Gun Control Survives The Supreme Court

[jpak]

http://motherjones.com/mojo/2011/06/gun-control-survives-supreme-court

In 2008, the US Supreme Court overturned a DC law banning city residents from owning handguns. The decision in District of Columbia v Heller was unprecedented because the sharply divided court found—for the first time—that Americans have an individual right to own guns outside of the "well regulated militia" described in the Second Amendment.

Critics warned that the decision amounted to a death blow for all sorts of reasonable laws regulating gun ownership, and the National Rifle Association seemed to agree with them. The gun group's vice president, Wayne LaPierre, said at the time that the Heller ruling would be "the opening salvo in a step-by-step process" to kill off most of the nation's gun control laws.

Well, three years later, gun control is alive and well despite more than 400 legal challenges based on Heller, according to a new report (PDF) by the Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence. The NRA as well as dozens of criminals have attempted to invoke Heller in court to challenge everything from bans on carrying concealed weapons in public to restrictions on gun ownership by people involved in domestic violence. Almost all of those challenges have failed, according to the Brady Center, including a second lawsuit filed by Dick Heller, the plaintiff in the original Supreme Court case, who sued again to try to invalidate restrictions on semi-automatic weapons in the nation's capital.

The failed lawsuits have also produced some surprisingly strong language from judges who don't want to use Heller to implement the NRA's vision of "any gun, any person, anywhere." For instance, in finding that there is no constitutional right to carry a gun in a car or national park, the 4th Circuit court of appeals, one of the most conservative courts in the country, declared: "This is serious business. We do not wish to be even minutely responsible for some unspeakably tragic act of mayhem because in the peace of our judicial chambers we miscalculated as to Second Amendment rights."

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[LAGC]

1. I love the picture MoJo found to go with this story.

A kid with a rocket launcher. How cute.

[jpak]

2. He bought it at a gun show

:D

:hi:

[LAGC]

3. I'm sure he did.

:hippie:

[Pullo]

5. ........ from an ATF agent

:-)

[discntnt_irny_srcsm]

18. On his way to sell it in Mexico.

:rofl:

[GreenStormCloud]

8. Without the rocket it is just an empty tube, and completely legal. N/T

[friendly_iconoclast]

9. Good point. Only dangerous if the kid decided to swat someone upside the head with it.

Then again, gun control is usually about the appearance of danger, not the reality....

[Name removed]

16. Deleted message

Sub-thread removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Pullo]

4. Thread should be titled: "Whats Left of Gun Control ........ "

Meanwhile, gun laws across the nation continue to be loosened, maintaining a decades long trend.

yurp

[gejohnston]

6. what crap

In 2008, the US Supreme Court overturned a DC law banning city residents from owning handguns. The decision in District of Columbia v Heller was unprecedented because the sharply divided court found—for the first time—that Americans have an individual right to own guns outside of the "well regulated militia" described in the Second Amendment.

No it was not unprecedented. It always has been an individual right outside of a militia. The group rights theory did not exist until the 1930s. No SCOTUS ever ruled for group theory.

Well, three years later, gun control is alive and well despite more than 400 legal challenges based on Heller, according to a new report (PDF) by the Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence. The NRA as well as dozens of criminals have attempted to invoke Heller in court to challenge everything from bans on carrying concealed weapons in public to restrictions on gun ownership by people involved in domestic violence. Almost all of those challenges have failed, according to the Brady Center, including a second lawsuit filed by Dick Heller, the plaintiff in the original Supreme Court case, who sued again to try to invalidate restrictions on semi-automatic weapons in the nation's capital.

That is a total crock. At no time has the NRA ever represented criminals. When have felons ever use Heller as a challenge for violating the Federal Firearms Act of 1938? Come on, Brady always makes crap up.

[eqfan592]

13. Also the article implies that the court was...

..."sharply divided" over the idea that Amerians have an individual right to own firearms. This was not in fact that case at all. In fact, ALL of the judges stated that it was CLEARLY an individual right, and that this was never, in fact, in question.

[friendly_iconoclast]

7. I liked this line: '...the NRA's vision of "any gun, any person, anywhere." '

Looks like the MoJo writer got hold of a copy of "The Protocols of The Elders of The NRA", as I doubt anyone could actually

find some evidence of the NRA advocating anything like this.


As usual with NRA-haters, the writer seems notably phobic about providing evidence or actual links, and is getting thoroughly

cuffed about the head and shoulders in the comments section.

[krispos42]

15. Reminds me of the "abortion on demand" talking point the reichwing uses

"What, you want abortion on demand?"

Yes!

"What, you want to just be able to buy a gun?'

Yes!

[benEzra]

10. More false dichotomy...it is not an either/or choice between

"no gun regulation whatsoever" and "Brady Campaign wish list made law of the land."

The Supreme Court upheld the right of mentally competent adults to choose to own Title 1 small arms "in common use for lawful purposes", and the keeping of said firearms in a mode suitable for defensive use.

The biggest effect, outside of a few way-out-there jurisdictions like D.C. and Chicago, is to take most of the gun control advocates' ban lists off the table, at least insofar as infringing lawful ownership goes.

[S_B_Jackson]

11. jpak, are you sure about the contention in this article about, "gun control being alive and well"?

Even before Heller in 2008, there was the overturning by the California Appeals Court of San Francisco's gun ban.

Then, of course, we have Heller itself. Which DC is still incurring unnecessary and expensive legal fees trying to deny to themselves that they actually lost. But then Heller was just the beginning....and it only applied to the District of Columbia.

The real whammy to MOJO's position was the follow-on case, McDonald v. Chicago, decided just last summer in which the USSC incorporated the 2nd Amendment against all states, counties and municipalities. This issue isn't going to go away, and though you and Mother Jones may wish to stick your collective heads in the sand, you're on the losing side of the argument.

[DonP]

12. Perhaps you should show this to your own Governor who just signed another set of looser gun laws?

As did about a half dozen other governors, both GOP and Dem. I guess they don't all realize what a big "hit" gun control still is. Maybe pass it around the Maine and other state legislatures too?

Let's see ... you have one desperate MoJo article versus weekly (actually almnost daily now) stories about gun laws being relaxed around the country.

I'd give MoJo about as much credibility on the future success of gun control as I'd give the NEJM on the best way to catch Walleye after a cold front moves through, maybe less.

Ha! That really is getting desperate for any kind of "success" to tout.

[rl6214]

14. Unrec for just the idiocy of this article and the idiocy of this post

[Atypical Liberal]

17. LOL

LOL. The tide is still going our way. We are now down to one state in the union that does not allow concealed carry.

At least on the firearm-rights front, freedom is prevailing.

[Atypical Liberal]

19. Yet another state signs castle doctrine into law.

http://www.timesleader.com/news/ap?articleID=7258947

The tide is going our way.

[aikoaiko]

20. Only the anti-gun fear mongers said Heller would destroy all gun control

and allow criminals to go free.


What idiots and now they are claiming this is victory.

[virginia mountainman]

21. LOL it as if their heads are in the sand!!

Now tell me, who won the debate??