Court considers county's right to regulate guns

A divided federal appeals court wrestled Thursday with potentially the most important gun case in its history, a dispute over a firearms ban at the Alameda County Fairgrounds that has expanded into a constitutional battle over state and local authority to regulate gun possession. Some judges on an 11-member panel of the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals appeared to agree with gun-rights advocates that the Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms, recently interpreted by the U.S. Supreme Court to protect an individual's right to own guns, is binding on states and can be used to challenge the county ordinance. Others noted that the high court has never overturned its own 19th century rulings that said the Second Amendment applies only to the federal government. And one judge suggested the court should uphold the ordinance as a valid public safety measure without deciding the constitutional issue. Even if state and local governments are constitutionally required to let residents own guns for self-defense, "it doesn't seem to affect" the Alameda County law, said Judge Susan Graber. County supervisors outlawed firearms on all county property, including the fairgrounds in Pleasanton, in 1999, a year after 16 people were injured in a melee at the fair in which shots were fired. The ordinance did not expressly prohibit gun shows at the fair, but none has been held since 1999. Two gun show promoters filed the suit now before the court, claming the ban violated free speech as well as the Second Amendment...SFChronicle