The US Supreme Court tomorrow will take a new look at the right to bear arms in a case that could have an impact on the growing push by US President Barack Obama’s opponents to loosen gun laws.
The nation’s top court will decide whether its landmark June 2008 decision recognizing the right of every US citizen to possess arms for self-defense should apply to local as well as federal laws.
Local regulations have increasingly been at the forefront in the battle over gun control in the US, where some 200 million firearms are in circulation and the right to bear arms is enshrined by the Constitution.
While Obama has not moved to curb gun freedoms, arms sales have shot up since his election in 2008 and conservatives deeply suspicious of his intentions have stepped up efforts to promote arms.
“State legislatures are flexing their conservative muscle and passing some laws that they would not otherwise have been able to pass,” said Peter Hamm of the Brady Campaign, a gun control advocacy group named after former US president Ronald Reagan’s spokesman, who was severely injured in the assassination bid on the president.
In Virginia, the legislature is on track to legalize the carrying of guns in bars and to drop restrictions that residents can only buy one firearm a month.
Such measures can pass due to last year’s election of Republican Governor Bob McDonnell. His Democratic predecessor, Tim Kaine, supported some gun rules after the 2007 massacre of 32 people at Virginia Tech University.
Among other states, Tennessee last year approved a law allowing the carrying of guns in establishments serving alcohol and Arizona is looking at measures to allow arms on university campuses and without licenses.
At the federal level, US lawmakers have blocked the capital city of Washington from voting representation in Congress due to opposition to its gun laws.
Meanwhile, the US has seen a continual gun violence. Last month, a woman biology professor killed three staff members at an Alabama university; a month earlier, eight people were killed in another Virginia shooting.
Hamm said the Brady Campaign was “severely disappointed” in the Obama administration, which did not fight a new law allowing guns in national parks and trains after lawmakers attached it to unrelated legislation.
But Eugene Volokh, a professor of law at the University of California at Los Angeles, said that Obama’s election led to a spurt of concern and sales among gun enthusiasts.
“A Democratic president coupled with a Democratic Congress coupled with occasional talk from Democratic leaders about banning guns or at least substantial restrictions — actually people do worry, why wouldn’t they?” he asked.
The powerful National Rifle Association has waged a major push against the president under the slogan, “Obama would be the most anti-gun president in American history.”
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