I’m disappointed that it was such a narrow majority:

District of Columbia v. Heller (Second Amendment challenge to D.C. handgun ban): Scalia majority opinion striking down ban. 5-4 ruling. Breyer dissent, joined by Stevens, Souter, Ginsburg. (No concurring opinions.)

If Obama does somehow get into the Oval Office, I’m glad that this case was handled this year. Almost certainly whoever his choice of nominees would be would have gone the other way. Of course, for the Dems, it will only be maintaining status quo, since it’s the “liberal” justices that are most likely to step down soonest, I think.

Souter in particular was a disastrous pick for a supposedly Republican president.

Anyway, now on to the next case, depending on who brings it (I’m guessing someone in Chicago), which will bring in the Fourteenth Amendment and incorporation. But at least the court is now on record as having declared the right an individual one (again, I’m saddened, but no longer shocked, that four justices bizarrely think otherwise).

[Update a few minutes later]

I’ll add that, based on what I’ve seen so far, it looks like the majority got it right. It’s an individual right having nothing to do with state militias, but not an unlimited one. A gun ban in shopping malls or campuses is stupid, but not unconstitutional.

[Update a little after 11 AM EDT]

Eugene Volokh already has some initial thoughts, with more surely to come later, after the opinion is read. This is an interesting political point:

This split should be useful to either of the Presidential candidates who wants to make either gun control or gun rights into an election issue — my guess is that this is more likely to be McCain. Expect McCain ads in states where there are likely many pro-gun swing voters stressing, “your constitutional right to keep and bear arms hangs by one vote.” Also expect fundraising letters to likely pro-gun contributors stressing this at length.

Also expect questions of Obama whether he continues to support the gun ban in Chicago. And whether he still thinks that gun sales should be banned within five miles of a school (i.e., almost everywhere).

[Afternoon update]

I haven’t read the dissents (and don’t know if or when I will, given time constraints), but is it possible that the majority isn’t as narrow as it looks? Four justices ruled that the DC ban was Constitutional, but they didn’t necessarily do so on the basis that the right to keep and bear isn’t individual. For instance, as Ed Whelan notes:

Stevens doesn’t dispute that the Second Amendment protects an individual right, but he finds the scope of that right limited to using weapons for certain military purposes. He argues that the text of the Second Amendment (5-17), its drafting history (17-27), and the Court’s precedents–especially its 1939 ruling in United States v. Miller (42-45)–support his reading.

Breyer argues that even if the Second Amendment does protect a right of personal self-defense, D.C.’s law is constitutional because the burdens it imposes are not disproportionate in light of the law’s legitimate objectives. (That sure sounds like a meaningful test, doesn’t it?)

So now we have at least six justices who agree that it is an individual right (Whelan doesn’t say what Breyer’s opinion on that score is, since Breyer doesn’t accept that the ban would be Constitutional under that interpretation). And since Ginsburg and Souter joined Stephens dissent, and didn’t write one of their own, doesn’t it really make it at least eight to one?

Some interesting legal speculation on the upcoming Heller decision to rule on the constitutionality of DC’s gun ban, and on the meaning of the Second Amendment.