Idaho snubs Federal law, am I reading this right?

[outerlimit]

I suspect the way to press the issue safely would be to get the federal tax stamp, purchase the suppressor and then have the Idaho Attorney General sue the Feds to get your $200 back. It gets kicked up to the Supreme Court for their decision, no Federal laws were ever broken.

Since everyone seems to be of the opinion "from my cold dead hands", but "I'm not gonna be the test case" and "I'll ridicule anyone who is", maybe someone is "brave" enough to do this, since there's no risk to one's money or risk of a prison sentence. Seems like a reasonable request made to the Attorney General if the offer was in fact made to defend anyone running afoul of the NFA, the least they could do is sue to get your money back.

 

[Girodin]

You are aware a substantially similar law from Montana has already been taken to court right? MSSA v. Holder. It was recently appealed to the 9th circuit.

The fact of the matter is to challenge this law you need to overturn 70 years of commerce clause juris prudence. That means you have to get the case to the supreme court. Since the court chooses what cases they hear and it is a very small number of the cases appealed to them there is a good chance you never even get to make your argument. Getting a favorable decision is also a long shot. Not wanting to commit ones self to years of court battles that are very unlikely to produce favorable results is pretty reasonable.

It is not ridiculing someone willing to be a test case to point out the realities of the situation based on a firm understanding of the legal concepts and precedents involved. Or to point out that there is an ongoing case that will decide these issues right now anyways.

I would love a favorable SCOTUS decision and for reasons much more weighty than simply being able to more easily and less expensively buy a suppressor.

 

[boisepatriot]

I really appreciate some of the thoughtful comments on this topic. I would add that the state politicians who passed this law have no intention of risking their own profits to defend it. They did it to placate us. Look who brought the Montana case that is now before the 9th Circuit, not the state of Montana, private citizens groups. I would love it if our attorney general had the guts to take on this and other issues. I think he's a good man, but he's still a politician, and they never take risks that might cost them power or money. Only the people are going to take on fights like this.