by Stephen P. Halbrook

About the author: Stephen Halbrook, a legal expert who focuses on Second Amendment issues, is the author of That Every Man Be Armed: The Evolution of a Constitutional Right.

The two most politically incorrect parts of the Bill of Rights are the Second and Tenth Amendments. The Second Amendment provides that “the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.” The terrible Tenth adds that “the powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution” are “reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.”

Nothing in the Constitution delegates power to Congress to prohibit firearms, and firearms prohibitions obviously infringe on the right to keep and bear arms. These constitutional guarantees are hated by those who would increase federal power beyond any bounds...