This is the Cato Daily Podcast for Friday, September 8th, 2003.

I'm Caleb Brown.

It is now a matter of public controversy.

Is it cruel and unusual punishment to forever deny voting rights to

former felons and if so what does that say about the denial of Second Amendment

rights to those same people? Cody Wiznuski is with the Firearms Policy Coalition.

We spoke last month in Chicago.

In attempting to understand the circumstances under which a government either state or federal or local

I suppose but mainly state or federal can a bridge the right to keep them bear arms is it's shrinking. The opportunities for government

to do that are shrinking. Whether or not those governments really recognize that

at this point is another matter.

So there was this case about whether or not having your right to vote prohibited from exercising

that right, whether or not that constituted cruel and unusual punishment

under the US Constitution, which a court said, a federal court said, yes, this is cruel and unusual punishment.

That has incredible implications for the Second Amendment.

Can you walk us through, first of all, what are the elements of this case that tied directly to people trying to secure their own protection.

Yeah, absolutely. So you're right. I mean, government's opportunity to regulate second amendment issues are or the natural right of the

individual to keep and bear arms to possess arms for self-defense are certainly shrinking today and they're returning much more closely

to what they should be or what they were at the founding era and that's the key that we've

seen right so when Bruin was

handed down last year it reiterate what the reiterated what the Supreme Court

had said in Heller and essentially that is that you must look to text as informed by history when you're assessing any Second Amendment challenge.

...