A Federal Judge Calls Clarence Thomas’ Bluff on Gun Rights and Originalism.

Slate ^ | 11.02.2022 | MARK JOSEPH STERN

[Carriage Hill]

Federal judges are not historians, but they are increasingly obligated to play them on the bench. In his Bruen decision last June, Justice Clarence Thomas ordered courts to assess the constitutionality of modern-day gun restrictions by searching for “historical analogues” from 1791, when the Second Amendment was ratified. Ever since, judges have struggled mightily with this task—in part because most have no training in real historical analysis, but also because the record is often spotty and contradictory. In light of Bruen’s maximalist language, they have erred on the side of gun owners, finding a constitutional right to buy a gun while under indictment for a violent crime, to carry a gun into airports, and to scratch out the serial number on a firearm, rendering it untraceable.

[Political Junkie Too]

Fair enough.

-PJ

[KC Burke]

Joe Biden was also on that committee.

[Twotone]

Joe Biden was on the Judiciary Committee, but this was a subcommittee that came up with the document. I’m sure the entire Judiciary Committee had to vote on the final results. I’d love to know who voted what, but I’m too busy to go searching. :-)

[zeugma]

They all must have serial numbers for tracking/tracing purposes, they are recorded on the Federal Form 4473—or ‘yellow sheet’ at point of sale, new or used. Call a gun shop and ask.

Again, if I were on a jury, I'd laugh that charge right out of the room. We can get rid of this kind of stupidity by taking our rights as jurors seriously. If we do that enough, eventually the government goons will stop bringing charges on something ridiculous as that, and we could likely get it removed from the code.

I suspect that it will soon be challenged under Bruin, and be struck down anyway.

[lepton]

That is ‘early gun laws’, not early laws. Until Nat Turner’s revolt, many slave owners had slaves who were armed and hunted on behalf of their owners.