ACLU Shoots Itself in the Foot with Heller Response

A little over a week ago I commented on the ACLU's then-current position on the 2nd amendment. This analysis pointed to the single page buried on their website where they address gun rights, or in this instance the lack thereof. I also posed a challenge - and a hope - that if the Heller case landed on the side of individual rights the ACLU would drop their current position and defend this right with equal rigor.

Since last week's historic 5-4 decision upholding an individual's right to keep and bear arms, the ACLU has been mostly silent. There is a short post on their blog that states their current and mostly unaltered view of the 2nd amendment:

The ACLU interprets the Second Amendment as a collective right. Therefore, we disagree with the Supreme Court’s decision in D.C. v. Heller.

They go on to say that because of some unanswered questions about the text of the ruling and how it will affect current legislation, its meaning is obfuscated. Regardless of how broad or narrow the ruling is, the ACLU's failure to recognize and defend this right puts their entire mission in jeopardy. To selectively interpret sections of the Bill of Rights and allow them to be gutted at will, even by democratic majorities, clearly reveals them as a partisan establishment.

There is also a certain bit of irony that I want to point out. The ACLU blog's tag line is "Because Freedom Can't Blog Itself." I suppose they are correct. For this freedom, the blogging will need to be done by myself and other Constitutional rights advocates

note: It looks like some of my fellow 2nd bloggers have tackled this very same topic. Here it is on 'Of Arms and the Law', The Wall Street Journal's Best of the Web, and World Net Daily writes about how the ACLU blog is being hammered with repudiating comments.