A Blog Posting by Lindsey Schromen-Wawrin and Tish O’Dell of the Community Environmental Legal Defense Fund, from March 14th, 2018.
When does the right to own a gun carry more cultural and legal weight than the right of a community to collectively decide what safety means and how to create protected, healthy, and resilient communities?
That is a two-part question – and in this two-part blog, we first offer a reframe, exploring one way to look at the rights and regulations of gun ownership. We also explore the power of the National Rifle Association.
Then we look at “ceiling preemption,” offering our legal examination of why the right to carry a gun carries more weight today than the right of a community to collectively make decisions to restrict weapons.
Part I – A Right to Property
The right to property is protected by the constitution – as is the right to own a gun. The latter is protected specifically by the Second Amendment. (More on that in Part II below.)
And yet the right to property doesn’t mean there are no laws in place to regulate the use of that property. For example, laws are put in place regarding the use of a car: You must be a certain age to drive on the roads, you are required to take classes to learn to drive and receive a driver’s license, you must pass an eye exam, and so on. Further, not just any car can be on the road. Cars, also, must meet certain requirements. Why? All the laws are supposed to make the community safer for everyone.
Establishing more stringent laws governing gun ownership is not a move to take away the right to own a gun. Instead, it seems to be a reasonable response to the growing number of lives lost to gun violence – one step of many that are likely necessary to create safety and address the root causes of violence. MORE…