By a strange turn of events, the Second Amendment right to bear arms has been used to uphold the Constitution’s rule that only the states — not the District of Columbia — may have voting members in the House of Representatives.
Here is what happened: The U.S. Senate voted last year to grant Washington, D.C., a voting member in the House, despite the Constitution’s clear provision that the House “shall be composed of Members chosen every second Year by the People of the several States.” Because D.C. is not a state, the Senate’s action was unconstitutional.
But also included in the Senate bill that passed was a provision to restore Second Amendment rights to the District of Columbia, where strict gun control is practiced (and where crime nevertheless remains extremely high).
Fast-forwarding to the present, the House has been debating its own legislation to grant Washington a voting member in the House, and that version also included language restoring Second Amendment rights in the district.
That left liberal Democrats with a choice they did not like: They wanted to vote for the bill, because they knew that a House member from Washington would be an automatic pro-Democrat vote. But they objected to the Second Amendment rights that the legislation would have restored.