Posted on 05/24/2008 12:45:08 AM PDT by neverdem
The only U.S. Supreme Court decision that specifically dealt with the right of the people to keep and bear arms, is about to get a second look. News On 6 anchor Scott Thompson reports the high court is going to take up a new Second Amendment case. When it does, it may turn a small-time hood from Oklahoma into a household name. During the Great Depression, the only thing more common than dust storms in Oklahoma may have been criminal legends. Charles "Pretty Boy" Floyd was the subject of a song written by Woody Guthrie. Hollywood immortalized Clyde Barrow and Bonnie Parker in the movie "Bonnie and Clyde." Machine Gun Kelly earned the FBI's title of "Public Enemy Number 1." But none of them can claim the distinction Claremore's Jack Miller can. "Yes, this obscure figure in Oklahoma history that people know very little about was a major figure in a U.S. Supreme Court case," said author and historian R.D. Morgan. Morgan writes non-fiction books about Oklahoma outlaws in the 20's and 30's, and the lawmen who tracked them down. He says Jack Miller's claim to fame is a surprising one. "I'm sure today he would be just absolutely shocked that he would be famous or infamous for a Supreme Court ruling," said R.D. Morgan. Morgan says Jackson "Jack" Miller spent a lot of time in the gambling halls in and around Claremore. "He was a flamboyant character, drank too much, certainly involved in the bootlegging trade for a while. He was a big talker, an exuberant personality," said R.D. Morgan. So how did a con man from Claremore end up with his name on a landmark Supreme Court decision? The journey began when he joined the Irish O'Malley gang, and started carrying a sawed-off shotgun. "The O'Malley gang was the last of the big super gangs of the 1930's, they had robbed over a dozen banks," said R.D. Morgan. Jack Miller liked to carry his shotgun while working as the gang's lookout and getaway driver. Their crowning achievement came in 1934, when they robbed the Okemah National Bank and the 1st National Bank of Okemah simultaneously. "Of course, a double bank robbery is a rare occurrence, a successful one in American history," said R.D. Morgan. "Investigators dubbed the Okemah robberies as one of the slickest pair of robberies in the history of the state." The feds eventually tracked down every member of the O'Malley gang, and granted Miller immunity so he'd testify against them. But that's not what committed Miller's name to history. Jack Miller's name ended up in the U.S. Supreme Court, thanks to his sawed-off shotgun. He and a friend were arrested for transporting it across state lines, after driving from Claremore to Arkansas. A lower-court judge sent it directly to the U.S. Supreme Court. "The first major federal firearms statute, the national firearms act of 1934, was unconstitutional because it violated the second amendment rights to keep and bear arms," said Oklahoma City University professor Michael O'Shea. Congress had passed the National Firearms Act to target gangsters and the weapons they used. It required a $200 tax stamp on Tommy guns and sawed-off shotguns. Since Jack Miller and his buddy hadn't bothered to buy one of those stamps, they gave the High Court its first chance to rule on the issue of gun control. "Not only is their name immortalized in this case, but what the Supreme Court said about their case is now sort of likely to play a role in this case at the top of the national headlines," said Michael O'Shea. The U.S. Supreme Court overruled the lower court, voting unanimously to uphold the National Firearms Act. Oklahoma City University law professor Michael O'Shea says many experts are surprised the "United States versus Miller" ruling has held up so long. It was written by James Clark McReynolds, one of the least popular justices in history, a man not known for writing thoughtful opinions. Also, Jack Miller's attorney didn't bother going to Washington D.C., to argue for his client. "Yeah, especially to decline to even file a brief on your client's behalf. You know, that's, it could be argued that that was, you know, legal malpractice," said Oklahoma City University professor Michael O'Shea. And O'Shea also says the decision didn't answer most of the questions surrounding the Second Amendment. "The fact that it sort of carefully throws in all these, has the minimum amount of analysis and just kind of throws in this grocery list of citations to authorities that point in different directions making it clear that, you know, everybody's got something to grab onto to support their view," said Michael O'Shea. The incident that preserved the United States versus Miller decision happened under what is now Oologah Lake. Before the case could be sent back to the lower court, Miller's bullet-riddled body turned up on the bank of Spencer Creek in Rogers County. He apparently died at the hands of a fellow robber, as did his U.S. Supreme Court case. "The case went away, and for the next, you know, nearly 70 years, no gun control case got no constitutional challenge to gun control got to the Supreme Court," said Michael O'Shea. For the last seven decades, Miller has rested in this grave in Claremore, forgotten by just about everyone but legal scholars and historians. One of those historians believes that would be okay with the shotgun-toting getaway driver and snitch. "The law was something I'm certain Jack Miller never thought much about, except how to get out of jail," said author and historian R.D. Morgan. Jack Miller's case will make headlines again in about a month, when the U.S. Supreme Court finally takes up another Second Amendment challenge to gun control. It's a case called D.C. versus Heller, and centers on the handgun ban in Washington, D.C.
