D.C’s handgun ban found unconstitutional

By a 5-4 majority (the four liberals in dissent), the Supreme Court ruled that the the District of Columbia’s handgun ban and trigger-lock requirement violate the Second Amendment. The majority held (in an opinion written by Justice Scalia) that the total ban on handgun possession prohibits an entire class of arms that Americans overwhelmingly choose for the lawful purpose of self-defense. Under any standard of scrutiny, that ban falls.

My law partner Tom Goldstein of the SCOTUSblog provides his “sense of the bottom line” of this decision here.

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