By a 5-4 vote, the right to keep and bear arms is a fundamental right to our system of liberty

Fine, the Supreme Court voted that the right to own a gun is fundamental and so applies to the states...only, should not the vote have been 9-0?


Should not all the justices who have sworn to uphold the Constitution echo in sentiment the words of Sam Alito?

"It is clear that the Framers . . . counted the right to keep and bear arms among those fundamental rights necessary to our system of ordered liberty."

Should not all our Supreme Court justices understand the common sense that our founding fathers understood?

"Before a standing army can rule, the people must be disarmed; as they are in almost every kingdom of Europe. The supreme power in America cannot enforce unjust laws by the sword; because the whole body of the people are armed, and constitute a force superior to any band of regular troops that can be, on any pretence, raised in the United States." Noah Webster, An Examination into the Leading Principles of the Federal Constitution, 1787


"Guard with jealous attention the public liberty. Suspect every one who approaches that jewel. Unfortunately, nothing will preserve it but downright force. Whenever you give up that force, you are inevitably ruined." Patrick Henry, speech in the Virginia Ratifying Convention, June 5, 1778


"Laws that forbid the carrying of arms... disarm only those who are neither inclined nor determined to commit crimes... Such laws make things worse for the assaulted and better for the assailants; they serve rather to encourage than to prevent homicides, for an unarmed man may be attacked with greater confidence than an armed man." Cesare Beccaria, On Crimes and Punishment, quoted by Thomas Jefferson in Commonplace Book, 1774-1776


"When the resolution of enslaving America was formed in Great Britain, the British Parliament was advised by an artful man, — who was governor of Pennsylvania, to disarm the people; that it was the best and most effectual way to enslave them; but that they should not do it openly, but weaken them, and let them sink gradually, by totally disusing and neglecting the militia." George Mason, speech in the Virginia Ratifying Convention, June 14, 1778


"What, Sir, is the use of a militia? It is to prevent the establishment of a standing army, the bane of liberty. Whenever governments mean to invade the rights and liberties of the people, they always attempt to destroy the militia, in order to raise an army upon their ruins." Elbridge Gerry


"A militia, when properly formed, are in fact the people themselves ... and include all men capable of bearing arms." Richard Henry Lee


"Who are the militia? Are they not ourselves? Is it feared, then, that we shall turn our arms each man gainst his own bosom. Congress have no power to disarm the militia. Their swords, and every other terrible implement of the soldier, are the birthright of an American...[T]he unlimited power of the sword is not in the hands of either the federal or state governments, but, where I trust in God it will ever remain, in the hands of the people." Tenche Coxe, The Pennsylvania Gazette, Feb. 20, 1788


"The Constitution shall never be construed to prevent the people of the United States, who are peaceable citizens from keeping their own arms." Samuel Adams


"Americans [have] the right and advantage of being armed, unlike the citizens of other countries whose governments are afraid to trust their people with arms." James Madison


"One loves to possess arms, though they hope never to have occasion for them." Thomas Jefferson to George Washington, 1796. The Writings of Thomas Jefferson, (Memorial Edition) Lipscomb and Bergh, editors


"Laws that forbid the carrying of arms... disarm only those who are neither inclined nor determined to commit crimes... Such laws make things worse for the assaulted and better for the assailants; they serve rather to encourage than to prevent homicides, for an unarmed man may be attacked with greater confidence than an armed man." Jefferson's 'Commonplace Book,' 1774-1776, quoting from On Crimes and Punishment, by criminologist Cesare Beccaria, 1764

Since we have the right to life, it seems we should have the right to the means necessary to protect that life, and no debate necessary. Who are these people that want us defenseless, and why?

Dissent: Sonia Sotomayor said, “I can find nothing in the Second Amendment’s text, history, or underlying rationale … to protect the keeping and bearing arms for private self-defense purposes.” She also said that the Court should consider overruling Heller altogether. This doesn't fit with how she responded during her confirmation hearings last year in saying that the Second Amendment provides individuals with the right to keep and bear arms.


A 5-4 victory in a case (McDonald v. Chicago) that should have been a slam dunk makes me uneasy with what could happen to our Constitution in the future by virtue of one more backwards 'progressive' vote. (Otis McDonald)


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