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Originally Posted by Gary L. Griffiths
No right is absolute. Does a convict on death row have the right to keep and bear arms? If not, then the right isn't absolute. There are other restrictions that even most gun rights activists would agree are reasonable. To date, the SCOTUS has said only that the people have the absolute right to keep and bear arms in their homes, although they have hinted that the right isn't exclusive to the home. What "reasonable" restrictions are will be the subject of litigation until well into the second half of this century.
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The SCOTUS has done a lot more than "hint" that the RKBA extends beyond the home. ALL the arguments to the effect that the 2nd Amendment (as "ratified" by
Heller) only applies within the home completely ignores the facts that (a)
Heller spoke specifically to the home because that's the question that was asked, and (b) nowhere in the text of the 2nd Amendment is "in the home" mentioned or even implied.
But what this case is about (as well as the Maryland case) is not what "reasonable" regulations may be uniformly applied to the bearing of arms, but the prohibition of exercising a Constitutionally-guaranteed right for no clearly defined reason other than not being able to articulate a sufficiently scary-sounding immediate threat against your person.
As the key saying puts it, "One should not need a permission slip to exercise a fundamental right."