[url]http://www.opinionjournal.com/columnists/bminiter/?id=110002744[/url]

[b]Ready, Fire, Aim[/b]

The U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals has given gun-control advocates an early Christmas gift--a comprehensive, historically based argument that undermines an individual's right to own firearms. This is a gift the antigun crowd sorely needed after the revelation that Michael Bellesiles's book "Arming America"--which claimed guns were rare in early America--was a work of slipshod scholarship if not outright fraud.

The Ninth Circuit also takes aim at the Fifth Circuit, which held last year in U.S. v. Emerson that the Second Amendment does, in fact, protect an individual's right to firearms. Gun-rights supporters should welcome the Ninth Circuit's decision, for one simple reason: It is a reasoned, if mistaken, argument, rather than the crude emotional appeal that is the antigun folks' usual stock in trade. So let the debate begin....


...Rarely have 27 words written out in a plain sentence caused so much confusion amongst seemingly intelligent people. But the Second Amendment has long baffled gun-control advocates, university professors, liberal judges and more than a few opportunistic politicians.

Let's get this straight, the Second Amendment is clear: "A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed." That means just what it says: The people have a right to keep and bear arms, and that right shall not be infringed.

Mr. Miniter is assistant editor of OpinionJournal.com. His column appears Mondays.

[b]BATTLESTATIONS!!![/b]