THE PECULIAR STORY OF UNITED STATES V. MILLER PDF link of a very interesting story in the war on guns
UNITED STATES v. MILLER, 307 U.S. 174 (1939) 6 PDF pages of the decision, a rather empty vessel, which was partly justified on the precedents established by cases using the Harrison Act, the first, or one of the first, war on drugs act.
War And Decision: Samizdat History
The Death of Conservatism Is Greatly Exaggerated
From time to time, I’ll ping on noteworthy articles about politics, foreign and military affairs. FReepmail me if you want on or off my list.
ping for later
—bflr—
Now there's one articulate barrister
What I DO get is that SCOTUS said that a sawed off shotgun was not a normal firearm used by 'the militia' so it wasn't protected by the 2A - ergo all 'Assault Weapon' bans ARE Unconstitutional as we should have 'common weapons' used BY the military..
'A body of citizens enrolled for military discipline.' And further, that ordinarily when called for service these men were expected to appear bearing arms supplied by themselves and of the kind in common use at the time.
Plus it's already established law (starry decide us)(/s) that 'The Militia' is not the State National Guard. So here's my $200 (or whatever it is now) for the transfer stamp, now where's my 'machine gun' :-)
And please no M-16A2 or variant. Take that wimpy caliber and 3 round burst and shove it. An AR-10 for me please.
Unless the AR-10 is select-fire or full auto, you don’t need a tax stamp.
Comment# 2's distribution is the best I usually do on this forum. I found it in a strange way. I was searching on Yahoo News for gun control stories. This story from late January, early February was number 19 or 20. It makes no sense to me chronologically.
However, it makes sense if it was linked that much. I read a story, in the NY Times OpEds IIRC, that said something to that effect is the way Google ranks the links it finds when doing a search.
What's seldom mentioned is the bottom line of U.S. v. Miller: the case was REMANDED to trial court. Few people seem to grasp the significance of this.
Trial court is generally the only place where one may introduce controversial evidence may be used in making a final decision (generally, evidence introduced in other ways is only usable in deciding whether a case should go to, or return to, trial court). The indictment against Miller was initially thrown out before his case ever got to trial court, and thus before he had any opportunity to present any evidence of anything. The Supreme Court didn't find evidence that a sawed-off shotgun wasn't a militarily-suitable weapon, nor did it find that since Jack Miller had failed to present in timely fashion evidence of military suitability, it could affirmatively rule that he could not make such a claim (having never gone to trial, Miller had not yet had the opportunity to present such evidence). All it found was that the case couldn't be thrown out on Second-Amendment grounds until the question of military utility had been addressed in trial court.
Had the case against Miller and Layton gone to trial court, the two of them would have had the opportunity to present evidence that short shotguns were sometimes used in World War I. The government would have had a very time winning its case; although trial courts do not set legally-binding precedents, if it became well-known that Miller was acquitted despite clear evidence that he had possessed the weapons in question without proper tax payment, NFA offenses would have become unprosecutable.
I wish an anti-gun legal scholar could explain a couple things:
This was judicial activism at its worst.
Interesting: he needed to have the Supreme Court hear the case before Miller et al. could present evidence.
BTW, reading more of the history, it seems even clearer why Miller needed the shotgun; by stealing it, the government is complicit in Miller's murder.
Fixed that for you.
L
THE PECULIAR STORY OF UNITED STATES V. MILLER
Has this story been posted to FreeRepublic separately? It certainly deserves it.
Not when I just searched for it, probably because of the pdf format.
Didn't A. Kennedy mention the "deficiency" in Miller during the oral argument for D.C. v Heller?
THE PECULIAR STORY OF UNITED STATES V. MILLER
I found this cached version, but it needs serious editing.
The AR-10 I was thinking of is the original, full auto. That's why I mentioned the transfer tax stamp.
You know, that's, it could be argued that that was, you know, legal malpractice," said Oklahoma City University professor Michael O'Shea.
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