The U.S. Supreme Court is scheduled to make a critical decision on the Second Amendment this term. This week the court will hear the oral arguments of McDonald v. Chicago [1]. The decision will apply to all states, but the Supreme Court of Washington State recently made a similar decision for its citizens. In mid-February, the court ruled on State v. Sieyes [2], stating that an individual’s right to bear arms, guaranteed by the Second Amendment, applies to states through the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. The Pacific Legal Foundation gives a wonderful summary of the case and how the Court reached its conclusion here [3]. The Sieyes ruling only applies to the state of Washington, but hopefully this is an indication of how the U.S. Supreme Court may reach a conclusion which would protect a citizen’s liberty and freedom.
Karla Kay Edwards [4] is Rural Policy Analyst [5] at Cascade Policy Institute [6].