Gun rights: Supreme Court brings Second Amendment to the streets
In its biggest Second Amendment ruling in over a decade, the U.S. Supreme Court today said that Americans have a right to carry a handgun in public.
As it enters the final week of a controversial term – the court is expected to push federal law to the right in a number of areas, including abortion and climate regulation – the ruling in this closely watched case significantly expands gun rights. Delivered along the high court’s ideological divide, the decision also comes a month after a mass shooting at a Texas elementary school left 21 people, including 19 children, dead – a fact not lost on the dissenting justices.
Today’s ruling continues a throughline in America toward prioritizing Second Amendment rights for individuals. Half of U.S. states have adopted permitless carry or constitutional carry, which offers few, if any, restrictions on purchasing or carrying a handgun. Americans purchased a record number of – 23 million – in 2020 during the pandemic. There are an estimated 400 million guns in a country of 332 million people, or 120 guns per 100 residents.
