What Can We Expect from Second Amendment Case at Supreme Court?

            The liberty principle for this Freedom Friday concerns the Second Amendment right guaranteed to the people to “keep and bear arms,” meaning the natural right to defend themselves. Yesterday, the U.S. Supreme Court heard oral arguments in New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen. According to Amy Swearer at The Heritage Foundation, this is the first in more than a decade that the Supreme Court has heard a Second Amendment case.

            The law in New York prohibits most people from carrying firearms in public for self-defense. Swearer wrote that New Yorkers must prove that they have a “good cause” for “needing” to carry a gun before they are given a permit to do so. New York is not the only state to restrict the right to keep and bear arms because “seven other states” have “similarly restrictive public carry laws.”

The laws create a “special subset of people” who have the opportunity to exercise their Second Amendment rights. Swearer gave the following details about the case.

The petitioners in this case are two New York residents with extensive experience and training with firearms. Both were denied concealed carry permits because licensing officials determined they did not “face any special or unique danger to [their] life.”

The two gun owners argue that New York’s restrictive and discretionary system for public carry permits is unconstitutional because it effectively stripped them of their right to bear arms in public for self-defense.

New York, for its part, argues that its laws constitute perfectly reasonable regulations that are fully consistent with the text, history, and tradition of the Second Amendment.

            Shearer explained why she believes that the case is an “uphill battle for New York.” She wrote, the “oral arguments before the Supreme Court highlighted serious problems with New York’s interpretation of the Second Amendment and the history of gun control.” The arguments also “underscored the uphill battle the state faces in defending the constitutionality of its public carry laws.”

One reason given by Shearer for such a decision is that the New York Solicitor conceded “many points that seriously damaged New York’s overall argument.” Shearer predicted that the majority of the Supreme Court will decide in favor of the petitioners. They will rule that “ordinary citizens” have the right “to carry firearms in public for self-defense,” and “states must permit residents to exercise this right subject only to reasonable regulations on time, place, and manner.”