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Big News!

Lawman

Lawman

Well-Known Member
None
BREAKING NEWS -- Divided three-judge D.C. Circuit panel holds that the District of Columbia's gun control laws violate individuals' Second Amendment rights

http://howappealing.law.com/


Holy F'ing crap of all the laws to be called into question and actually overturned I didnt expect this one to happen anytime soon.
 
Brett327

Brett327

Well-Known Member
None
Super Moderator
Contributor
Lawman said:
BREAKING NEWS -- Divided three-judge D.C. Circuit panel holds that the District of Columbia's gun control laws violate individuals' Second Amendment rights

http://howappealing.law.com/


Holy F'ing crap of all the laws to be called into question and actually overturned I didnt expect this one to happen anytime soon.
Click to expand...

Interesting. We'll have to see how it plays out.

Brett
 
M

MasterBates

Well-Known Member
I was just about to post this as well..

Gun rights were restricted in incremental steps.. That is how we will get them back...

This may be a big step...
 
Lawman

Lawman

Well-Known Member
None
MasterBates said:
I was just about to post this as well..

Gun rights were restricted in incremental steps.. That is how we will get them back...

This may be a big step...
Click to expand...

Especially when given the reasoning of what this can and most likely will do as a codified law. Given the opinion of a Court as high as it is, it will lend lots of fire to the arguments of overturning more locally restrictive gun laws such as Handgun bans in citys. Im usually for States rights before Federal but individual localities need to learn that they are not empires unto themselves sometimes.
 
Flash

Flash

SEVAL/ECMO
None
Super Moderator
Contributor
Lawman said:
BREAKING NEWS -- Divided three-judge D.C. Circuit panel holds that the District of Columbia's gun control laws violate individuals' Second Amendment rights

http://howappealing.law.com/


Holy F'ing crap of all the laws to be called into question and actually overturned I didnt expect this one to happen anytime soon.
Click to expand...

I imagine that this will go to the full Circuit court, and then to the Supreme Court. It will be a while.....
 
Fly Navy

Fly Navy

...Great Job!
pilot
Super Moderator
Contributor
The Supreme Court has largely refused to hear a 2nd Amendment case in the past. Wonder if they'll hear this one.
 
scoober78

scoober78

(HCDAW)
pilot
Contributor
This presents an interesting problem for the high court...which will almost certainly have to address this if it is brought to them.

The trouble, as I see it is that there are really two constitutional issues here. The first, clearly enough, is the second amendment question. Rephrased, is the right guaranteed in the second amendment, "The right of the people to keep and bear arms...", a right which is construed on the individual citizen. The court could uphold the ruling of the lower court, that it is...or not.

Second, if the court decides that it is a right guaranteed to the individual, then you have to deal with the enfranchisement issue...Are the residents of the District of Columbia citizens of the United States? The court could easily rule that they are not and strike down the Circuit's decision without even ruling on the 2nd Amendment issue. The court has a long history of doing this...Dred Scott v. Sanford and many others. It sounds crazy that they may not be, but there is a long legal precedent for this sort of thing. For more than half of their existance for example, the Bill of Rights were thought not to apply to the states and correspondingly, not their citizens.

Don't get me wrong here guys...I would love to see this go down...but this case gives the Justices many ways out of addressing the 2nd Amendment question we all want to see...Not as cut and dry as it looks.
 
Flash

Flash

SEVAL/ECMO
None
Super Moderator
Contributor
scoober78 said:
This presents an interesting problem for the high court...which will almost certainly have to address this if it is brought to them.

The trouble, as I see it is that there are really two constitutional issues here. The first, clearly enough, is the second amendment question. Rephrased, is the right guaranteed in the second amendment, "The right of the people to keep and bear arms...", a right which is construed on the individual citizen. The court could uphold the ruling of the lower court, that it is...or not.

