True Threats, Self-Defense, and the Second Amendment

Second Amendment Sanctuaries: A Legally Dubious Protest Movement

This article assesses the origins and spread of the Second Amendment sanctuary movement in which localities pass ordinances or resolutions that declare their jurisdiction's view that proposed or enacted state (or federal) gun safety laws are unconstitutional and therefore, local officials will not implement or enforce them. While it is important to assess Second Amendment sanctuaries from a legal perspective, it is equally as important to understand them in the context of a broader protest movement against any efforts to strengthen gun laws. As the gun violence prevention movement has gained strength across the United States, particularly at the state level, gun rights enthusiasts have turned to Second Amendment sanctuaries in order to create a counter narrative to the increasing political power of gun safety. By passing these ordinances or resolutions, local officials legitimize and fuel Second Amendment absolutism which poses real risks to public safety and democracy.

Why Regulate Guns?

Courts reviewing gun laws that burden Second Amendment rights ask how effectively the laws serve public safety - yet typically discuss public safety narrowly, without considering the many dimensions of that interest gun laws serve. "Public safety" is a social good: it includes the public's interest in physical safety as a good in itself, and as a foundation for community and for the exercise of constitutional liberties. Gun laws protect bodies from bullets - and Americans' freedom and confidence to participate in every domain of our shared life, whether to attend school, to shop, to listen to a concert, to gather for prayer, or to assemble in peaceable debate. Courts must enforce the Second Amendment in ways that respect the public health and constitutional reasons a democracy seeks to protect public safety. Lawyers and citizen advocates can help, by creating a richer record of their reasons in seeking to enact laws regulating guns.This inquiry is urgent at a time when the Supreme Court's new conservative majority may expand restrictions on gun laws beyond the right to keep arms for self-defense in the home first recognized in District of Columbia v. Heller in 2008.