Officials Keep Whittling Away At Second Amendment Rights

Forbes ^ | September 15, 2016 | George Leef

[reaganaut1]

Earlier this year, Justice Clarence Thomas caused a mild sensation among Court watchers when he asked his first question from the bench in a decade. His question to the government’s counsel was why should it be so easy for a citizen to be deprived of his or her rights under the Second Amendment. (I wrote about the incident and the underlying case here.)

That question applies with equal force in a case where state officials have decided to deny gun permits to individuals who have been issued cards enabling them to purchase medical marijuana. Why should the fact that a person could purchase marijuana for medical purposes be grounds for declaring him ineligible to own a gun?

Here are the facts.

A woman who is a Nevada resident, Rowan Wilson, sought to purchase a gun from a firearms store in the town of Mound House in 2011. The owner of the shop (Fred Hauser) however, refused to sell to her because he was aware that she had recently obtained a medical marijuana registry card from the Nevada Department of Health and Human Services .

The reason why that mattered to him was that gun shop owners had received a letter from the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (BATF) stating that any person who uses marijuana for medical purposes qualifies as an “unlawful user of a controlled substance” and is therefore forbidden to purchase a firearm under federal criminal law.

Therefore, if Hauser had sold Ms. Wilson a firearm, he would have committed a felony since he had “reasonable cause to believe” that she was forbidden by statute to purchase a gun. Much better to lose a sale than to go to jail.

[sparklite2]

Yes, it would be nice if the ACLU were as concerned about the 2nd Amendment as they are about the First.

[Pontiac]

A woman who is a Nevada resident, Rowan Wilson, sought to purchase a gun from a firearms store in the town of Mound House in 2011. The owner of the shop (Fred Hauser) however, refused to sell to her because he was aware that she had recently obtained a medical marijuana registry card from the Nevada Department of Health and Human Services .

Why not just go to a gunshot were she is not known to buy her firearm rather than make a federal case of the issue.

Now there is a new judicial precedent that is there for every activist judge to use to chain all of us the federal whipping post.

[falcon99]

Interesting, second amendment right can be denied because of a legal medical marijuana card, but that same person can still vote.

[RossA]

How old do you have to be to remember the ACLU defending the first amendment?

[Big Red Badger]

The Question is asked on former 4473,

That was Easy.

[sparklite2]

1997

In a landmark 1997 decision, the U.S. Supreme Court agreed
with the ACLU’s argument that the Internet itself is a free-speech zone.

More current ---

Many universities, under pressure to respond to the concerns
 of those who are the objects of hate, have adopted codes or
 policies prohibiting speech that offends any group based on
race, gender, ethnicity, religion or sexual orientation.

That's the wrong response, well-meaning or not.
The First Amendment to the United States Constitution
protects speech no matter how offensive its content.

[Cyclone59]

I don’t know about that, so much in Missouri. Yesterday because the first day that anyone who wants to can carry a gun without a permit or any training. - the training part scares me.