The Supreme Court has come out with a number of key rulings in the last few days as it closes out its term until October:
Probably the most important ruling issued by the Supreme Court was its 5-4 decision striking down the DC gun ban and affirming an individual right to keep and bear arms. Speaking for the majority, Antonin Scalia stated that the Constitution doesn't allow outright prohibitions of the sort attempted by the District of Columbia. At the same time, the individual right to keep and bear arms is not unlimited: laws against concealed weapons, prohibiting felons and the mentally ill from gun ownership, or imposing regulations on the sale of arms, are not necessarily jeopardized by an acknowledgment of individual gun ownership rights.
It's probably not going to be too often that I extol the wisdom of a ruling by the Roberts Supreme Court, and rarer still when I find myself agreeing with Antonin Scalia of all people, but I think that the court's ruling on this case was absolutely correct. I know I probably risk disapproval from some of my fellow liberals by saying this, but I don't see how it's consistent with liberalism to support banning gun ownership, or to argue that the right to own guns is collective rather than individual. In so many other areas, we have always supported a broad interpretation of the bill of rights. We've argued for an implied right to privacy based on the 4th Amendment in support of the right to use birth control, the right to have an abortion, and the right of gays and lesbians to have sex with one another. We've argued that the 1st Amendment's guarantee of freedom of speech is not limited to spoken words and extends broadly to freedom of expression in any form, including flag-burning. Within this philosophical context, it is hugely hypocritical to parse away the individual right to keep and bear arms based on a tortured interpretation of the text of the 2nd Amendment: "A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed." The statement about a well-regulated militia being necessary for security is not a qualifying statement, it's a logical justification for the right to bear arms - a preamble, if you will. If the First Amendment had explicitly stated that freedom of speech was necessary for citizens to criticize their government in a democratic society, we as liberals would fight vigorously against any attempt to limit freedom of expression to cases where political speech is involved. Likewise, if we want to be philosophically consistent, we should drop the whole idea of reframing gun rights as collective rather than individual.
Like any individual right, the right to bear arms has reasonable limits that aren't inconsistent with the general recognition of the right itself. You can't yell "fire" in a crowded theater, because individual freedom of speech doesn't trump public safety. By the same token, as this court has argued, recognizing an individual right to bear arms doens't prohibit the government from enacting reasonable restrictions on that right. Almost nobody thinks that people should be allowed to own tactical nukes (although there may be a few NRA members who would have no problem with that), and most people would agree with the idea of keeping weapons out of the hands of criminals and the insane. The key word is "reasonable": it's reasonable to want to keep guns out of the hands of people who have a demonstrated inability to exercise their right to own guns responsibly, but not to keep them out of the hands of everyone. Gun control advocates should not view today's ruling as a defeat, but rather as a challenge to reframe their efforts to promote gun safety within a context that is more amenable to gun enthusiasts and others who support gun ownership rights.
In another ruling that I agree with, from yesterday, the Supreme Court ruled that it is unconstitutional to execute someone for raping a child, reserving the death penalty for murderers and those who commit crimes against the state. This time, I'm at least siding with the liberal wing of the court against the conservative wing - to be honest, it feels kind of gross being on the same side as Antonin Scalia in a philosophical argument. As someone who comes from a state (Texas) where 33 wrongfully convicted prisoners (and counting) have been freed since 2001, I'm glad that the Supreme Court has done away with the death penalty for child rape. From a philosophical standpoint, I think it should be done away with for all cases - putting aside the very real and very substantial risk of wrongful conviction, it should not be the business of government at any level to kill people in the absence of a clear and present danger to human life. A convicted killer (or other criminal) who has been locked up does not constitute a danger to human life because they're in jail, so there is no need to kill them and thus no legitimate justification for doing so.
And having said this, I find myself in the uncomfortable position of disagreeing with Barack Obama, who I think is dead wrong in coming out against this ruling. Yes, child rape is heinous, but if we're going to have a death penalty at all, which he thinks we should, we should at least reserve it for cases where a human life has been taken. Allowing it in the case of child rape opens up a pandora's box of allowing the death penalty any time the public's sense of outrage is piqued, including cases like child rape where the very question whether a crime has been committed is often hard to ascertain. For example, if we're going to execute people for raping children, will we also execute them for allegedly shaking a child to death?
And now, it's back to disagreeing with the Supreme Court. In a depressing reminder that the Court is stacked with right-wing Republicans, Wednesday saw a ruling that slashes the amount of punitive damages Exxon will be required to pay for the Exxon Valdez spill back in the 1980's. This ruling reinforces the idea that huge, highly profitable corporations won't be held responsible when they engage in actions that jeopardize the life, health and welfare of the general public. This ruling is a perfect example of why we need a Democrat in the White House, to appoint judges who aren't beholden to big business.
And today, the Court ruled 5-4 that the so-called "millionaire's amendment," which allows candidates to receive larger contributions when their wealthy opponents spend heavily from their own money, is unconstitutional. Today's decision is being framed as an attempt to treat people equally under the law, but I believe that there is a broader interest in leveling the playing field to minimize the natural advantage that the ultra-rich have in financing their own political campaigns when they run against people who aren't rolling in money. Today's ruling makes it harder for people who aren't multi-millionaires to compete politically against people who are, and that's not a good thing in a representative democracy.
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