DC appeals Parker case to SCOTUS

[kermit315]

^^ bite your tongue

 

[AF_INT1N0]

YES,YES, YES...Hopefully we get a decision before the next election. I'm optimistic that teh "Individual Right" will be upheld.

Now I'm in CA how will this effect me? Will the AW & .50 BMG be unconstitutional?

Yes.. But a better ruling would be if the BullSh$T may issue policies in some counties are shot down for violating the 14th.

 

[Matt King]

Does anybody have a list of municipalities that restrict handgun ownership?

These are the ones that I know of:

New York

Chicago

Washington D.C.

 

[Megistopoda]

Do you mean ban, or restrict?

Many municipalities restrict handguns, and some effectively ban them. It will take a lot of work to list them all...and there is a lot of variation among those that restrict:

Among the ones that ban:

Washington, DC
Chicago, IL
Morton Grove, IL
Evanston, IL
Oak Park, IL
Wilmette, IL
Winnetka, IL

Among the ones that either ban or "restrict"
Cicero, IL
Hazel, IL
Highland Park, IL
Niles, IL
Northbrook, IL
Riverdale, IL
Aurora, IL
Woodridge, IL
Channahon, IL
Shorewood, IL

I do not know what such "restrictions" entail, other than knowing that Highland Park requires a police department permit in order to own a handgun. Illinois is particular in having "home rule" which allows municipalities to regulate firearms as they "see fit."

 

[Matt King]

Among the ones that either ban or "restrict"
Cicero, IL
Hazel, IL
Niles, IL
Northbrook, IL
Riverdale, IL
Aurora, IL
Woodridge, IL
Channahon, IL
Shorewood, IL

How far do these "restrictions" go?

 

[ozwyn]

Good for us says I.

I think we have a darn good chance of winning. And as others have mentioned, refusing to hear the case IS a win.

I am just glad we had some determined people willing to take a shot at this case and willing to go forward in spite of initial NRA opposition.

 

[Langenator]

it sounds like the appeal will be submitted around September

Actually, as it stands right now, the petition for cert is due on 7 August, although DC has asked for a 30 day extension. If I was the Chief Justice, I'd tell them to get bent, you've had since May, stop stalling.

If SCOTUS picks up the case the whole thing will come down to Kennedy. We already know how the other 8 will vote.

Not necessarily. I've read some non-2A cases where the opinion-writing justice(s) included the right to bear arms in the list of basic rights, when dealing with issues like free speech, voting rights, etc. One of those opinions I distinctly remember as being written by Justice Ginsburg.

Now, she may, in fact, be willing to say this when it doesn't mean anything and vote much differently when it counts, but it is a positive sign, if a small one.

I'll try to dig up the book when I get home.

 

[Kim]

You are right about Ginsberg. I think it was in Casey. Also I watched Kennedy on C-span give a talk to youngins and some boy stood up and said since the 2nd is old and obviously an obviously not needed today when will the USSC rule it is not an indivivual right or some nonsense. Kennedy was by this time irritated with the crazy questions he had been getting from the truly uneducated youth. He said something like " Oh No NO you can not just say something like that the Constitution has meaning".

 

[jpk1md]

While I cannot vouch for the quality of the source this is nonetheless interesting and hopefully true.....maybe some of the Lawyers in the group can speak to the following article as a whole and the text below....

davidkopel.com/2A/lawrev/35finalpartone.htm

Since William Rehnquist was appointed Chief Justice in 1986, six different opinions have addressed the Second Amendment. The authors of the opinions include the small left wing of the Court (Justices Stevens and Ginsburg), the Court's right wing (Justices Thomas and Rehnquist), and the Court's centrist Justice O'Connor. Every one of the opinions treats the Second Amendment as an *114 individual right. Except for Justice Breyer, every sitting Supreme Court Justice has joined in at least one of these opinions-- although this joinder does not prove that the joiner necessarily agreed with what the opinion said about the Second Amendment. Still, five of the current Justices have written an opinion in which the Second Amendment is considered an individual right, and three more Justices have joined such an opinion.

If accurate I would say things bode well for a ruling in FAVOR of the 2A as an Individual Right based upon the fact that a number of these Justices are still sitting on the bench.

You guys are going to love this narrative on Justice Thomas from the above article:

C. Printz v. United States

In Printz v. United States, the Supreme Court voted 5 to 4 to declare part of the Brady Act unconstitutional, because the Act ordered state and local law enforcement officials to perform a federal background check on handgun buyers. [FN58] While the Printz decision was not a Second Amendment case, Printz did result in some Second Amendment language from Justice Clarence Thomas's concurring opinion.
Justice Thomas joined in Justice Scalia's five-person majority opinion, but he also wrote a separate concurring opinion--an opinion which shows that all the *122 Second Amendment scholarship in the legal journals is starting to be noticed by the Court.
The Thomas concurrence began by saying that, even if the Brady Act did not intrude on state sovereignty, it would still be unconstitutional. [FN59] The law was enacted under the congressional power "to regulate commerce. . .among the several states." [FN60] But the Brady Act applies to commerce that is purely intrastate--the sale of handgun by a gun store to a customer in the same state. [FN61] Justice Thomas suggested that although the interstate commerce clause has, in recent decades, been interpreted to extend to purely intrastate transactions, that interpretation is wrong. [FN62]
Even if the Brady Act were within the Congressional power over interstate commerce, Justice Thomas continued, the Act might violate the Second Amendment:


