The Second Amendment, Sensitive Places, and Comprehensive Government Security compendium by Dr. Angus McClellan has just been posted on SSRN. This comprehensive survey of historic "gun free zones" demonstrates that when the government required its citizens to disarm to enter such locations, it protected them with armed security. Holding a Ph.D. in American government and public law from Claremont Graduate University in California, McClellan has been a visiting professor at Hampden-Sydney College in Virginia and a postdoctoral research associate with the James Madison Program at Princeton University.
The Supreme Court in Bruen held that "when the Second Amendment's plain text covers an individual's conduct, the Constitution presumptively protects that conduct," and to justify a modern regulation "the government must demonstrate that the regulation is consistent with this Nation's historical tradition of firearm regulation." In other words, once government regulates "arms-bearing conduct," the government bears the burden to show that a longstanding historical tradition existed going back to the Founding to justify that modern-day gun control law and to demonstrate a historical exception to the Amendment's "unqualified command." McClellan's research will be invaluable for scholars and litigators researching America's historical tradition of firearm regulation as it concerns so-called "sensitive places."
The historical scope of the research extends from colonial through early antebellum times (in some cases including English antecedents). Original quotes and sources with links are set forth in extensive footnotes. Vast evidence exists that security was provided in each of the 13 original states (plus Vermont) in courthouses and legislative assemblies. Evidence was also located that 10 of the original states had security at polling places, but I suspect that further evidence will be found that it existed at all of the states.
