By M Dowling
James Woods said, “The Second Amendment has now proven to be the most essential clause in the entire American Constitution.”
The Supreme Court significantly narrowed a federal law that banned drug users from owning firearms, ruling unanimously in United States v. Hemani that applying the ban to a recreational marijuana user violated the Second Amendment. The Court found the government failed to prove a historical tradition of disarming regular drug users.
A Supreme Court that is often ideologically divided on gun control issues nonetheless unanimously agreed June 18 that a federal law aimed at keeping guns out of the hands of dangerous people went too far.
But two of the court’s three liberal justices still want a course correction on how the court evaluates gun regulations.
Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson said the “historical tradition” test for gun rules that the court created in its landmark 2022 decision in New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen is “unworkable.”
Justice Sotomayor agrees with Jackson. However, if they had their way, the Constitution would only be a living document, changeable upon their whims and feelings.
The reason history is considered is to make us stick to the Constitution and not wander into the fad of the day.
Bruen is an excellent decision. It protects us from authoritarians.