If my understanding is correct, the case will deal with incorporation of the 2nd Amendment. Incorporation is legal-speak for applying an amendment to the states – in other words state (and local) laws could not supersede the Constitution. (I’m hoping the Sound Off Sister will review and comment on this post…)

Chicago has very strict gun laws. As a matter of fact, residents have been denied their right to purchase a handgun since 1982. So the federal government says you have the right to bear arms, but the city of Chicago – since in their mind the 2nd Amendment has not been incorporated – assume they have the power to restrict the purchase, ownership and carry rights of their residents and guests visiting the city.

Another way to look at it is the state does not think the United States Constitution applies – in some cases – unless it is politically expedient for them.

Side note: I find it funny that many liberals can find language in the Constitution not only permitting, but encouraging federal cash for local schools, firetrucks, city parks, brick sidewalks and street signs – but then claim the 2nd Amendment does not apply in their city.

Many amendments have been incorporated against the states, but the Supreme Court has not answered the incorporation question for the 2nd Amendment. Currently, the Circuit Court of Appeals are split on the subject with the Ninth incorporating (surprise there) and the Second and Seventh not incorporating. The SCOTUS decision – with arguments scheduled for next year – will fix the split decisions.

If the 2nd is held to be not incorporated, you’ll see quite a bit of “feel good” legislation that will limit your rights to protect yourself and your family. Held incorporated, many states and cities – including Washington D.C. – will need to revisit their current restrictions on purchase and ownership.

For many states, the incorporation of the 2nd Amendment is moot since their individual constitutions already cover the topic. As an example, Connecticut’s Constitution (Article 1, Sec. 15) reads …

Every citizen has a right to bear arms in defense of himself and the state.

That pretty much clarifies the issue of incorporation for Connecticut unless someone repeals Article 1, Sec. 15. The Illinois Constitution seems a bit more vague in its first clause. Article 1, Sec. 22 reads …

Subject only to the police power, the right of the individual citizen to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.

I read that section as follows … Our state laws (police powers) can be written to restrict your ownership of firearms… but the right of the individual citizen to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.

Good one.

Hence, Illinois is a good battleground to discuss and rule on incorporation of the 2nd Amendment to the states.

Even though Heller overturned D.C. law banning the possession of a firearm for personal use, the city fought long and hard to ensure it was so damn expensive to pass the rules and jump through the hoops, many residents can not afford the costs. In early September, Christian Davenport – a Washington Post staff writer – wrote about his experiences and the fact it cost more than $800 to go through the process including the inexpensive used revolver he purchased for $275.

This tactic – letting residents know they have the right, but they must pay outrageous fees for that right – is completely dishonest and if I was on the SCOTUS, I’d be slapping heads.

McDonald v. Chicago (08-1521) is scheduled for arguments in early 2010.

More over at SCOTUS Blog, Josh Blackman’s Blog, Volokh Conspriacy and Hot Air.

I am not comforted by his testimony today when question by Dr Tom Coburn. You have to listen closely (audio is stepped on by Shep Smith) but he clearly states that position as accepted fact until Heller. I am not ware it was accepted by anyone other than gun control advocates. Based on what I heard … he is a man who will push Heller to the limits.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pUdYWEXq-2M

If you would like the longer cleaner version you can find it here at C-Span … the key portion begins at 53:40

The only guns he will “reasonably restrict” will be those belonging the law abiding citizens. The criminals don’t care. He scares me and should all law abiding citizens. Or am I overreacting?

For more news on Holder and the 2nd Amendment … go to Instapundit here … and then follow every day.

Heller’s pistol is a semi-automatic handgun that has a magazine that holds seven rounds. For those interested, I would guess that the weapon is a .40 or .45 caliber. They denied the application for no good reason at all, just to be a pain in the ass and illegally fight the SCOTUS decision.

He did not bring his weapon to the meeting since his lawyer figured there was a good chance he’d be arrested doing so.

Here’s the information from WUSA9.com…

Dick Heller is the man who brought the lawsuit against the District’s 32-year-old ban on handguns. He was among the first in line Thursday morning to apply for a handgun permit.

But when he tried to register his semi-automatic weapon, he says he was rejected. He says his gun has seven bullet clip. Heller says the City Council legislation allows weapons with fewer than eleven bullets in the clip. A spokesman for the DC Police says the gun was a bottom-loading weapon, and according to their interpretation, all bottom-loading guns are outlawed because they are grouped with machine guns.

Are you kidding me? A semi-automatic pistol that holds seven rounds is grouped with fully automatic machine guns?

