The U.S. Supreme Court on Thursday struck down a century-old New York state law that limited who can carry concealed weapons in public, with Justice Clarence Thomas writing for the 6-3 majority that the statute violated the Second Amendment’s right to bear arms. The ruling vastly expands gun rights in the U.S. just weeks after mass shootings in Buffalo, New York, and Uvalde, Texas, and represents “a revolution in Second Amendment law,” says Slate senior writer Mark Joseph Stern. “It declares that any restriction on the right to self-defense is presumptively unconstitutional.” In light of the Supreme Court decision, a bipartisan gun violence bill passed by the Senate is “one step forward, two steps back.” Stern also discusses a separate ruling in which the court’s conservative majority said a person who is arrested and not told of their right to remain silent cannot subsequently sue police for violating their Fifth Amendment rights against self-incrimination — even if statements they give are ultimately used against them at trial. The decision could be setting the stage for the court to overturn the 1966 Miranda v. Arizona precedent altogether, Stern warns.
