Putting Aside the Second Amendment

“A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.”  This is the Second Amendment of the Constitution.  The Supreme Court has recently found that this is an individual right that extends beyond the purposes of forming a militia.  They were, however, explicit that the right was not unlimited and that their ruling did not mean that guns could not be prohibited from certain places, that concealed weapons could not be prohibited, and that certain types of weapons could not be outlawed.  Now, I think the Court was wrong to extend this right beyond the context of the formation of militias within which it was drafted and pretty obviously meant to be constrained, but that being said it seems pretty clear that there is absolutely no justification for using the Second Amendment as a reason to impede reasonable regulation of gun ownership, including universal background checks and the outlawing of assault weapons and high capacity magazines.  So, let’s stop pretending that the Second Amendment is a barrier to regulation, and get to work crafting reasonable and effective regulations.