Good News At Last !!!

[9mmfan]

Supreme Court decision on 2nd Amendment


J. Miles Cary
Kari Clarke looks at her shooting coach and husband, Floyd Clarke, as he instructs her Thursday at Gunny's Indoor Shooting Range in Maryville. The couple support the Supreme Court's decision affirming individuals' Second Amendment right to have guns for self-defense in the home.

J. Miles Cary
Chris Wood, left, and Brian Birchfield fire at targets Thursday at Gunny's Indoor Shooting Range. Wood and Birchfield spent an hour firing rounds from a selection of handguns.



THE RULING: The Supreme Court ruled unconstitutional Washington, D.C.’s, strictest-in-the-nation handgun ban, saying the Second Amendment protects an individual’s right to own guns for self-defense.
THE IMPACT: Cities with strict handgun laws on the books could face challenges to the restrictions. Most of the nation’s firearms regulations, however, probably will stay on the books.
THE SIGNIFICANCE: It was the first time in almost 70 years the high court addressed the scope of the Second Amendment and the first time it directly interpreted the amendment’s ambiguous meaning

• McCain and Obama respond to gun ruling
• High court's ruling brings clarity to 2nd Amendment

Kari Clarke fired her first gun the same day the U.S. Supreme Court upheld her right to own it.
"I'd always hated guns before, but I knew eventually I'd have to learn how to shoot it," the Knoxville mother said Thursday. "It grew on me. Now I'm ready to carry a gun."
Clarke and her husband, Floyd, learned about the court's ruling as they practiced with a .40-caliber pistol at Gunny's Indoor Shooting Range in Maryville. They and gun owners around the state and country celebrated the justices' 5-4 vote which found that the Constitution's Second Amendment guarantees law-abiding individual Americans the right to own guns for self-defense in the home.
"It's really not anything we didn't know," said Trevor Putnam, vice president of Coal Creek Armory in West Knoxville. "The right to self-defense existed before the Constitution. All this does is reaffirm what we knew 200 years ago. It goes beyond anything written on paper. It goes back to the beginning of time."
Clarke and her husband, who has owned guns for years, said that's their main reason.
"The police cannot be everywhere all the time, and there are some really bad people out there," Floyd Clarke said. "That's why I wanted my wife to get involved, so that she's able to defend herself. What most liberals don't understand is that whenever you outlaw guns, only the outlaws are going to have guns. Too many of our rights have been eroded already."
Thursday's decision struck down a 32-year-old ban on handguns in Washington, D.C. It marked the Supreme Court's first entry into the gun-rights debate. The D.C. law forbade residents to own any handguns not bought before the law took effect in 1976. Shotguns and rifles had to be registered and kept unloaded and locked or disassembled.
Dick Anthony Heller, a security guard, sued for the right to keep a pistol at his home for protection. Local gun store owners said that's the same thing most of their customers want.
"They don't want to strap it on their hip like Wyatt Earp," said David "Gunny" Perry, a former police officer and owner of Gunny's Indoor Shooting Range. "Most of my customers are older people. They want to learn to use a gun because they're home by themselves. A gun levels the playing field between an elderly female who can't defend herself and a street-hardened thug."
The court's decision didn't open up the world of gun ownership to everyone. The ruling left intact the authority of state and local governments to put reasonable restrictions on gun ownership - barring felons and the mentally ill, for example, or not allowing guns on school property. That means Tennessee's current laws won't likely change, authorities said.
"Tennessee law is already pretty much in line with the Constitution," said Knox County Sheriff's Office Sgt. Mike Lett, who oversees the county's gun training for carry permit applicants.
[/B]
Local law enforcement called the D.C. approach unnecessary and extreme.
"We've got enough gun laws on the books," said Lett, the KCSO sergeant. "If they will enforce the laws that are on the books now, we don't need any additional laws."
Knoxville Police Department spokesman Darrell DeBusk said the agency had no comment on the ruling.
"We're not going to get involved in any gun issues," he said.
Neither side expects the court's decision to end the gun-control debate.
"It's a victory for D.C. gun owners and a good step forward," said Putnam, the Coal Creek Armory vice president. "I don't think Tennessee is going to see much effect. Chicago's going to change. New York City's going to change. It's mostly going to be about getting permits in large, urban areas where people haven't been able to get them."

[ptgustan]

Requiring a permit or a license to exercise a fundamental constitutional right is itself unconstitutional. Prior restraint of the exercise of such rights is forbidden. You can't be required to get a license or permit to vote, give a speech, write a book or join a church. After Heller, keeping and bearing arms is similarly protected conduct.

[Cyrille]

You know I never thought of that, the writer is right of course, one doesn't need a permit or a license to excersize a RIGHT!

[GlockMeister]

Me either. But I'm not about to push my luck and go around carrying a firearm, loaded or not, in the state of Illinois and if and when I get caught, I'm not going to say that I don't need no stinkin' permit or license to carry a gun, because it's my right as my defense. lol

[Windwalker]

Well, it might have to be appealed from the lower Court but at some point it should be upheld.

[Cyrille]

No doubt, carring will put one "in harm's way" but liberty wasn't won by sitting at home and handling your firearm!

[mwatson]

hopefully the states that have concealed carry will now let that individual open carry.
Who knows.
Mike

[Cyrille]

Well there is that---- hope, I mean