. . . .Even if we construe Congress' authority to regulate interstate commerce to encompass those intrastate transactions that "substantially affect" interstate commerce, I question whether Congress can regulate the particular transactions at issue here. The Constitution, in addition to delegating certain enumerated powers to Congress, places whole areas outside the reach of Congress' regulatory authority. The First Amendment, for example, is fittingly celebrated for preventing Congress from "prohibiting the free exercise" of religion or "abridging the freedom of speech." The Second Amendment similarly appears to contain an express limitation on the government's authority. That Amendment provides: "[a] well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed." This Court has not had recent occasion to consider the nature of the substantive right safeguarded by the Second Amendment. [n.1] If, however, the Second Amendment is read to confer [FN63] a personal right to "keep and bear arms," *123 a colorable argument exists that the Federal Government's regulatory scheme, at least as it pertains to the purely intrastate sale or possession of firearms, runs afoul of that Amendment's protections. [n.2] As the parties did not raise this argument, however, we need not consider it here. Perhaps, at some future date, this Court will have the opportunity to determine whether Justice Story was correct when he wrote that the right to bear arms "has justly been considered, as the palladium of the liberties of a republic." 3 J. Story, Commentaries §1890, p. 746 (1833). In the meantime, I join the Court's opinion striking down the challenged provisions of the Brady Act as inconsistent with the Tenth Amendment. [FN64]

There are several notable elements in the Thomas concurrence. First, Justice Thomas equates the Second Amendment with the First Amendment. This is consistent with the rule from the Valley Forge case that all parts of the Bill of Rights are on equal footing; none is preferred (or derogated). [FN65] He implicitly rejected second-class citizenship for the Second Amendment.
Justice Thomas then suggests that the Brady Act could be invalid under the Second Amendment. [FN66] Regarding right to bear arms provisions in state constitutions, some state courts have upheld various gun restrictions as long as all guns are not banned. [FN67] Justice Thomas plainly does not take such a weak position in defense of the Second Amendment. [FN68] His implication is that by requiring government permission and a week-long prior restraint on the right to buy a handgun, the Brady Act infringed the Second Amendment.
And of course by recognizing that handguns are a Second Amendment issue, Justice Thomas implicitly rejects the argument that the Second Amendment merely protects "sporting weapons" (usually defined as a subset of rifles and shotguns). [FN69]
Noting that the Second Amendment was not at issue in the case before the Court (the case was brought by sheriffs who did not want to be subject to federal commands, rather by gun buyers or gun dealers), Justice Thomas gently urges the rest of the Court to take up a Second Amendment case in the future. And he leaves no doubt about his personal view of the issue, as he quotes the 19th century legal scholar and Supreme Court Justice Joseph Story, who saw the right to bear arms "as the palladium of the liberties of a republic." [FN70] *124

There are two footnotes in the Second Amendment portion of the Thomas concurrence. In the first footnote, the Justice states that the Supreme Court has not construed the Second Amendment since the 1939 case United States v. Miller (which upheld the National Firearms Act's tax and registration requirement for short shotguns [FN71]). He added that the Supreme Court has never directly ruled on the individual rights issue.

1 Our most recent treatment of the Second Amendment occurred in United States v. Miller, 307 U.S. 174 (1939), in which we reversed the District Court's invalidation of the National Firearms Act, enacted in 1934. In Miller, we determined that the Second Amendment did not guarantee a citizen's right to possess a sawed off shotgun because that weapon had not been shown to be "ordinary military equipment" that could "contribute to the common defense." Id., at 178. The Court did not, however, attempt to define, or otherwise construe, the substantive right protected by the Second Amendment.

The second footnote addressed the growing scholarship on the Second Amendment:

2 Marshaling an impressive array of historical evidence, a growing body of scholarly commentary indicates that the "right to keep and bear arms" is, as the Amendment's text suggests, a personal right. See, e.g., J. Malcolm, To Keep and Bear Arms: The Origins of an Anglo American Right 162 (1994); S. Halbrook, That Every Man Be Armed, The Evolution of a Constitutional Right (1984); Van Alstyne, The Second Amendment and the Personal Right to Arms, 43 Duke L. J. 1236 (1994); Amar, The Bill of Rights and the Fourteenth Amendment, 101 Yale L. J. 1193 (1992); Cottrol & Diamond, The Second Amendment: Toward an Afro Americanist Reconsideration, 80 Geo. L. J. 309 (1991); Levinson, The Embarrassing Second Amendment, 99 Yale L. J. 637 (1989); Kates, Handgun Prohibition and the Original Meaning of the Second Amendment, 82 Mich. L. Rev. 204 (1983). Other scholars, however, argue that the Second Amendment does not secure a personal right to keep or to bear arms. See, e.g., Bogus, Race, Riots, and Guns, 66 S. Cal. L. Rev. 1365 (1993); Williams, Civic Republicanism and the Citizen Militia: The Terrifying Second Amendment, 101 Yale L. J. 551 (1991); Brown, Guns, Cowboys, Philadelphia Mayors, and Civic Republicanism: On Sanford Levinson's The Embarrassing Second Amendment, 99 Yale L. J. 661 (1989); Cress, An Armed Community: The Origins and Meaning of the Right to Bear Arms, 71 J. Am. Hist. 22 (1984). Although somewhat overlooked in our jurisprudence, the Amendment has certainly engendered considerable academic, as well as public, debate.

