There's A Right To Bear, Not Just Keep, Arms
Walter Olson writes at Cato that the Ninth Circuit Court just recognized the right to actually bear arms:
California law forbids the carrying of firearms in public places without a license and provides that the issuance of such a license requires "good cause." San Diego County, as part of its implementation of that law, has set a number of restrictive policies on what it will consider good cause, which must be exceptional circumstances ("distinguish[ed]... from the mainstream"), and it specifies that concern for "one's personal safety alone is not considered good cause."That's a policy in considerable tension with the language of the Second Amendment, which protects individuals' right not only to "keep" arms, but also to "bear" them. What does the verb "bear" mean in this context? That has given rise to considerable dispute, and some federal courts, such as the Third Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals, appear to believe that it provides very little protection for individuals' right to possess guns outside the home.
The Ninth Circuit says that the bearing off arms can't be relegated to a "second-class right, subject to an entirely different body of rules than the other Bill of Rights guarantees that we have held to be incorporated into the Due Process Clause."
UPDATE: Eugene Volokh on "Turning San Francisco Into San Antonio" hysteria:
Now it might well be that the court will rehear the case, but I think it's important to realize that shall-issue isn't just a "San Antonio" matter. One could as easily say "turning San Francisco into Portland," "turning San Francisco into Seattle," or "turning San Francisco into Burlington, Vermont."In Oregon, pretty much any law-abiding adult can get a license to carry concealed. In Washington State, this has long been the rule. And in Vermont, people have pretty much always been able to carry concealed guns even without a license.
Perhaps I've missed the news, but I don't think people are gunning each other down in the streets in these places.
When guns are outlawed, only criminals will own guns.
Criminals don't care about gun control laws because the criminals will just buy them on the black market. And the more laws that are passed to control or eliminate guns, the larger the black market for them will become.
Nick at February 16, 2014 9:10 AM
One of the most horrible lies perpetrated by anyone is that a license conveys ability - as in, "they can't POSSIBLY be carrying a gun without a permit!"
Ridiculous naiveté.
Many arguments revolve around the difference between the America of the late 1700s and today, when we have police everywhere. Umm, police have never had the ability, much less the duty, to protect your person. That's been a lie, too.
Now that it is obvious that the system does NOT, in fact, protect any individual, it becomes more obvious that the operative syllable in the term, "self-defense" is "self".
Radwaste at February 16, 2014 12:42 PM
I'm from the Northwest, and people from Washington and Oregon are the LAST people I would expect to behave responsibly with guns (or anything else, for that matter). So if there's not a remarkable amount of accidental or intentional gun violence there, well...
Sosij at February 16, 2014 1:35 PM
What Radwaste said.
Police carry guns to protect themselves, not the citizen.
Nick at February 16, 2014 1:52 PM
What surprises me was that it was the Ninth Circuit Court that made this decision.
This is the same court that faced calls for being disbanded over many of their decisions that were so liberal the rest of the country thought they were insane. Obviously they found a copy of the U.S. Constitution finally.
As Rad so rightly points out -- no one else is responsible for whether you live or die at any point on your continuum.
There are multiple states that have laws on the books that it is illegal to commit suicide. What are they going to do -- throw your dead carcass into a cell?
This is 98% of criminal law. It can effect the offender after the action has already occurred. But the person they beat, raped, robbed, or killed can't be undone.
The Minority Report does not exist and probably never will. And even that was a flawed system.
So you have to have the weapons to defend yourself or depend on the kindness of strangers. I don't like strangers.
Jim P. at February 16, 2014 4:55 PM
FWIW, neighborhoodscout.com shows your chance of being a victim of a violent crime in San Francisco is 1 in 140... versus San Antonio, with a 1 in 196 chance. (Chance of being a victim of violent crime in CA is 1 in 236. In TX it's 1 in 245.) It's usually not the people who are legally carrying guns that you need to worry about.
ahw at February 17, 2014 8:36 AM
Well, Portland occasionally has people shoot each-other... but they're almost all people who aren't carrying legally.
Exactly the same sorts who cause problems in, say, Oakland right now, where it's equally illegal for a convicted felon to carry a gun, or for anyone to do so while committing a felony.
Somehow that doesn't stop them.
Sigivald at February 17, 2014 12:48 PM
No, the 9th Circuit didn't suddenly read the Constitution, but they (or the subset of them that decided this case) did read the Supreme Court decisions - and it's pretty clear that if you follow the logic of those, the right to _bear_ arms is also protected, and SDC's policy clearly violates that. So the only surprise is that the 9th followed the law...
My guess about that is that they're _hoping_ to be overturned, and that by following the precedents to what they think of as a horrible decision, they'll force the SC to partially reverse itself. They can't imagine that five Justices might support allowing an ordinary citizen without any political pull to go armed just because she wants to.
markm at February 20, 2014 7:36 PM
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