Second, if the court decides that it is a right guaranteed to the individual, then you have to deal with the enfranchisement issue...Are the residents of the District of Columbia citizens of the United States? The court could easily rule that they are not and strike down the Circuit's decision without even ruling on the 2nd Amendment issue. The court has a long history of doing this...Dred Scott v. Sanford and many others. It sounds crazy that they may not be, but there is a long legal precedent for this sort of thing. For more than half of their existance for example, the Bill of Rights were thought not to apply to the states and correspondingly, not their citizens.

Don't get me wrong here guys...I would love to see this go down...but this case gives the Justices many ways out of addressing the 2nd Amendment question we all want to see...Not as cut and dry as it looks.
Click to expand...

You need to read up on the Constitution a little bit, DC residents were granted the right to vote by the 23rd Amendment (a basic right of citizenship), and if my Constitutional history is right the Supreme Court cannot overturn amendments. Dredd Scott was a different matter because slaves were not considered citizens by the Constitution (that old 3/5's rule).

Ironically, one of the legal arguments by the District is that it is not a state and the amendment doesn't have the same application. An interesting part of the decision, the appeals court panel overturned the part of the law that says people cannot have handguns inside thier home, the prohibition on carrying them around was left standing.
 
The Chief

The Chief

Retired
Contributor
Fly Navy said:
The Supreme Court has largely refused to hear a 2nd Amendment case in the past. Wonder if they'll hear this one.
Click to expand...

Interesting question, interesting subject, interesting timing. About 8 weeks ago I was picked-up in a foursome at Congressional CC, the discussion was about the sad state of affairs where citizens of DC could not have guns in the home for self defense but all the thugs on the steet did indeed have guns even though outlawed for over 30 years, and the city is still said to be murder Capitol of the Nation, for good reason. Seems that some of the folks newly elected to the National Government are making a lot of noise about this issue. About 4 weeks ago, after a lot of discussion in the DC City Government about the issue, a proposal for a 90 day waiver to allow citizens to buy guns, aimed primarily at new citizens of the District, was introduced. After the 90 days, back to the ban. While on the surface this is simply another insane proposal, the timing of the courts' decision is very remarkable.:icon_smil
 
scoober78

scoober78

(HCDAW)
pilot
Contributor
And you need to re-read my post. I said nothing about the Supreme Court overturning an amendment...and if you think the issue of DC citizenship is settled legally...you are sorely mistaken.

I would agree that I overstated the degree to which they are or are not citizens, however...there is much legal ground to be covered in between.
 
Flash

Flash

SEVAL/ECMO
None
Super Moderator
Contributor
scoober78 said:
And you need to re-read my post. I said nothing about the Supreme Court overturning an amendment...and if you think the issue of DC citizenship is settled legally...you are sorely mistaken.

I would agree that I overstated the degree to which they are or are not citizens, however...there is much legal ground to be covered in between.
Click to expand...

As someone who was born and raised in the DC area and now back in the area I am mroe than familiar with the issues surrounding DC statehood issues (the place is so screwed up they will never become the 51st state, nor should they). But I think you overstated what the Supreme Court might do, they are not immune to the public's perceptions of them and the law. Not only that, Cheif Justice Roberts has made a practice of trying to decide cases in the narrowest way possible with the broadest amount of support from the other justices. Sweeping decisions like we saw in the 50's, 60's and 70's will not come out very often from the Roberts court for a while.

"In a recent speech in Chicago, Chief Justice John Roberts stated that the Supreme Court functions best "when it can deliver one clear and focused opinion of the court." He lauded the importance of judicial "consensus," arguing that cases should be decided "on narrow grounds"

http://www.law.uchicago.edu/news/stone-on-roberts/index.html

With all of that, I would not be suprised if the Supreme Court upheld or overturned the Appeals Court panel's decision on narrow statehood or other constitutional grounds. But I very seriously doubt a sweeping decision out of this Supreme Court at this time for this important and volatile issue.
 
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