Positive Second Amendment : Rights, Regulation, and the Future of Heller

The Second Amendment is among the most recognized provisions of the Constitution. It is also perhaps the most misunderstood. Common misconceptions about the amendment - what it forbids, what it permits, how it functions as law - distort the gun debate and America's constitutional culture. In The Positive Second Amendment, Blocher and Miller provide the first comprehensive post-Heller account of the history, theory, and law of the right to keep and bear arms. Their aim is not to pick sides in the gun debate, but rather to show how a positive account of the 'constitutional' Second Amendment differs from its political cousin. Understanding the right to keep and bear arms as constitutional law will challenge many deeply held beliefs. But it may also provide a better way to negotiate the seemingly intractable issues that afflict America's debate over gun rights and regulation.

Joseph Blocher is Professor of Law at Duke University School of Law. As an associate at O'Melveny & Myers LLP, he co-authored the briefs for the District of Columbia in District of Columbia v. Heller. His Second Amendment scholarship has been published in the Yale Law Journal, Stanford Law Review, NYU Law Review, University of Chicago Law Review, and many other journals.

Darrell A. H. Miller is the Melvin G. Shimm Professor of Law at Duke University School of Law. He is a graduate of Harvard Law School and Oxford University and is a former Marshall Scholar. His scholarship has been cited by the Supreme Court of the United States, the United States Courts of Appeals, the United States District Courts, and in congressional testimony and legal briefs.