Someone needs to step up and slap these Washington D.C. bullies around and let them know they are dead wrong on this. Can Heller sue the District for 10 million dollars? 100 million dollars? I think that might be the only way to stop them.

Does SCOTUS have the ability to throw these criminals (the D.C. City Council) in jail for contempt of court?

HotAir has more, Malkin is mad, and I’m totally incensed at the city where I lived during two years of college.

I used to like Washington D.C. I have no desire to go back. Washington D.C. bureaucrats are IDIOTS; when it comes to education, taxes, second amendment rights and just about any other government function they are terrible – and the citizens pay.

Check out what Heller’s experience was like…

Heller, accompanied by an adviser, was met on the steps of the building by a cluster of camera crews and Lt. Jon Shelton, head of the firearms registration unit. In an animated discussion, police explained to Heller that he needed to show officials the guns he wanted to register — and allow them to be test-fired — as part of the registration process.

Heller’s adviser, Dane von Breichenruchardt, president of the Bill of Rights Foundation, a public interest group, said Heller owns at least two handguns — a .45-caliber semiautomatic pistol and a 9-shot, .22-caliber revolver — and has stored them for years with a friend in Maryland. Although officials said that gun owners in Heller’s situation can bring legally owned firearms from other jurisdictions into the District in order to register them, von Breichenruchardt said he had told Heller not to do so without written assurance that it was permissible.

After Assistant Police Chief Peter J. Newsham promised Heller in front of a dozen reporters and news cameras that he would “absolutely not” get in trouble for bringing a revolver into the city, von Breichenruchardt said Heller would do so another day. Neither Heller nor his adviser seemed upset by the delay.

Yeah right, he won’t get in trouble. Suuuurrre.

So, just what is the process D.C. residents must go through? Here are the rules, but I’ve copied them here and added some comments in red.

Provisions for registering a handgun purchased for self-defense in a District residence.

• A District resident who seeks to register a handgun must obtain an application form from MPD’s Firearms Registration Section and take it to a firearms dealer for assistance in completing it.
• The applicant must submit photos, proof of residency and proof of good vision (such as a driver’s license or doctor’s letter), and pass a written firearms test. Written test? What is this test? Who administers this test? Is it available in languages other than English? I ask because I’d like to take the test in Polynesian please. Are police officers required to take the same test?
• If the applicant is successful on the test, s(he) must pay registration fees and submit to fingerprinting. MPD will file one set of fingerprints and submit the other to the Federal Bureau of Investigation for analysis and criminal background check. How much are the fees? Is it $100 per year like it is for those requesting Massachusetts non-resident permits? Just want to check if I need to tap the 401k.
• MPD will notify the applicant whether all registration requirements are satisfied. At that point, the applicant returns to the Firearms Registration Section to complete the process and receive MPD’s seal on the application. What is the turn around time? Is there a law on the books that requires the applicant get an answer by a specific time? Is their an appeals board as efficient as the one in Connecticut?
• The applicant takes his or her completed application to a licensed firearm dealer to take delivery of the pistol. If the dealer is outside the District, the dealer transports the pistol to a licensed dealer in the District to complete the transaction. Is there a licensed FFL in the District? Looks like the only one I can find might not be willing to help me out. [Reference for readers]
• The applicant takes the pistol to the Firearms Registration Section for ballistics testing. When testing is complete, the applicant may retrieve the pistol and take it home. Are you kidding me? Hand my pistol over for ballistics testing? What happens if you mess it up and it no longer shoots straight? What kind of handgun training is required of those who are handling my weapon? I’m shooting about 300 to 500 rounds a month and have taken courses that involved proper concealed carry techniques over three days and 24 hours involving more than 1,200 rounds. Who’s more qualified?

Provisions for registering a handgun legally registered in another jurisdiction, or a handgun possessed in the District but not registered.

• Applicants bringing a firearm from another jurisdiction into the District must transport it immediately to the Firearms Registration Section, or notify the Section that they will do so within 48 hours.
• MPD will allow the registration of previously possessed handguns other than those that qualify as “machine guns” under District law (that is, all automatics and most semiautomatic pistols) for the next six months. During that period, the Office of the Attorney General has established an Amnesty policy not to prosecute anyone for unregistered possession of such a handgun when it is brought to MPD for registration, although those who have committed other crimes with firearms of course remain subject to prosecution. You read that correctly – no semi-automatic pistols are welcome in the district. What makes a 10 shot revolver safer [cough, cough] than my 8 shot 1911? This flies in the face of the SCOTUS decision.
• Regulations for registering handguns in either of these two scenarios are similar to those for newly-purchased handguns, but do not require the assistance of a licensed firearms dealer.

