SCOTUSblog is reporting that SCOTUS has decided to hear an appeal in the case of McDonald vs. Chicago, the case challenging the city of Chicago’s total handgun ban.

Taking on a major new constitutional dispute over gun rights, the Supreme Court agreed on Wednesday to decide whether to apply the Second Amendment to state, county, and city government laws.

The Court had three cases from which to choose on the Second Amendment issue — two cases involving a Chicago gun ban, and one case on a New York ban on a martial-arts weapon.  It chose one of the Chicago cases — McDonald v. Chicago (08-1521) — a case brought to it by Alan Gura, the Alexandria, VA., lawyer who won the 2008 decision for the first time recognizing a constitutional right to have a gun for personal use, at least in self-defense in the home (District of Columbia v. Heller).  A second appeal on the Chicago dispute had been filed by the National Rifle Association (NRA v. Chicago, 08-1497).  Presumably, the Court will hold onto that case until it decides McDonald; the same is likely for the New York case, Maloney v. Rice (08-1592) — a case in which Justice Sonia Sotomayor had participated when she was a judge on the Second Circuit Court.

McDonald vs. Chicago is the best case to take regarding how the Second Amendment applies to the states.  NRA vs. Chicago is basically a carbon copy of McDonald, and in Maloney, while the case was decided on the grounds that Heller didn’t apply to the states, it is also not the best case to take on appeal since it dealt with the keeping and bearing of nunchuks.

Now I’m a supporter of all of your major martial arts, but part of me is not particularly concerned if the Second Amendment is found to not protect the right to own nunchucks as is see them to have little offensive or defensive value.  On the other hand, think of all the hilarious home videos we will be without if nunchucks are outlawed and people can’t make movies of guys hitting themselves in the groin with nunchucks anymore.  That’s the ten-thousand dollar winner every time.

My non-risky prediction in McDonald?  A standard 5-4 victory for the Constitution.