In the early 21st century, a Supreme Court case addressed the application of the Second Amendment to state and local governments. Otis McDonald challenged the city's strict handgun ban, arguing that it infringed his Second Amendment rights to keep and bear arms. Learn why the Supreme Court ruled that the Second Amendment is fully applicable to the states through the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. Understand how Justice Samuel Alito's opinion emphasized the fundamental nature of this right for self-defense and its incorporation against state and local governments, having a lasting effect on gun control laws at both the federal and state levels.