Provisions for transporting firearms legally within the District.

• When the law allows transporting a firearm legally, the owner must transport it unloaded and securely wrapped in a package, with the package visible in plain view. And how the heck is the firearm supposed to be wrapped and in plain view so that …. oh, never mind. I’m forgetting how stupid you D.C. gun haters are.

Provisions for becoming a licensed firearms dealer.

• Firearms dealers must first be licensed by the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms.
• Potential firearms dealers must be eligible to register guns in the District and eligible under federal law to sell them.
• Firearms dealer licenses will be valid for one year.
• Applications for dealer licenses will include a sworn or affirmed statement by the applicant, and may require photographs and fingerprints.
• Firearms dealers must also comply with other District licensing and zoning requirements, such as having a Basic Business License and certificate of occupancy. Licensing and zoning, yeah, right. I’m sure those departments won’t have an issue with me opening up a store with more than 5,000 firearms inside the doors.

Can we all see how stupid this is. It must stop.

What options do D.C. residents have now that that the city can not block them from participating in their God given right to protect themselves and their families? You would not be surprised to learn that there is no place in the District to purchase a firearm.

What a great business opportunity! If someone approached me looking for funding to build a recreational indoor range that offered a wide selection of firearms, accessories and training opportunities; I may just head to the bank and close out that savings account earning 2 percent.

Here’s the problem for D.C. residents. Blogger see-dubya over at Michelle Malkin’s site points us over to another blog – Slublog – that gives us the scoop.

If you want to purchase a pistol, you must buy that weapon or have it transferred to you by a Federal Firearms Dealer (FFL). Here in Connecticut you can walk into a local dealer who has an FFL and after providing your Connecticut Pistol Permit and a quick background check you can walk out with your purchase. (Don’t forget the ammo, a good holster and a few extra mags.)

If you purchase the pistol from an out-of-state dealer, you can not go through the same process as you would in your home state. Yes – get ready to cringe you gun-bashers – you can purchase a pistol over the Internet from a FFL. But, the FFL you purchase the pistol from can only ship your pistol to a local FFL in the state where you reside.

Once the local dealer takes possession, you go through a transfer process. Your local FFL will charge you between $20 and $50 (totally up to the dealer) to complete the paperwork, check your pistol permit and call in for your background check.

So, since there are no places to buy a firearm in D.C., residents can purchase online and have the pistol shipped to a local (Washington D.C. based) FFL.

A reader from another blog – Of Arms & the Law – did an FFL check to see if there were any Washington D.C. based dealers who could complete transfers. He found one.

Joshua Sugarmann can help you out. His FFL is valid through March of 2011 so you don’t need to rush; but he might not want to help you out.

Sugarmann is the executive director and founder of the Violence Policy Center; an “education center.” He also puts together Web sites like Ban Handguns Now where he promotes his book, Every Handgun is Aimed at You.

From the center’s Web site:

The Violence Policy Center (VPC), a national tax-exempt 501(c)(3) non-profit organization based in Washington, DC, works to stop this annual toll of death and injury through research, advocacy, and education. The VPC approaches gun violence as a public health issue, advocating that firearms be subject to health and safety standards like those that apply to virtually all other consumer productst (sic).

Ironic huh? In short, I don’t think Josh is going to help D.C. residents with a transfer.

Note: A great read is Gun Facts, a free electronic book that takes an honest look at the statistics and crap that organizations including the Violence Policy Center and the Brady Center put out.

The obvious question is why the BATF would provide Sugarmann with an FFL, but the obvious move would be to step into the District and start building that gun store!

Related:

• Of Arms & the Law
• KnoxNews.com

SCOTUSblog has the Cover it Live feed going right now. Best bet might be to click here to catch it.

9:58 a.m. Three opinions set for today, and Heller will not be first. We should know the decision right away, but the particulars will take a few minutes.
10:05 a.m. Per SCOTUSblog, Heller will be last.
10:12 a.m. Heller affirmed. Vote was 5-4, Second Amendment protects an individual right to possess a firearm.

As we wait for the actual opinion in PDF format, one comment. I expected 6-3 or even 7-2, but 5-4 really bugs me.

Opinion is here – this is a link on the Conservative247.org site just in case other news sites are overwhelmed. It is 157 pages.

Quite honestly, this is the first Supreme Court transcript I can ever remember listening to or reading from. That said, it seemed like Dillinger came into the court knowing that he was fighting a loosing battle from the getgo. You could just tell that he wanted to say guns are just evil, and we should not have them.

