imported post
Scalia also makes clear that when "the right of the people" are referred to everywhere in the Constitution, it means just that: individual rights, not to be construed as "collective rights".
From Justice Scalia's Majority Opinion (slip opinion), June 26, 2008)
1. Operative Clause.
a. “Right of the People.” The first salient feature of
the operative clause is that it codifies a “right of the people.”
The unamended Constitution and the Bill of Rights
use the phrase “right of the people” two other times, in the
First Amendment’s Assembly-and-Petition Clause and in
the Fourth Amendment’s Search-and-Seizure Clause. The
Ninth Amendment uses very similar terminology (“The
enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall
not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by
the people”). All three of these instances unambiguously
refer to individual rights, not “collective” rights, or rights
that may be exercised only through participation in some
corporate body.5
It's an important point, because individual rights were assumed by the framers of the Constitution to be "God-given", and not privileges doled out by a collection of functionaries controlled by a mish-mash of elected officials.
I think, too, the SCOTUS ruling will smack the anti-gunners in the face, even the casual ones we meet while OCing, as we go about our business. Heh.
