Phila. gun-control proponents optimistic after ruling

Local proponents of tougher gun-control laws, including Mayor Nutter, saw a silver lining yesterday in the U.S. Supreme Court's landmark handgun ruling.

While the decision invalidated the District of Columbia's strict ban on handgun possession, it left open the right of government to provide some regulation of gun use.

Nutter said he had drawn a "certain sense of excitement and a little bit of pleasure" from the ruling. The folks at CeaseFire PA said they were "heartened." And New Jersey Attorney General Anne Milgram said the decision "endorsed commonsense licensing of firearms and concealed-weapons restrictions like we have in New Jersey."

The optimistic assessments were drawn from a key part of Justice Antonin Scalia's opinion for the five-justice majority - that "the right secured by the Second Amendment is not unlimited" and that there were still a "variety of tools" to fight gun violence.

Nothing in the court's opinion, Scalia wrote, should be taken to "cast doubt on longstanding prohibitions on the possession of firearms by felons and the mentally ill," or laws forbidding firearms in "sensitive places" such as schools and government buildings, or laws imposing conditions on the commercial sale of guns.

That drew sighs of relief in many places - from prosecutors who had been worried about whether firearms laws already on the books would survive to those who had been fearful that the court might have gone even further in establishing gun rights.

Nutter said that, in limiting its holding to the matter of self-defense, the decision was "an explicit statement of support for cities all across America who are creating reasonable measures to limit the ability of those who will do harm."

CeaseFire PA also took solace that the court held that Second Amendment rights are not unlimited.

"For far too long, opponents of any commonsense handgun-safety laws - led by the NRA - have hid behind the Second Amendment and falsely claimed the amendment prohibits any reasonable regulation of the right to keep and bear arms," CeaseFire PA president Phil Goldsmith and executive director Joe Grace said in a statement.

But legal experts cautioned that the opinion provided little guidance for what kind of ordinances might pass muster, other than making it clear that absolute bans of handguns would not.

And there was a wide expectation that lawyers on both sides of the issue would still be busy. The NRA, for example, said it already was poised to challenge firearms laws in Chicago and San Francisco.

"It's a mess," said Temple University law professor David Kairys, who said the court did not set forth a clear standard of review. "I suspect the pro-gun legal groups, which are quite well-funded, will start bringing suits around the country."

Carl Tobias, a law professor at the University of Richmond, said the ruling left many questions unanswered.

"Clearly, anything like D.C.'s is just not going to fly. But measures short of that might," said Tobias. "Maybe there is some wiggle room, but I don't know if there's a lot."

While the ruling does protect the right to own guns in the home, it does not prohibit other regulations, said Jon'a Meyer, criminology professor at Rutgers University-Camden.

"A man's house is his castle, and now he's allowed to protect his castle," Meyer said. "But he cannot protect the rest of the city's castles."

The ruling's application to the home setting means it should not lead to increases in most kinds of violent crime, with the possible exception of domestic violence, she said.

Nutter said the Supreme Court ruling would not affect Philadelphia's effort to enact stricter gun-control laws than currently exist in Pennsylvania.

The mayor also said the city would soon begin enforcing its new three gun laws.

A Philadelphia Common Pleas Court judge last month threw out two of a total of five gun-restriction laws the administration was pushing, but kept three intact.

Those are a 48-hour deadline for reporting lost or stolen guns; the right of police to confiscate guns with a judge's approval from people considered a danger to themselves or others; and a ban on guns for people subject to protection-from-abuse orders. City lawyers are currently creating guidelines for how those laws should be enacted.

The city is also pressing Harrisburg lawmakers to give Philadelphia greater leeway to enact even more local restrictions.

"We do need our General Assembly to take further action and provide more reasonable gun legislation," Nutter said. "It would certainly be my hope that the General Assembly upon seeing this opinion will continue to recognize we have serious issues not just here in Philadelphia" but in other Pennsylvania cities, too.

The ruling will not interfere with New Jersey's "very strong gun-safety laws," said attorney general spokesman David Wald.

State law requires background checks for gun purchases and bans assault weapons but, unlike Washington, not for handguns.

"We regulate the possession of handguns - we don't ban handguns," Milgram said in a statement. "But we have strict licensing requirements and we are prepared to maintain those requirements and vigorously enforce our laws."