We have just received word that the U.S. Supreme Court will hear another case on the individual rights of gun owners, according to a release by the Buckeye Firearms Association.
A group of Chicago gun owners is challenging a lower appeals court ruling that while the Second Amendment guarantees individual rights on the federal level, it does not bar state or city governments from passing restrictions or outright bans on guns.
Chicago imposes a handgun ban similar to the one the Supreme Court struck down last year for Washington D.C. In that case, District of Columbia v. Heller, the court declared what we have all known: that the Second Amendment guarantees an individual right to firearms for self-defense and does not merely refer to a state “militia.”
However, the 5-4 decision did not address one important question:
Does the Second Amendment also apply to states and municipalities?
The new case is called McDonald v. City of Chicago and will probably come before the court as early as this coming January, 2010. The decision may come sometime in June.
