States must protect gun rights as they ensure public safety

STATE governments can and should enact gun regulations that increase the public's safety, but Americans do have an individual right to own them.

That last part is an unwelcome thought to some people. There has long been an argument that "the right of the people to keep and bear arms," guaranteed by the Second Amendment, was meant to apply only to militias.

That was a specious argument, and in District of Columbia v. Heller (2008), the Supreme Court threw it out. Gun rights belong to individuals, like the others in the Bill of Rights.

In Heller, the Court didn't apply the Second Amendment to the states. Last week the Court heard arguments in McDonald v. Chicago, a case that asks it to do that. It should do so, while allowing states to have reasonable regulations.

It can be done. Washington state has had an individual gun right in its constitution since statehood in 1889.

In this state you can't have an armed gang, but you can arm yourself. Your gun rights are limited if you are under age, incapable, or are convicted of a crime. The law limits what sort of arms you can have, and it requires a permit to carry a concealed weapon. It forbids you from taking your gun into a prison, a mental institution or a school. And so on.

Always, there are lines to draw. Justice John Paul Stevens wondered aloud last week if Second Amendment rights might be limited to the home. Probably not.

We are reminded of Seattle's recent argument with the state about whether the city can ban guns in parks. One of the plaintiffs was a female parole officer, who presumably feared some of the people she'd dragged back to prison. Another was a gay man who feared being a victim of a hate crime.

The justices need to define federal gun rights in a way that gives them substance while allowing the states a strong power to protect public safety.