hey there welcome back to heimlich's history in this video we're going to look at yet another one of your required supreme court cases for the ap government curriculum namely mcdonald v chicago so if you're ready to get them brain cows milked then let's get to it so just like in all of my required case videos let's begin with the facts of the case the facts of this case actually begin with another case that had been decided in 2008 namely heller v the district of columbia in that case the court ruled that the restrictive gun ownership laws in washington d.c were unconstitutional however because d.c is a federal district that ruling only applied to federal territory so a man named otis mcdonald along with a few other chicago residents decided to do what they could to apply this decision to the state for mcdonald's part he was a grandfather whose street had been taken over by gangs and his house had been robbed five times as a hunter he owned several rifles and shotguns legally but argued that such large guns weren't practical for use in self-defense in case of a midnight break-in so he wanted to buy a handgun but the problem was that chicago arguably had the most restrictive handgun laws in the nation and so the constitutionality of those laws was brought before the supreme court okay so what was the constitutional principle at stake in this case well this is pretty obviously a case about the second amendment it's protection of a citizen's right to bear arms mcdonald and the folks who filed with him argued that chicago's restrictive gun laws infringed upon their right to own guns especially after the ruling in the heller case however the opposing side argued that restrictive gun laws were necessary to uphold public order and safety and remember in cases like these that's always the balance the court is trying to strike do we uphold personal liberty at the expense of public order and safety or vice versa well to see which they chose let's look at the decision the court handed down the court ruled in favor of mcdonald and the other petitioners arguing that chicago's gun laws were indeed a violation of these citizens second amendment rights however always keep in mind that although this is a case about the second amendment it's not only a case about the second amendment it's confusing well then let me explain it up real nice for you remember that the second amendment along with the other nine amendments in the bill of rights only protects citizens from the federal government not the state government it was the passage of the 14th amendment with its equal protection clause that allowed the court to apply the bill of rights to state governments as well and that's why the court can rule on a state law about guns and it's very important that you understand the logic of what happened as a result of this case so follow me here as i consider why this case matters since the heller case only applied to federal territory and not to the states the mcdonald decision applied that same ruling to the states this process is what's known as selective incorporation which is the means by which the court applies the civil liberties found on the bill of rights to the state and so the result of this decision was that any state or city that had similar restrictive gun laws had to rewrite their laws to fall in line with the mcdonald ruling and why well because as justice samuel alito wrote in his majority opinion it is clear that the framers and the ratifiers of the 14th amendment counted the right to keep and bear arms among those fundamental rights necessary to our system of ordered liberty on the other hand dissenting judges argue that there was nothing in the history or logic of the second amendment that made gun ownership a fundamental right but alas their argument did not carry the day okay i hope that helped if you want even more help then click right over here and grab a view packet which is going to help you get an a in your class and a five on your exam in may i've got videos on all the other required supreme court cases right here so click away if that's something that you're into subscribe if you want me to keep making these videos and i shall surely oblige heimler out