He was joined by Chief Justice John Roberts and Justices Antonin Scalia, Anthony M. Kennedy and Clarence Thomas.
Justices Stevens and Stephen Breyer, joined by Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Sonia Sotomayor, each wrote a dissent. Stevens, in his final day on the bench after more than 34 years, said that unlike the Washington case, Monday’s decision “could prove far more destructive — quite literally — to our nation’s communities and to our constitutional structure.”
Two years ago, the court declared that the Second Amendment protects an individual’s right to possess guns, at least for purposes of self-defense in the home. That ruling applied only to federal laws.
Gun rights proponents almost immediately filed a federal lawsuit challenging gun control laws in Chicago and its suburb of Oak Park, Ill, where handguns have been banned for nearly 30 years. Lower federal courts upheld the two laws.
Monday’s decision did not explicitly strike down the Chicago area laws. Instead, it ordered a federal appeals court to reconsider its ruling. But it left little doubt that the statutes eventually would fall.
Read tomorrow's Arkansas Democrat-Gazette for full details.
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