CHIEF JUSTICE ROBERTS: If you’re right, Mr. Dellinger, it’s certainly an odd way in the Second Amendment to phrase the operative provision. If it is limited to State militias, why would they say “the right of the people”? In other words, why wouldn’t they say “state militias have the right to keep arms”?

MR. DELLINGER: Mr. Chief Justice, I believe that the phrase “the people” and the phrase “the militia” were really in — in sync with each other. You will see references in the debates of, the Federalist Farmer uses the phrase “the people are the militia, the militia are the people.”

CHIEF JUSTICE ROBERTS: But if that’s right, doesn’t that cut against you? If the militia included all the people, doesn’t the preamble that you rely on not really restrict the right much at all? It includes all the people.

Slammed.

JUSTICE SCALIA: I don’t see how there’s any, any, any contradiction between reading the second clause as a — as a personal guarantee and reading the first one as assuring the existence of a militia, not necessarily a State-managed militia because the militia that resisted the British was not State- managed. But why isn’t it perfectly plausible, indeed reasonable, to assume that since the framers knew that the way militias were destroyed by tyrants in the past was not by passing a law against militias, but by taking away the people’s weapons — that was the way militias were destroyed. The two clauses go together beautifully: Since we need a militia, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.

MR. DELLINGER: Yes, but once you assume that the clause is designed to protect the militia, it — surely it’s the militia that decides whether personal possession is necessary. I mean, Miller — what makes no sense is for Miller to require the arm to be militia-related if the right is not, and the key phrase is “bear arms.” If people –

JUSTICE KENNEDY: Well, do you think the clause, the second clause, the operative clause, is related to something other than the militia?

MR. DELLINGER: No. I think –

JUSTICE KENNEDY: All right. Well, then –

Owned. With that said by Kennedy, I think the swing vote will go to Heller in this case.

JUSTICE ALITO: Your argument is that its purpose was to prevent the disarming of the organized militia, isn’t that correct?

MR. DELLINGER: That is correct.

JUSTICE ALITO: And if that was the purpose, then how could they — how could the Framers of the Second Amendment have thought that it would achieve that person, because Congress has virtually plenary power over the militia under the militia clauses?

MR. DELLINGER: That is because, I think, Justice Alito, that those who wanted to retake State authority over the militia didn’t get everything they wanted. Madison actually did this somewhat reluctantly and wanted to maintain national control.

JUSTICE SCALIA: They got nothing at all, not everything they wanted. They got nothing at all. So long as it was up to the Federal Government to regulate the militia and to assure that they were armed, the Federal Government could, could disband the State militias.

MR. DELLINGER: Yes, but if — well –

JUSTICE SCALIA: So what, what was the function served by the Second Amendment as far as the militia is concerned?

There was quite a bit of talk concerning the militia clause in the 2nd Amendment as well as discussion about militias as mentioned in the Constitution.

CHIEF JUSTICE ROBERTS: What is — what is reasonable about a total ban on possession?

MR. DELLINGER: What is reasonable about a total ban on possession is that it’s a ban only an the possession of one kind of weapon, of handguns, that’s been considered especially — especially dangerous. The

CHIEF JUSTICE ROBERTS: So if you have a law that prohibits the possession of books, it’s all right if you allow the possession of newspapers?

MR. DELLINGER: No, it’s not, and the difference is quite clear. If — if you — there is no limit to the public discourse. If there is an individual right to guns for personal use, it’s to carry out a purpose, like protecting the home. You could not, for example, say that no one may have more than 50 books. But a law that said no one may possess more than 50 guns would — would in fact be I think quite reasonable.

CHIEF JUSTICE ROBERTS: The regulation –the regulation at issue here is not one that goes to the number of guns. It goes to the specific type. And I understood your argument to be in your brief that because rifles and shotguns are not banned to the staple extent as handguns, it’s all right to ban handguns.

MR. DELLINGER: That is correct because there is no showing in this case that rifles and handguns are not fully satisfactory to carry out the purposes. And what — and what the court below says about — about the elimination of this –

Dillinger, in the last quote above, implies that rifles and shotguns can be kept at home for protection, but unfortunately D.C. law states that they must be unloaded, and locked. But Dillinger sort of states that loaded and locked is okay. Not in my book buddy, removing a trigger lock when the gun is loaded is certainly not very safe gun handling!

He later states that he’s timed how long it takes to remove a trigger lock – 3 seconds. Yeah right.

You can download the full transcript by clicking the link below, and read along while listening to the audio links. It’s quite interesting.

Argument Transcript [PDF - 400kb]
Audio Clips [Provided by DownRange.tv]