THE JUSTICE SPEAKS – AT 8:18 A.M. ET:  Associate Justice Antonin Scalia has made some major comments on the issue of gun control that have gone viral.  They are among the most important public comments made by a member of the Supreme Court in living memory.  From National Journal:

Justice Antonin Scalia, one of the Supreme Court's most vocal and conservative justices, said on Sunday that the Second Amendment leaves room for U.S. legislatures to regulate guns, including menacing hand-held weapons.

"It will have to be decided in future cases," Scalia said on Fox News Sunday. But there were legal precedents from the days of the Founding Fathers that banned frightening weapons which a constitutional originalist like himself must recognize. There were also "locational limitations" on where weapons could be carried, the justice noted.

When asked if that kind of precedent would apply to assault weapons, or 100-round ammunition magazines like those used in the recent Colorado movie theater massacre, Scalia declined to speculate. "We'll see," he said. '"It will have to be decided."

As an originalist scholar, Scalia looks to the text of the Constitution—which confirms the right to bear arms—but also the context of 18th-century history. “They had some limitations on the nature of arms that could be borne," he told host Chris Wallace.

This will get me into trouble with some readers, but the justice is absolutely correct.  As a responsible gun owner, with a bit of knowledge of the history of guns, I've long recognized that we, as a nation, have always had forms of gun control, which have passed Constitutional muster.  We don't permit the private ownership of fully automatic weapons (machine guns) for example.  We don't permit private ownership of artillery or mortars.  We don't permit private citizens to store, in their finished basements, nuclear weapons.

Pundits are already saying that Scalia's comments open the door to a major national discussion of gun control, and they are right.  Should we oppose this discussion?  No, we should welcome it.  It's about time.  Too often, both sides in the debate simply give us knee-jerk sloganeering rather than thoughtful comments and suggestions.  We ask that they elevate their rhetoric.

Those of us who believe in the Second Amendment, and believe that it is fundamental to the nation's character, have an obligation to address gun violence, and what steps can be taken to reduce it.  Surely not many people still oppose mandatory gun locks and safe storage.  And I have no problem with mandatory background checks, as long as they are conducted in a legal and effective manner, not the farce we have now.

Gun controllers have an obligation to remove themselves from the gimmicky, adolescent arguments they often put forward, including deceptive demands to "ban" assault weapons.  (Anyone familiar with guns knows that an assault rifle takes the same round, usually a .223, that can be inserted into perfectly legal hunting or target rifles, with the same lethal effect.  The guns look different, and assault rifles are configured for certain capabilities.  But the "ban" on assault rifles, which now has lapsed, apparently had no effect.)

We know that gun control laws, by themselves, have little impact.  Some forms of gun control, in conjunction with other steps, do have an effect.  But it's those other steps that our gun-control friends never seem to want to discuss, especially changing privacy policies involving the mentally ill, policies that prevent the inclusion of relevant mental-health histories in the federal database that is consulted when someone wants to buy a gun.  Add to that list of subjects our friends want to avoid the very effective stop 'n' frisk tactics used in New York, which have resulted in thousands of illegal guns taken off the streets.

And gun controllers must also deal with perhaps the most sensitive issue of all:  culture.  Gun tragedies do not happen evenly throughout the country.  Most happen, every day, in specific places with specific cultures, and specific governmental sensibilities. 

I believe that responsible gun owners are open to suggestions, but responsible, effective suggestions.  Is the gun-control side ready?  I doubt it, but we can move them along.

July 30,  2012