Ruling on Guns Elicits Rebuke From the Right

Four months after the Supreme Court ruled that the Second Amendment protects an individual right to possess guns, its decision is under assault — from the right.

Two prominent federal appeals court judges say that Justice Antonin Scalia’s majority opinion in the case, District of Columbia v. Heller, is illegitimate, activist, poorly reasoned and fueled by politics rather than principle. The 5-to-4 decision in Heller struck down parts of a District of Columbia gun control law.

The judges used what in conservative legal circles are the ultimate fighting words: They said the gun ruling was a right-wing version of Roe v. Wade, the 1973 decision that identified a constitutional right to abortion. Justice Scalia has said that Roe had no basis in the Constitution and amounted to a judicial imposition of a value judgment that should have been left to state legislatures.

Comparisons of the two decisions, then, seemed calculated to sting.

“The Roe and Heller courts are guilty of the same sins,” one of the two appeals court judges, J. Harvie Wilkinson III, wrote in an article to be published in the spring in The Virginia Law Review.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/21/washington/21guns.html?th&emc=th

Sorry judges Wilkinson and Posner, but the political process already happened some 200+ years ago on this topic.

Political process of amendment.

If people don't like the 2nd Amendment there is a process to repeal it. That's the course honest people would take.

David

not the opinion of two federal appeals court judges.

Two prominent federal appeals court judges say that Justice Antonin Scalia’s majority opinion in the case, District of Columbia v. Heller, is illegitimate, activist, poorly reasoned and fueled by politics rather than principle. The 5-to-4 decision in Heller struck down parts of a District of Columbia gun control law.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/21/washington/21guns.html?_r=1&th&emc=th&oref=slogin

Perhaps someday they will have the chance to join the Supreme Court and the decisions they render will be criticized by other judges.

I also have an opinion probably just as pertinent as theirs. After all opinions are like assholes, everyone has one.

I believe Justice Antonin Scalia’s opinion is well reasoned and is based on the original desires of the framers of the Constitution. Judge Scalia is above politics and has nothing to gain from playing political games. If anyone is interested in playing politics, it's probably these two judges who hope to land a seat on the Supreme Court when Obama becomes President.

And I'm sure that if the New York Times tried, they could find at least two federal appeals court judges who would agree with the Supreme Court decision. For example judges from the Appeals court that first ruled on the issue:

On June 26, 2008, the Supreme Court affirmed the Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit in Parker v. District of Columbia, 478 F.3d 370 (D.C. Cir. 2007).<1> The Court of Appeals had struck down provisions of the Firearms Control Regulations Act of 1975 as unconstitutional, and determined that handguns are "Arms" that may not be banned by the District of Columbia (Washington, D.C.), also striking down the portion of the law that requires all firearms including rifles and shotguns be kept "unloaded and disassembled or bound by a trigger lock."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/District_of_Columbia_v._Heller

One of my favorite Scalia quotes:
"Americans have too many rights..."

Is Heller like Roe?
Is Curly like Moe?
Is Soros like Joe-
the proverbial plumber?
I can’t think of anything dumber !


Is dung like snow?
Is stop like go?
Is Heller like Roe-
in ways that really matter?
Judge Harvie would rather not rehash !


Is people like State?
Is love like hate?
Is keep like wait -
for 9-1-1 to save you?
Not on this side of the looking glass !

Fortunately, these two would-be authoritarians don't sit on the Supreme Court.