what was the ruling in district of columbia v. heller
District of Columbia v. Heller District of Columbia v. Heller, 554 U.S. 570 (2008), is a landmark case in which the Supreme Court of the United States held that the Second Amendment protects an individual's right to possess a firearm unconnected with service in a militia for traditionally lawful purposes, such as self-defense within the home, and that Washington, D.C.'s handgun ban and requirement that lawfully-owned rifles and shotguns be kept "unloaded and disassembled or bound by a trigger lock" violated this guarantee. It also stated that the right to bear arms is not unlimited and that guns and gun ownership would continue to be regulated. Due to Washington, D.C.'s special status as a federal district, the decision did not address the question of whether the Second Amendment's protections are incorporated by the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment against the states,[1] which was addressed two years later by McDonald v. City of Chicago (2010) in which it was found that they are. It was the first Supreme Court case to decide whether the Second Amendment protects an individual right to keep and bear arms for self-defense.[2]
Virginia Declaration of Rights Articles 7â€“16 propose restrictions on the powers of the government, declaring the government should not have the power of suspending or executing laws, "without consent of the representatives of the people";[13] establishing the legal rights to be "confronted with the accusers and witnesses, to call for evidence in his favor, and to a speedy trial by an impartial jury of his vicinage," and to prevent a citizen from being "compelled to give evidence against himself."[14] protections against "cruel and unusual punishments",[15] baseless search and seizure,[16] and the guarantees of a trial by jury,[17] freedom of the press,[18] freedom of religion ("all men are equally entitled to the free exercise of religion"),[19] and "the proper, natural, and safe defence of a free state" rested in a well regulated militia composed of the body of the people, trained to arms, that standing armies in time of peace, should be avoided as dangerous to liberty;[20] Article 8 protects a person against "being deprived of his liberty except by the law of the land" which later evolved into the due process clause in the federal Bill of Rights.[18] Article 12 is the first ever codification of the right to a free press and was an important precursor to the First Amendment to the United States Constitution.[21]