AI-generated image. Today, in United States v. Hemani , the Supreme Court ruled that the Second Amendment prevents the federal government from banning gun ownership by marijuana users. Unusually for a Second Amendment case, the ruling is unanimous. It's a significant application and extension of the Court's 2022 ruling in the 2022 Bruen case, which sought to put more meat on the bones of Second Amendment rights by establishing a "history and tradition" test for reviewing gun regulations. It's a great moment for those of us who both support strong Second Amendment rights and hate the War on Drugs (elsewhere, I have argued that most of the federal War on Drugs is itself unconstitutional). The ruling also features a joint concurring opinion by Justice Alito joined by Justice Kagan - a rarely seen combination.
Justice Neil Gorsuch wrote the opinion for the Court, joined by seven justices in all. Here's an excerpt:
To determine when the government infringes the Second Amendment, we begin by asking whether the Amendment's terms cover the conduct in question. Bruen , 597 U. S., at 24. If so, the Constitution "presumptively" protects it. Ibid. To overcome that presumption, the government then bears the burden of showing its regulatory efforts are "consistent with the Nation's historical tradition of firearm regulation." Ibid….
§922(g)(3)'s unlawful user provision burdens conduct presumptively protected by the Second Amendment. After all, that statute bans a class of people including Mr. Hemani from possessing essentially any firearm for any purpose. As a result, the government acknowledges, it has a burden to carry….
To meet its burden of showing a law like that is consistent with the Nation's tradition of firearm regulation, the government relies on an analogy to what it calls "habitual drunkard" laws. These laws, the government submits, enjoy deep roots in the country's history and are "relevantly similar" to the regulation it wishes to enforce against Mr. Hemani….
We disagree. We appreciate that drugs and guns can sometimes make for a dangerous mix. We appreciate, too, that the government's effort to analogize a modern statute addressing drug use to historical laws must be approached with a sensitivity to the fact that many drugs well known today were unknown in early America. As we have put it, the Second Amendment "can, and must, apply to circumstances beyond those the Founders specifically anticipated." Bruen , 597 U. S., at 28. But, even taking all that into account, the government cannot carry the burden it has set for itself. We decide cases "based on the historical record" and arguments "compiled by the parties" before us. Id., at 26, n. 6. And the habitual drunkard laws on which the government relies here differ dramatically from §922(g)(3)'s unlawful user provision on every single metric the government invites us to consider: They targeted different kinds of people, did so for different purposes, and operated in different ways. Whether any one of these problems taken in isolation would prove fatal to the government's cause, we need not decide. Taken cumulatively, we hold, they certainly do. And, apart from pointing to habitual drunkard laws, the government has not even attempted to prove that any other specific historical principle might justify its prosecution in this case….
Gorsuch goes on to point out that habitual drunkards are fundamentally different from people who merely drink alcohol - or use marijuana - on a regular basis:
Had habitual drunkard laws applied to those who simply drank regularly, many notable early Americans could have faced trouble. John Adams took "a tankard of hard cider" with his "daily breakfast….". Some say James Madison "consumed a pint of whiskey daily." D. Okrent, Last Call: The Rise and Fall of Prohibition 8 (2010)…. George Washington often drank three glasses of madeira in the evening—"not enough to be considered a heavy drinker in his day." Id., at 5. Thomas Jefferson enjoyed "3 or 4 glasses [of wine] at dinner…."
There was, in short, a "culture of copious drinking" in early America. D. Korostyshevsky, Incapable of Managing His Estate: Habitual Drunkards and the Expansion of Guardianship in the Nineteenth-Century United States, 43 Law & Hist. Rev. 795, 800 (2025)….
Given all this, it seems the government's historical laws targeted habitual drunkards not merely because they regularly used intoxicants, or even sometimes used them to excess. Instead, those laws focused on habitual drunkards because their drinking rendered them practically incapacitated and incapable of managing their affairs….
The law [at issue in this case], the government insists, does not require it to show that a particular individual is regularly incapacitated, much less incapable of conducting his affairs or a threat to himself or others. Put simply, on the government's telling, §922(g)(3) sweeps in large numbers of people without regard to whether their substance use has the kind of incapacitatin…
Read the full article at Reason →📄Source document: United States v. Hemani→16 reports
The HillIndependentCenter2 days agoThe Supreme Court issued a unanimous but narrow ruling on gun rights, finding that the government cannot criminalize firearm possession based solely on marijuana use. While the decision was technically unanimous, internal divisions among the justices were evident. Conservative Justice Samuel Alito and liberal Justice Elena Kagan both expressed concerns that the court's opinion extended too far. Liberal Justices Ketanji Brown Jackson and Sonia Sotomayor signaled potential challenges to the conservative framework for evaluating gun rights. Justice Clarence Thomas suggested a desire to invalidate
Bias read (Center): The article presents the Supreme Court's decision without overtly favoring any side. It highlights differing opinions among justices and quotes both supporters and critics of the ruling, maintaining a balanced perspective.
ReasonIndependentCenter2 days agoIn United States v. Hemani, the Supreme Court ruled unanimously that a federal law prohibiting firearm possession by individuals who are 'unlawful users' of controlled substances violates the Second Amendment. The decision was based on the principle established in Bruen, which requires the government to justify such restrictions with historical precedents. The Court noted that existing laws targeting habitual drunkards do not align with the current provision. The ruling specifically distinguishes this law from others that involve pre-deprivation processes.
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Bias read (Center): The article presents the Supreme Court's decision without overtly favoring either side. It explains the legal reasoning behind the ruling and includes both the government's argument and the court's rejection of it. The language remains neutral, focusing on the application of the 'history and tradit
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SlateIndependentCenter2 days ago Neil Gorsuch’s New Gun-Rights Decision Is a Love Letter to Legal WeedThe Supreme Court ruled unanimously that criminal charges against a marijuana user for owning a firearm do not violate the Second Amendment. The decision in United States v. Hemani held that the federal government cannot disarm individuals who consume cannabis unless there is evidence they are impaired. The ruling reflects the growing legal and social acceptance of cannabis in the U.S.
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Bias read (Center): The article presents the Supreme Court's decision in a neutral manner, focusing on the legal reasoning provided by Justice Gorsuch without overtly favoring either side. It reports the facts of the case and the court's narrow ruling without using biased language or emphasizing one perspective over.
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Official sources cited
- court United States v. Hemani
- press release NBC News
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Official sources cited
- court Supreme Court ruling
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Official sources cited
- government Gov. Patrick Morrisey (R)
- press release WTRF
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