Simple explanation of Heller and McDonald?

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DefiantDad

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Not being a lawyer, or any kind of "expert" on constitution law I find it a bit hard making sense of the rulings in layman's terms.

Can someone kindly explain just the nutshell?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/District_of_Columbia_v._Heller

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McDonald_v._Chicago

As I understand it, Heller was trying to get handguns classified as arms, so that it is covered under the 2nd Amendment (I am naively surprised they were not already).

And McDonald was trying to get the Supreme Court to agree that the 2nd Amendment applies to all states (again, I am surprised this was/is not self-evident).

?
 
Short and sweet explanation: In Heller the Supreme Court ruled that handguns are arms in common use, and that the 2nd Amendment protects the right of the people to possess handguns in their homes, and to keep them loaded and ready for use to defend themselves.

The decision only applied to the Federal Government because the ruling was on a case appealed by the District of Columbia, and only applied to keeping a handgun in the home or residence because that was the issue in question.

In McDonald the Court ruled that the Heller decision also applied to the states and all subordinate governmental units.

The end result is that anywhere in the United States or its possessions, you may possess a handgun in your residence and keep it loaded and ready for use. Nothing more.

Although the Court plainly articulated that the 2nd Amendment applied to both keeping and bearing arms for self-defense, they did not specify that it applied outside the home. Some appellate courts have held that it does, some have not. That will be the next major battle.
 
(I am naively surprised they were not already)

(again, I am surprised this was/is not self-evident)
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Don't be surprised. These were the first SCOTUS cases of their specific type, ever. Until rulings like these occur, nothing is definite.
 
I think that a simple explanation would be that Heller regarded whether the 2nd Amendment only protects the RKBA of a select group such as people in the National Guard (a "collective right"), or if it protects the RKBA of the general population (an "individual right"). And McDonald regarded whether the 2nd Amendment, which was intended to bind only the federal government, was made binding upon the States by the 14th Amendment.
 
Thanks everyone. Boy, this is surreal. It looks almost like the Constitution was never clarified until now.

"The end result is that anywhere in the United States or its possessions, you may possess a handgun in your residence and keep it loaded and ready for use. Nothing more."

On this, I assume that while that is the clarification, individual states need to have specific suits to clarify its application to the individual state (and then city), because from what I understand in some (many?) places, it is NOT legit to keep your firearm loaded at home and in fact ammunition needs to be physically separated from the firearm.
 
...the Constitution was never clarified...
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It's not that the document isn't clear, it is. But many, many Americans don't like what it states and they would prefer that it be altered in part or in whole. That is not actually possible in one effort, so the only way to remove the strength of the document is to interpret it differently than what it is. If you can argue that the 2A is a collective right as opposed to an individual right, and if you can win that argument, then you can nullify that right.
 
Heller means nothing to me. I live in Westchester NY and we still have a trigger lock law on the books.
 
Heller means nothing to me. I live in Westchester NY and we still have a trigger lock law on the books.
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Heller and McDonald mean everything to you. That law is Unconstitutional if it prevents you from keeping a loaded weapon for use, as long as its within your control. (It would be applicable, however, to weapons left loaded and unlocked where unsupervised children are present.) It should be repealed, but due to sloth/indifference among lawmakers it'll probably remain on the books indefinitely. No prosecutor worth his salt should ever dream of prosecuting it, though.
 
I see a fair amount of "hand-wringing" about Heller and McDonald only finding a right to keep a gun in the home for self defense. But that was the underlying factual context for each case, and courts decide the cases in front of them.

We need to remember that in the course of deciding Heller and McDonald, the rulings made by the United States Supreme Court on matters of Constitutional Law, as necessary in making its decisions in those cases, are now binding precedent on all other courts. Now the Supreme Court has finally confirmed that (1) the Second Amendment describes an individual, and not a collective, right; and (2) that right is fundamental and applies against the States. This now lays the foundation for litigation to challenge other restrictions on the RKBA, and the rulings on matters of law necessarily made by the Supreme Court in Heller and McDonald will need to be followed by other courts in those cases.

In real world terms, that is huge.

We all went to bed the night before the Heller decision was published, not knowing whether or not the Second Amendment would be recognized by the courts as describing a personal right to keep and bear arms. By lunch time the next days the rights described by the Second Amendment were clarified ad personal rights.

When we all went to bed the night before the McDonald decision was published, we had little prospect for successfully challenging in court many of the most restrictive state gun laws. That all changed by breakfast time, of at least our mid-morning coffee break. Finally we had something to work with.

Of course, as with any court decision, those decisions directly impacted only the matters raised in those cases. Gun control would not disappear overnight. But now we have a multiplicity of cases all around the country trying to chip away at vulnerable laws.

We're up against determined opposition, this will all take time, and all gun control will not be going away. But with Heller and McDonald we finally have some decent tools to work with. Our job now is to use those tools wisely.
 
It is very dangerous saying that is all that Heller and McDonald said, that is in fact what many antis will argue.


Heller said many more things.
However it said so much that it is up to the courts to figure it all out. What Hypnogator said is what the end result is to the lay person, but be careful thinking about Heller that way.


Heller means what the courts decide it means over the next few years. If people are convinced it meant only what Hypnogator said, then that is all it will ever mean, and the antis won't even have to fight much to get that victory.
Heller said a mouthful, even alluded to ownership of military type arms.
However what nobody can argue one way or the other is that it clearly said someone must be able to have a handgun in their home, as well as that nobody can be required to keep their guns handgun or long gun in a disassembled or unloaded state (as DC law did of legal long guns.)



