Happiness is a warm gun

The Supreme Court recently ruled that Americans have the individual right to own guns for self-defense and hunting purposes. This is the first major ruling on gun rights in United States history. There was a 5-4 vote ruling in favor of this. It ended the handgun ban in the District of Columbia.

There was a 32-year-old ban on handguns in D.C. Justice Antonin Scalia says the court’s majority opinion is that the Constitution does not allow for “the absolute prohibition of handguns held and used for self-defense in the home.”

It is amusing that it took them so long to come to this conclusion from what is said in the Constitution. The Second Amendment declares the right to keep and bear arms by individuals. This is a bluntly stated in the amendment. Where the idea came from that local government could restrict guns without the law being found unconstitutional is beyond me.

Having declared gun ownership a citizens’ right, the courts have left some jurisdictions open for lawsuits. Cities such as the District of Columbia and Chicago can be sued for infringing on rights of citizens.

That the Democrats were so quick to jump on the bandwagon against this ruling tells me this was the right thing to do. Democrat Dianne Feinstein of California says, “70 years of precedent has gone out the window,” and she also states that the people of the country will be less safe because of it. Ms. Feinstein not only sounds ridiculous, but she is dead wrong.

It shouldn’t have taken a Supreme Court ruling for people to understand that carrying a gun is the right of every able-bodied citizen in this country, but it did take that. People who are against this concept are stepping on the Founding Fathers’ ideas, and they make life harder for our nation’s police force.

Our Founding Fathers believed in personal responsibility, and that each of us should protect his or her country and his or her own property and family. As citizens of this country, we had the right and responsibility to help with our own protection. When this was questioned because lawmakers had a hard time understanding the Constitution, the rights of every citizen were put into question as well. The one who is capable of quietly taking away all of our freedoms and forces us to be completely dependent on the government will be the one who can break us.

A nation that receives everything from its government, including personal security, is not free at all. Attempting to take our personal security—including our handguns—away was a serious attempt at replacing our strength with a crutch.

This case, District of Columbia v. Heller, has clarified that we have the right to bear arms—whether we are in a militia or not. The Supreme Court justices have done something worthwhile, it seems. They have taken the steps to give citizens back the freedoms that the Founding Fathers had bestowed upon us to begin with.

The people of the District of Columbia can now own handguns. Living in the most dangerous city in the country can be frightening at times—with crime in the streets, and people being killed weekly—but now citizens don’t have to be victims.

It’s a fact: Police are busy and can’t help everyone.

The Supreme Court has just returned to society the ability to help itself, and this gift is greater than any other they could have given.