“Following Thursday’s U.S. Supreme Court ruling on guns, sundry outraged mayors were fuming because the justices, ‘for the first time,’ discovered in the Constitution an individual right to bear arms, placing in danger all their precious (though thoroughly counterproductive) local victim disarmament edicts. The city of Chicago, for instance, currently governed by yet another Richard Daley (how many does this one make?) had filed an amicus brief arguing that since the Second Amendment restricts only federal gun-banning, it shouldn’t apply to Cook County. That argument would have made some sense before enactment of the 14th Amendment in 1867 (apparently it still takes some time for news to reach Chicago), specifically barring states, counties and municipalities from restricting the rights of U.S. citizens. This was done specifically to stop recalcitrant racist jurisdictions in the years immediately following the Civil War from attempting to limit the rights of black citizens to register and go to the polls.” (06/29/08)