The pro-gun community really needs to keep from shooting themselves in the foot by telling the public what Heller meant, the courts have not yet determined what rights were gained under Heller, and which ones were not. Explaining it to people in a simplified manner may just result in Heller meaning a lot less long term than it could have.
Undoing potential victories before they are decided.

Heller may yet mean many rights. It may mean military arms are in common use and protected as well. For example.
 
Heller does not nullify the trigger lock law in Westchester NY. It requires locks when you leave your home.
 
alsaqr said:
Its significant that SCOTUS denied cert in cases since Heller and McDonald.
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Not necessarily. There are many reasons SCOTUS will deny cert. They are asked to review a great many more cases than they possibly could.

rajb123 said:
Heller does not nullify the trigger lock law in Westchester NY.
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Heller doesn't "nullify" any law, except the District of Columbia law that was the subject of that case. Heller and McDonald simply provide legal bases for challenging other gun control laws. That's just the way things work in court.
 
It requires locks when you leave your home.
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And this is a problem because.....:confused:

I don't see how a law requiring safe storage of your firearms while you are not present in any way infringes on your right to keep and bear arms.:)
 
hypnogator......

some James bond types don't have kids,and want a piece handy at all times and a backup gun around every corner of the house.....and the trigger lock law is stupid most gun owners have a safe,and store ammo separately,for the most part,except cpl holders,oh that's right nobody's got a cpl in new york.
 
Its significant that SCOTUS denied cert in cases since Heller and McDonald.
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No, not at all.

http://www.supremecourt.gov/faq.aspx#faqgi9
How many cases are appealed to the Court each year and how many cases does the Court hear?
The Court receives approximately 10,000 petitions for a writ of certiorari each year. The Court grants and hears oral argument in about 75-80 cases.
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"The denial means that this Court has refused to take the case. It means nothing else." Frankfurter, J. dissenting in Darr v. Burford, 339 US 200, 226 (1950)
 
"The denial means that this Court has refused to take the case. It means nothing else."
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Well, it also means that the lower court's ruling stands, which is much more than 'nothing.'
 
I can't wait until they get to the "shall not be infringed" part,
That would include the excise taxes imposed on firearms and other sporting goods.

The montra of the anti-gunners in congress and the suprenme court is, "if I can tax it I can control it".
 
Well, it also means that the lower court's ruling stands, which is much more than 'nothing.'
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But it does not mean 'the Supreme Court has ruled on the law in the lower court case and decided the decision was correct'.

A case denied cert couldn't get four votes from the nine justices.
 
Ok I want to ask a further related question then. If the federal decision of the 2A applies to the states, by what means can anti-firearms states refuse to adopt it? Take into consideration the refusal of states to adopt what is referred to as Obamacare. Seems two sides of the "must adhere to" principle. How will this work out?
 
Quote:
It requires locks when you leave your home.
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And this is a problem because.....

I don't see how a law requiring safe storage of your firearms while you are not present in any way infringes on your right to keep and bear arms.
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2 things come to my mind,

1.) the reality of how attacks occur. having to lock up your weapon and unlock it each and every time you exit and enter your home can very well nullify any ability to stop an attack. 2ndly that dashing out of the house for some emergency could leave you vulnerable to legal problems. if i got a call from my neighbor 2 blocks away that my kid just fell off his bike and is bleeding from the head, i don't want to take precious seconds to lock my gun before going to get my kid and rush to emergency room.

2.) the law of a gun lock in that scenario focuses on the gun being bad and/or the law-abiding gun owner being bad; this is wrong and shouldn't just be accepted. violent criminals are bad, any law should focus on people who are violent - it should never focus on a device as a gun and definitely shouldn't focus on the very people who are obeying laws and aren't violent.
 
Ok I want to ask a further related question then. If the federal decision of the 2A applies to the states, by what means can anti-firearms states refuse to adopt it? Take into consideration the refusal of states to adopt what is referred to as Obamacare. Seems two sides of the "must adhere to" principle. How will this work out?
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probably too complicated for my small brain to answer but my first thought is i prefer states to have more power over a lot of things and i think the feds have taken way too much power on many things in the 50yrs i've been around.

i'm infact somewhat glad we have glaring-example states like california, illinois, new york - to all out prove how gun control fails the safety of the law-abiding and harms them. people who argue to me to ban guns i just point to living proof such as the virginia tech incident, the ft. hood incident, and to some extent the entire states as i just mentioned, vs. the good states.

let all the violent criminals live with the gun-grabbers, they almost completely are already. i'm content to never travel to nor through such places.
 
Ok I want to ask a further related question then. If the federal decision of the 2A applies to the states, by what means can anti-firearms states refuse to adopt it?
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So far, there are two lines of resistance.

1) state and local jurisdictions argue that their laws do not violate the protections we think the 2A provides;

and

2) they argue that, even if their laws do conflict, there is something like a 'compelling state interest' in controlling guns and/or gun owners, in the interest of 'public safety', so the laws are justifiable infringements.

For example, defending jurisdictions commonly take the part of Heller (slip opinion, p 56) saying
The prohibition extends, moreover, to the home, where the need for defense of self, family, and property is most acute.
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to mean the Supreme Court has ruled that the 2A applies ONLY in the home, or take the Heller language
nothing in our opinion should be taken to cast doubt on longstanding prohibitions on the possession of firearms by felons and the mentally ill, or laws forbidding the carrying of firearms in sensitive places such as schools and government buildings, or laws impos- ing conditions and qualifications on the commercial sale of arms.26
——————
26 We identify these presumptively lawful regulatory measures only as examples; our list does not purport to be exhaustive.
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and assume that their laws fall within those categories.
 
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