Shelly Parker versus District of Columbia is perhaps the most important case that might come before the Supreme Court regarding gun control laws. The case, heard by a three judge panel from the DC Circuit Court of Appeals, involved six residents of Washington, DC who challenged three gun control ordinances. The majority had extensive use of historical writings and debates, English grammar, and a healthy dose of common sense to establish that the second amendment is an individual right, as the authors of the Bill of Rights had meant. After all, if the second amendment was meant exclusively as a right for the states to keep a militia, as the dissent had argued, then the second amendment would state "the right of the state to keep a militia shall not be infringed," or some other such similar phrasing, after all the authors were able to differentiate between the people and the state, as evidenced by the tenth amendment.

What is also worth noting is what would happen if the minority opinion is extended to its logical conclusion. If people can be denied one constitutionally guaranteed right, what is to prevent other rights from being denied? Also, if we are to accept what is widely taught that the Bill of Rights was designed to prevent the federal government from trampling on the rights of the people, then shouldn't the District of Columbia (a federal district after all) have a greater responsibility to uphold the rights recognized in the Bill of Rights? Finally, not to offend any liberals, wouldn't the reasoning behind the minority opinion hold that if DC were to become a state, as many are advocating for, that it must then abandon the gun ban it has in place?

The District still has the ability to appeal to the full DC Court of Appeals. The full court may then overturn the panel's decision, or it may very well affirm the panel's decision (hopefully), or reach an intermediate position. And regardless of what that outcome may be, with split lower courts, the Supreme Court may very well step in and finally give a definitive answer to the question of the second amendment (as the decision of US v Miller can, and has, been used by both sides of the debate to further their agendas).