I must admit I was pleasantly surprised with the reactions from those on the left to yesterday’s Supreme Court ruling pronouncing and individual right to own a gun. The large majority of blog posts and editorials I read throughout the day seemed to express support for the ruling, even going so far as to question how four Justices could have possibly dissented. In fact a Rassmussen poll released this morning shows that of those people familiar with the decision, 63% agreed with the ruling, while only 25% disagreed.

As I continue to read more editorials today, I am beginning to wonder if some liberal columnists are having buyer’s remorse with regards to their reactions yesterday. After all, it was the Conservatives Justices who were on the side of common sense when they decided that the words “the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed”, actually mean what they say.

According to editorials in the LA Times and Washington Post however, yesterdays ruling was Juducial activism by Conservatives, and a win for thugs. Erwin Chemerinsky argues it was judicial activism because the Judges overruled a law passed by the legislature (although I oddly did not see him make that argument the prior day when the liberal Justices did the same).

The Supreme Court’s invalidation of the District of Columbia’s handgun ban powerfully shows that the conservative rhetoric about judicial restraint is a lie. In striking down the law, Justice Antonin Scalia’s majority opinion, joined by the court’s four other most conservative justices, is quite activist in pursuing the conservative political agenda of protecting gun owners.

If the terms “judicial activism” and “judicial restraint” have any meaning, it is that a court is activist when it is invalidating laws and overruling precedent, and restrained when deferring to popularly elected legislatures and following prior decisions.

This argument is sadly coming from the dean of the UC Irvine School of Law, offering a shining example as to what is wrong with our educational system. The term “judicial activisim” has nothing at all to do with invalidating laws, it is the means used to do so that decide if a court is activist. For example In Roe v. Wade (which Chemerinsky is a supporter of), the Court ruled that the “Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, which protects against state action the right to privacy, including a woman’s qualified right to terminate her pregnancy”. This is Judicial activism at work, as evidenced by the fact that the “right to privacy” the Supreme Court deemed these women had, would not extend to the point that they would be allowed to use that privacy in order to prostitute themselves, or take narcotics.

In defense of Mr. Chemerinsky though, at least he made an attempt to rationalize why he believed this ruling was activism. On the other hand, Colbert King’s editorial at the Washington Post seems to lack any rational thought whatsoever.

There’s one group of District residents absolutely unfazed by today’s U.S. Supreme Court ruling shooting down the District’s strict handgun ban: the dudes who have been blowing away their fellow citizens with abandon since the law was put on the books 32 years ago.

Operating under the notion that it’s better to beg forgiveness than to ask permission, our shooters long ago decided not to wait for the high court’s thoughts on the matter. They simply arrogated to themselves the right to keep and bear arms and, with that right, license to shoot and kill, with impunity, whatever and whenever the evil spirits moved them.

Mr. King acknowledges that the criminal element in D.C. has been ignoring this ban on handguns ever since the law was instituted 32 years ago, yet somehow he believes this will be a victory for them? The argument against banning handguns is exactly this… criminals will continue to be armed, and law abiding citizens will be defenseless to protect themselves. What this ruling does is allow residents of D.C. to have a gun in their home to protect themselves from the same criminals Mr. King said have been “blowing away their fellow citizens”, and somehow he believes this is a bad thing?

I have long said I do not understand the liberal mind, and this only adds to that confusion. But for Mr. King and those who agree this ruling was somehow a victory for criminals, allow me to remind you the words of a wise man.

“Laws that forbid the carrying of arms . . . disarm only those who are neither inclined nor determined to commit crimes . . . Such laws make things worse for the assaulted and better for the assailants; they serve rather to encourage than to prevent homicides, for an unarmed man may be attacked with greater confidence than an armed man.”
–Thomas Jefferson, quoting Cesare Beccaria in On Crimes and Punishment (1764).

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