2nd Amendment

After the Supreme Court affirmed this week in McDonald v. Chicago that Second-Amendment rights for individuals do indeed apply even within a 25-mile radius of organic grocers and a liberal city council, Chicago Mayor Richard Daley went to work to subvert his constituents' newfound right to self defense.

The measure, which draws from ordinances around the country, would ban gun shops in Chicago and prohibit gun owners from stepping outside their homes, even onto their porches or garages, with a handgun.

Daley announced his ordinance at a park on the city's South Side three days after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that Americans have a right to own a gun for self-defense anywhere they live. The City Council is expected to vote on it Friday.

Daley goes on to explain how successful banning guns has been up until now:

"As long as I'm mayor, we will never give up or give in to gun violence that continues to threaten every part of our nation, including Chicago," said Daley, who was flanked by activists...

Those who already have handguns in the city — which has been illegal since the city's ban was approved 28 years ago — would have 90 days to register those weapons, according to the proposed ordinance

Last weekend in the allegedly gun-free paradise of Chicago? 54 shot, 10 dead in gun violence.

Daley was unable to include in the bill a requirement that citizens insure their guns or restrict each gunowner to only one gun, for fear of legal challenges, but added "everyone has a right to sue." Wel, it's nice he recognizes that right.

A little more than three years ago, Seung-Hui Cho entered a building at Virginia Tech, chained the doors shut and began shooting. He killed 32 people--the deadliest school shooting in United States history. The tragedy sparked a nationwide review of campus safety measures. Colleges began coordinating with local police to update old and outdated emergency policies. But the shooting also caused many students, dismayed by the poor emergency response by Virginia Tech administrators and police, to start looking toward ensuring their own safety. A movement was born to roll back long-standing handgun bans at colleges, led by the group Students for Concealed Carry on Campus.

Two years ago, the Supreme Court heard the hotly controversial Heller case, in which it ultimately recognized a personal right to keep and bear arms under the Second Amendment.  That case, which pertained only to federal (and District of Columbia) gun regulations, not state or other local gun regulations, sharply divided activists along partisan lines.

The Court is now considering McDonald v. City of Chicago, a follow-up case asking whether persons have an equivalent right against state and local governments.  The familiar partisan divide has returned, but this time the more heated divide separates dueling factions on the right.  Even more surprising is the subject of the debate: A 137-year-old line of Supreme Court precedent involving the Fourteenth Amendment.