MELISSA BLOCK, Host:

NPR legal affairs correspondent Nina Totenberg reports.

NINA TOTENBERG: Paul Helmke is the president of the Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence.

PAUL HELMKE: Justice Scalia went out of his way to say you can't have anyone having any gun anywhere anytime. And that restrictions on who gets guns, where they take the guns, how the guns are sold, how the guns are stored, how the guns are carried, and even what types of guns there are were all, quote, "presumptively lawful."

TOTENBERG: Eugene Volokh of UCLA Law School makes a similar point, noting that at least 40 states have state constitutions that guarantee the right to bear arms. And that hasn't prevented state courts from upholding their own state gun restrictions.

EUGENE VOLOKH: So a lot of state and local laws have already been challenged on the right to bear arms, guns, though at the state level. And most of them have been upheld. So it is pretty clear that the Second Amendment, even if incorporated against the states, would leave intact most gun control.

TOTENBERG: Nina Totenberg, NPR News, Washington. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.

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