Supreme Court Turns Down Case on Carrying Guns in Public<br />The case concerned a federal law that prohibits possessing a gun after a conviction of “a crime punishable by imprisonment for a term exceeding one year.” The law has an exception for “any state offense classified by the laws of the state as a misdemeanor<br />and punishable by a term of imprisonment of two years or less.”<br />In separate cases, two Pennsylvania men said the law was unconstitutional as applied to them.<br />“The Supreme Court has not answered that question, and we do not answer it here.”<br />The Supreme Court also turned down a second case on gun rights, this one about the constitutionality<br />of a law prohibiting people convicted of serious crimes from owning guns.<br />San Diego, for instance, defined good cause to require proof<br />that the applicant was “in harm’s way,” adding that “simply fearing for one’s personal safety alone is not considered good cause.”<br />In a 7-to-4 ruling, the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, in San<br />Francisco, said there was no Second Amendment right to carry a concealed weapon.<br />“Based on the overwhelming consensus of historical sources, we conclude<br />that the protection of the Second Amendment — whatever the scope of that protection may be — simply does not extend to the carrying of concealed firearms in public by members of the general public,” Judge William A. Fletcher wrote for the majority.<br />“There may or may not be a Second Amendment right for a member of the general public to carry a firearm openly in public,” Judge Fletcher wrote.
