[Vanity] US vs. Mathew Henry (9th circus machine gun (922(o)) ruling). Future USSC ruling next year

The Miller court found that they could not say Millers short barreled shotgun was protected by 2A because they had no evidence that it was a normal militia weapon.

Actually, the Miller Court indicated that "there is no judicial notice..." that a short barreled shotgun was protected by the 2A. This is because Miller, the plaintiff, was killed by some "friendly competition" and his lawyer saw no point in bringing any evidence to the table when: a) it didn't matter to his client; and b) he wasn't getting paid anything to do the work. The Solicitor General at the time put forth a specious argument about what the 2A meant, and the Court had nothing opposed to that view in front of it, so it adopted his view in their ruling. In point of fact, short-barreled shotties were commonly known during WW1 as "trench brooms," and could easily have been shown to have significant use and value to the militia.

As you noted, machine guns are highly valuable - though for the armed forces and NG, and thus also the militia. There won't be any lack of evidence today, that's for certain. My view of 922(o) is that it is, by itself, unconstitutional because Congress has passed a tax that the BATF cannot collect because of this subsection, i.e. the law contradicts itself. When combined with the fact that it limits the right to own full autos - an entire class of weapons - and that there are already about 250,000 full autos owned by civilians, there is no doubt that it is unconstitutional. Not to mention that the '34 NFA itself is a Constitutional abomination.

Looking forward to the day when us proles can legally by drop-in happy switches, and there are about 5 million of them out there - when that happens, there is NO WAY that any government is going to try to confiscate weapons.

The Miller court found that they could not say Millers short barreled shotgun was protected by 2A because they had no evidence that it was a normal militia weapon.

Actually, the Miller Court indicated that "there is no judicial notice..." that a short barreled shotgun was protected by the 2A. This is because Miller, the plaintiff, was killed by some "friendly competition" and his lawyer saw no point in bringing any evidence to the table when: a) it didn't matter to his client; and b) he wasn't getting paid anything to do the work. The Solicitor General at the time put forth a specious argument about what the 2A meant, and the Court had nothing opposed to that view in front of it, so it adopted his view in their ruling. In point of fact, short-barreled shotties were commonly known during WW1 as "trench brooms," and could easily have been shown to have significant use and value to the militia.

As you noted, machine guns are highly valuable - though for the armed forces and NG, and thus also the militia. There won't be any lack of evidence today, that's for certain. My view of 922(o) is that it is, by itself, unconstitutional because Congress has passed a tax that the BATF cannot collect because of this subsection, i.e. the law contradicts itself. When combined with the fact that it limits the right to own full autos - an entire class of weapons - and that there are already about 250,000 full autos owned by civilians, there is no doubt that it is unconstitutional. Not to mention that the '34 NFA itself is a Constitutional abomination.

Looking forward to the day when us proles can legally by drop-in happy switches, and there are about 5 million of them out there - when that happens, there is NO WAY that any government is going to try to confiscate weapons.

The Court seemed to imply that if evidence showed that short barreled shotguns were normal militia arms then it would have been protected by 2A.

Is that how you see it?

I agree with everything you posted.

Another point to consider is the case of US v. Rock Ridge Armory wherein the judge ruled against the ATF precisely because their "regulatory powers" stemmed from the ability to tax, and that by withholding the tax-stamp for new machine-guns they could not legitimately regulate machine-guns. -- This case's reasoning was so strong the ATF refused to appeal it higher because if they did the ruling [if upheld] would have stripped them of power in multiple states.

In addition to this, the 2nd amendment applies to the original Constitution "in order to prevent misconstruction or abuse of its powers, that further declaratory and restrictive clauses should be added" and therefore applies restriction to taxes 'infringing' the rights of keeping & bearing arms... AND to the commerce clause.
There might be argument that the 16th Amendment could be used to apply against weapons at the point-of-sale, but that has not been argued as the power/authority by which the right is regulated.

Another case to look at is US v. Leary. When the Government pulled the same stunt on marijuana and Dennis Leary handed their butts to them in the late 60’s. The MG ban is very similar in wording as the marijuana ban then.

Those tax laws are a pain sometimes.