The Supreme Court’s decision in D.C. v. Heller was the biggest victory for gun rights advocates in the modern era.
Last year, the court ruled for the first time in history that Americans have an inalienable right to own firearms — and to use them to protect themselves.
So why don’t firearms advocates feel better?
“I’m guessing that a lot of the increase [in gun sales] is due to hysteria promoted by gun-rights groups and the gun industry,” Johns Hopkins sociologist Daniel Webster told The Examiner in an e-mail. “It’s not a very rational argument. … The Heller decision clearly indicates that you can’t institute broad-scale gun bans.”
Some gun rights advocates say they were gratified that the court upheld the right of self-defense, but were still put off by Justice Antonin Scalia’s ruling that guns are nonetheless subject to “reasonable” restraints.
Yet some gun control advocates suggest that Heller was a net win for them.
“We were very pleased with the Heller outcome. Scalia lists essentially our entire agenda in the Heller decision,” said Daniel Vice, senior lawyer with the Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence.
Robert Levy, the Cato Institute scholar who funded the Heller plaintiffs in their challenge to D.C.’s gun laws, said the Heller case was an important victory, but not the last one.
“I’m afraid that nothing is going to happen until the Supreme Court tells us that the Second Amendment applies to states,” he said.
