The saving grace in Heller is that the unconstitutional verbiage in Justice Scalia’s majority opinion constitutes what lawyers call dicta — expressions extraneous to the issue presented to the court for decision, and therefore without legal force as “precedent.” Heller did not involve the possession of an M-16, or who might be disqualified from possessing firearms, or “gun-free zones,” or any statutes providing for “gun control” other than a few in the District of Columbia. Nonetheless, anti-gun legislators, politicians, special-interest groups, and media in every bastion of “gun-control” irrationality and fanaticism are already attempting to exploit the bare language, whatever its lack of legal effect, in new plots to disarm “the people.”Edwin Vieira, Jr. speaks with credibility. We would do well to pay heed.
[Via Ron W]