How many angels . . .? From Arizona Jim's claimed 20,000 gun laws emanating from municipal, state and federal jurisdictions it seems to me that states are involved negatively and positively concerning gun rights (and others) in certain specific areas, as you say, but subordinate to constitutional law as interpreted by the Court. Short answer, and I'm sure there are many others, but mine is from the federal showdown on Alabama's rights when the 101st and 102nd Airborne enforced the constitutional right of James Meredith to enrol at Ole Miss in 1962. I was there. A colleague Paul Guihard was killed on the campus that night.