In the second footnote, Justice Thomas points out that the text of the Second Amendment (which refers to "the right of the people") suggests that the Second Amendment right belongs to individuals, not the government.
*125

 

[leadcounsel]

Where can I send this guy a donation? He has done more for gun rights than anyone in a LONG time.

Let's all send a contribution, even if it's just a few bucks.

 

[scout26]

leadcounsel, he is funding it out of his pocket, and from what I've read and heard is not looking for nor does he want donations. However, I bet the Cato Institute would love to get a donation in his name.

Okay, mark this down. I'm going to go out on a limb here and predict that if Parker is granted cert, the ruling will be 7-2 or 8-1.

Does Vegas have a line on Supreme Court cases ???

 

[Langenator]

Does Vegas have a line on Supreme Court cases ?

Maybe. You can bet on just about anything there if you find the right place.

There is some site on the web, I forget the name, that pretends to be a sort of futures market for political type events (who gets each party's nomination for Pres, big Tango attack in the US before such and such date, etc). I forget the name, though.

 

[tulsamal]

Does anybody have a list of municipalities that restrict handgun ownership?

These are the ones that I know of:

New York

Chicago

Washington D.C.

But only D.C. is a Federal law. The US Supreme Court could easily rule that you can't have a Federal law banning handguns but that states are free to decide otherwise.

And, it seems to me, that only an outright ban would meet the criteria. A "de facto" ban isn't the same thing. Just because it is very difficult to get a handgun in NYC doesn't mean they are totally banned. Clearly they are not.

Gregg

 

[stevelyn]

After the rulings on Kelo, Raich, and McStain-Feingold, I don't have any faith that the SCOTUS will rule in favor of the Constitution.

IF they do......... and that's a BIG "IF", you can bet that anything resembling a favorable ruling is going to get mucked up by a lot of "reasonable restrictions" legalese Orwellian doublespeak babble.

 

[ctdonath]

Yes, SCOTUS' output has been scary weird lately.
Nonetheless, this is practically a perfect case, there won't be another for a long time, and lots of people have long been calling for SOME verdict from the top, right or wrong - the interminable ambiguity is the problem.

 

[K-Romulus]

Since the appeal is now officially THE cause celebre for the anti-gun-owner crowd, as evidenced by the former Solicitor General (among unnamed others) already signing on to help DC, I wonder who the Parker team will recruit to help?

 

[jpk1md]

You better hope that the NRA stays out of this and a bill doesn't make it to the floor of Congress to give DC Residents back their Gun Rights thus nullifying the appeal to SCOTUS.....

 

[Mazeman]

Does anyone know when we will hear whether or not SCOTUS will grant the one month extension?

 

[Al Norris]

I think the current team is more than a match for anything the D.C. crowd can bring to the party.

I'm really interested in the brief that D.C. will file and what grounds for appeal that they use.

 

[Henry Bowman]

Does anyone know when we will hear whether or not SCOTUS will grant the one month extension?

Depends on when they filed (or file) it. It almost certainly will be granted, and usually within about a week of asking. Amicus briefs will be due about a month later.

The Respondent does not have to file an opposition to the petition for cert., But the court is not likely to grant review without asking the respondent to file a brief. That can be a risky strategy because you then have a shorter time to compose the brief (maybe as little as 30 days), but will save the cost and effort of opposing a frivolous petition that the court is sure to deny.

 

[30 cal slob]

here is d.c.'s extension petition:

http://www.scotusblog.com/movabletype/archives/Heller applic for time 7-16-07.pdf

 

[bill larry]

bttt

 

[ServiceSoon]

How long does SCOTUS have to issue a Writ of Certiorari?

 

[Henry Bowman]

How long does SCOTUS have to issue a Writ of Certiorari?

As long as they want, but in reality it would probably happen (a decision to grant or deny review) near the end of 2007.

 

[vis-à-vis]

As long as they want, but in reality it would probably happen (a decision to grant or deny review) near the end of 2007.

The final point (#5) made in that document states the following:

No meaningful prejudice would arise from the extension, as this Court
would hear oral argument and issue its opinion in the October 2007 Term regardless of whether an extension is granted.

What does that mean?