Also known as: rights to bear arms · second amendment · 2nd amendment right
Written by attorneys — see sources below.
A constitutional right protected by the Second Amendment that entitles individuals to keep and bear arms for lawful purposes, with particular emphasis on self-defense within the home. Total bans on handgun possession in the home and requirements that firearms be rendered inoperable for immediate defensive use are invalid. The right applies against the states through the Fourteenth Amendment Due Process Clause.
Rosa Ruiz keeps a loaded handgun in her bedside drawer for protection after prior break-ins at her apartment. City officials enact a rule forbidding all handguns in residential units and requiring any long guns to be stored in locked ground-floor boxes overnight. Rosa challenges the rule in court. The court strikes down the restrictions because they eliminate her ability to maintain a functional firearm for immediate self-defense in her home.
Roberto Reyes resides in a state that bans handgun possession in apartments. He sues in federal court after police seize his handgun kept for home defense. The court applies the Second Amendment directly to the state measure. The ban falls because the right to keep arms for self-defense in the home binds state and local governments.
Ravi Reddy, a state sheriff, refuses to perform federal background checks on handgun purchasers under a new national law. He argues the mandate commandeers state officers. The court invalidates the federal requirement on federalism grounds while noting that the underlying individual right to possess arms remains intact and enforceable.
In 1993 Congress amended the Gun Control Act of 1968 by enacting the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act, which directed the Attorney General to create a national instant background-check system by November 30, 1998, and imposed interim requirements on firearms dealers and chief law enforcement officers until that system became operational. Under the interim scheme a dealer proposing to transfer a handgun had to obtain a sworn Brady Form from the purchaser, verify the purchaser's identity, forward notice and a copy of the form to the CLEO of the purchaser's residence, and wait five business days before completing the sale unless the CLEO notified the dealer that the transfer would not violate the law. Jay Printz, CLEO for Ravalli County, Montana, and Richard Mack, CLEO for Graham County, Arizona, filed separate federal actions challenging the constitutionality of the interim provisions that required CLEOs to perform background checks and related tasks. In each case the district court held that the obligation imposed on CLEOs was unconstitutional but severable from the remainder of the Act, leaving in place a voluntary background-check system. The Ninth Circuit consolidated the appeals and reversed, holding that none of the Brady Act's interim provisions violated the Constitution. The Supreme Court granted certiorari.
View caseRyan Roberts applies for a permit to carry a handgun outside his home for self-defense after receiving threats. State officials deny the permit under a discretionary licensing scheme. The court evaluates the denial against historical traditions of firearm regulation. The scheme is struck down because it lacks grounding in the nation's historical tradition of regulating arms.
New York has regulated public carriage of handguns since the early twentieth century. The Sullivan Law of 1911 made possession of a handgun without a license a crime. It was later amended to require that applicants for a license to have and carry concealed a pistol or revolver prove good moral character and other statutory criteria. The present scheme makes it a crime to possess any firearm without a license, whether inside or outside the home. Possessing a loaded firearm outside one’s home or place of business without a license is a felony. A license to possess a firearm at home or in a place of business requires a licensing officer to be satisfied as to good moral character and other statutory criteria. To carry a firearm outside the home for self-defense, an applicant must obtain an unrestricted license to have and carry a concealed pistol or revolver by proving that proper cause exists. If an applicant does not demonstrate proper cause, he may receive only a restricted license allowing carry for limited purposes such as hunting, target shooting, or employment. No New York statute defines proper cause. New York courts have held that an applicant shows proper cause only if he can demonstrate a special need for self-protection distinguishable from that of the general community. Brandon Koch and Robert Nash are law-abiding adults from Rensselaer County. Both sought unrestricted licenses to carry handguns in public for self-defense without claiming any special individualized threats. Each was denied an unrestricted license and given a restricted license instead. Koch and Nash sued state licensing officials under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, claiming the denials violated the Second and Fourteenth Amendments. The District Court dismissed the complaint. The United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit affirmed, relying on its prior decision upholding New York’s proper-cause standard.
View caseRegina Robinson challenges a federal agency rule that imposes storage requirements on handguns kept in homes near schools. She contends the agency lacked proper legislative guidance when issuing the rule. The court examines whether the delegation complies with constitutional limits on agency authority while preserving the core right to armed self-defense.
In 2006 Congress enacted the Sex Offender Registration and Notification Act. The statute requires sex offenders to register in the jurisdictions where they live, work, and attend school. It also directs the Attorney General to specify the applicability of its requirements to offenders convicted before the Act’s enactment and to prescribe rules for their registration. At the time of enactment the nation’s population of sex offenders exceeded 500,000, and Congress left the treatment of these pre-Act offenders to the Attorney General after concluding that immediate application would impose costly burdens on states and localities. The Attorney General first left pre-Act offenders unregulated for six months after enactment. An interim rule issued in 2007 then required all pre-Act offenders to follow the same registration rules as post-Act offenders. Subsequent Attorneys General issued varying guidelines, with one directing states to register only some pre-Act offenders, another requiring registration only for those convicted of a new felony after enactment, and still others differing on whether pre-Act offenders could receive credit for time already spent in the community. Herman Gundy pleaded guilty in 2005 to possessing child pornography. He was released from prison five years later. He was arrested in 2012 for failing to register as a sex offender under the rules then prescribed for pre-Act offenders and faced an additional ten-year prison term. Gundy was convicted in 2012. He argued in the district court that Congress had unconstitutionally delegated legislative power when it authorized the Attorney General to specify the applicability of SORNA’s requirements. The district court rejected the argument. The Second Circuit affirmed, relying on its precedent that SORNA does not unconstitutionally delegate legislative authority. The Supreme Court granted certiorari.
View caseRoland Rhodes faces prosecution under a state handgun ban after keeping a firearm in his residence for protection. He argues the state law violates a federal constitutional guarantee. The court considers whether the right to bear arms is among the liberties protected against state action through the Fourteenth Amendment.
The plaintiff in error was indicted by the grand jury of Monmouth County, New Jersey, for the crime of having exhibited a false paper to the auditor of the township of Neptune, with intent to defraud the township. The indictment was of the second degree, setting forth in two counts the same offense in different language. The plaintiff in error was arraigned and pleaded not guilty. At the trial he was a witness in his own behalf. He was asked on cross-examination, and in the hearing of the jury, whether he had been convicted of any offense. To this question he made no reply. The judge instructed the jury that they might draw an inference of guilt from his silence. The plaintiff in error was convicted, and the judgment of conviction was affirmed by the Court of Errors and Appeals. After the judgment of the highest court of the State had been entered, the case was brought here by writ of error. It is assumed, in respect of each of the two defendants, that the jury were instructed that they might draw an unfavorable inference against him from his failure to testify, where it was within his power, in denial of the evidence which tended to incriminate him.
View caseYes. The Second Amendment protects an individual right to keep and bear arms for lawful purposes, with special emphasis on self-defense in the home. A total ban on handgun possession in the home is unconstitutional because handguns are in common use for that purpose.
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Yes. The Second Amendment right is incorporated against the states through the Fourteenth Amendment Due Process Clause. Most provisions of the Bill of Rights, including this one, bind state and local actors.
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Regulations are constitutional only if consistent with the nation's historical tradition of firearm regulation. Interest-balancing tests such as intermediate scrutiny are rejected in this context.
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…protected a range of specific individual rights against federal infringement, it did not, with the possible exception of the Second Amendment, offer any similarly specific protections to areas of state sovereignty. : To the contrary, we have always recognized that while the federal commerce power may overlap the…