"Does the Second Amendment Bind the States?"

The title of this post is the headline of this effective column at FindLaw by Professor Michael Dorf.  This piece is one of the most effective discussion of the complex and interesting precedents at issue in the Second Amendment incorporation case taken up by the Supreme Court last week.  Here is a paragraph from the start of the commentary:

Last week, the Court announced that it would hear a case, McDonald v. Chicago, posing the question whether the Second Amendment applies to the states and their sub-divisions. In lawyer's jargon, McDonald requires the Court to say whether the Fourteenth Amendment "incorporates" the Second Amendment against the states.  As I shall explain in this column, the case poses an intellectual challenge for the Justices who were in the Heller majority.  To see why, we will need to begin by reviewing the story of how other constitutional rights came to be incorporated against the states.

Some related Second Amendment posts:

• What is the best argument that Heller should only impact the feds? Will it get any votes?
• What state and local issues will be litigated the most if (when?) Heller is incorporated?
• State AGs and the Second Amendment incorporation debate
• Assailing the unjustified Second Amendment limits in Heller
• What if no lower court judges participate in a "Second Amendment Revolution"?
• Has there been a single pro-gun-rights rulings in lower courts since Heller?
• What might 2009 have in store for . . . Second Amendment jurisprudence?