The Supreme Court Second Amendment Decision in Bruen Gains Public Approval

 The Supreme Court decision made on June 22, 2022, restoring the protections of right to bear arms outside the home by the Second Amendment, has bounced back to what it was before the decision was announced.

On November 30, 2022, a Marquette University Law School poll was released showing the results of this question, from September of 2021 through September of 2022.

The question was:

Table 11: Favor or oppose ruling that Second Amendment protects right to possess a gun outside the home. Among those with an opinion.

There were five polls taken before the decision was released on June 22, and two taken after the decision was released, one during July 5-12, and one during September  7-14. 

Before the Supreme Court decision on Bruen, the average of the five polls was: 

Heard of and favor the decision: 65%

Heard of and oppose the decision: 35%

After the decision, the average results of the two polls was:

Heard of and favor the decision: 56.5%

Heard of and oppose the decision: 43.4%

Marquette does  not show any more polls on this question after September 14, 2022. 

A new question was formulated and used in a Marquette poll for the week of November 15-22, five months after the Bruen decision. The heading for the category was: J2: Expand 2nd Amendment.

The question was: 

[In 2022 the Supreme Court ruled that the 2nd Amendment right to “keep
and bear arms” protects the right to carry a gun outside the home.] How
much do you favor or oppose this decision?

The new question was for all respondents, whether they had heard of the decision or not.  28% of 1004 respondents had not heard of the case. The question divides the response into four categories instead of only two.  Here are the results from the Marquette table:

Strongly favor 36%

Somewhat favor 28% 

Total in favor 64%

Somewhat oppose 19%

Strongly oppose 16% 

Total oppose 36% 

The total in favor (64%) and total oppose (36%) are incredibly close to the opinions found before the decision (65%/35%). They are easily within the accuracy limits of the poll.

About twice as many people are in favor of the Bruen decision, which restored the Second Amendment protection of the right to bear arms outside the home, as are opposed to it. What happened in between? Why did the numbers briefly drop to 56.5%/43.5%?

Opinion:

The dominant media came out with a series of articles after the Bruen decision. The articles claimed the decision would lead to more violent crime. The Washington post published a "news"  article in the Outlook section by a advocate of arms restrictions, John Donahue, titled:  

 The Supreme Court’s gun decision will lead to more violent crime

The Outlook section was discontinued in September of 2022.  

It seems likely the onslaught of negative articles about the Bruen decision swayed some people. This could account for the 8-9% swing in opinion against the decision. 

Then, articles started appearing about the results of the decision. Articles showing lower courts using the decision to restore the right to carry on private property; the right to carry in public places; the right to bear arms for those under a mere indictment; or under a mere restraining order. Articles such as those might have had an effect.

It is possible those who had not heard of the decision were much more favorable than those who had heard of it. The latest poll included both those who had heard of the decision and those who had not.

The  right to keep and bear arms is a popular right.  In a poll done in April of 2021, about 73-74% of the those polled considered 

"the 2nd Amendment is one of our most important and cherished civil rights in the U.S. Constitution.”

The Second Amendment costs residents of the United States very little. The effect on violent crime seems to be very small, for or against.  It mostly has an effect on the attitude of the people who exercise it. If a person has the means to protect themselves,their family, and their community, they feel substantially less dependent on the government. 

Limited government power means they have power of their own.

Nothing proves the government is limited by the Constitution like a robust protection of the right to keep and bear arms.

With a mostly originalist/textualist Supreme Court for the first time in over 80 years, the rights protected by the Second Amendment are being restored.

©2022 by Dean Weingarten: Permission to share is granted when this notice and link are included.

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