Posted on 11/09/2007 3:17:09 AM PST by cbkaty
Justices to decide whether to take up case on strict limits approved in D.C.
WASHINGTON The Supreme Court will discuss gun control today in a private conference that soon could explode publicly.
Behind closed doors, the nine justices will consider taking a case that challenges the District of Columbia's stringent handgun ban. Their ultimate decision will shape how far other cities and states can go with their own gun restrictions.
"If the court decides to take this up, it's very likely it will end up being the most important Second Amendment case in history," said Dennis Henigan, the legal director for the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence.
Henigan predicted "it's more likely than not" that the necessary four justices will vote to consider the case. The court will announce its decision Tuesday, and oral arguments could be heard next year.
Lawyers are swarming.
Texas, Florida and 11 other states weighed in on behalf of gun owners who are challenging D.C.'s strict gun laws. New York and three other states want the gun restrictions upheld. Pediatricians filed a brief supporting the ban. A Northern California gun dealer, Russell Nordyke, filed a brief opposing it.
From a victim's view: Tom Palmer considers the case a matter of life and death.
Palmer turns 51 this month. He's an openly gay scholar in international relations at the Cato Institute, a libertarian research center, and holds a Ph.D. from Oxford University. He thinks that a handgun saved him years ago in San Jose, Calif., when a gang threatened him.
"A group of young men started yelling at us, 'we're going to kill you' (and) 'they'll never find your bodies,' " Palmer said in a March 2003 declaration. "Fortunately, I was able to pull my handgun out of my backpack, and our assailants backed off."
He and five other plaintiffs named in the original lawsuit challenged Washington's ban on possessing handguns. The District of Columbia permits possession of other firearms, if they're disassembled or stored with trigger locks.
Their broader challenge is to the fundamental meaning of the Second Amendment. Here, commas, clauses and history all matter.
The Second Amendment says, "A well-regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed."
Gun-control advocates say this means that the government can limit firearms ownership as part of its power to regulate the militia. Gun ownership is cast as a collective right, with the government organizing armed citizens to protect homeland security.
"The Second Amendment permits reasonable regulation of firearms to protect public safety and does not guarantee individuals the absolute right to own the weapons of their choice," New York and the three other states declared in an amicus brief.
Gun-control critics contend that the well-regulated militia is beside the point, and say the Constitution protects an individual's right to possess guns.
Clashing decisions
Last March, a divided appellate court panel sided with the individual-rights interpretation and threw out the D.C. ban.
The ruling clashed with other appellate courts, creating the kind of appellate-circuit split that the Supreme Court likes to resolve. The ruling obviously stung D.C. officials, but it perplexed gun-control advocates.
If D.C. officials tried to salvage their gun-control law by appealing to the Supreme Court as they then did they could give the court's conservative majority a chance to undermine gun-control laws nationwide.
Just like I've always said. The idea that Crips are militia is balderdash.
Considering you were the one trying to tie said Militia clause to the Crips in the first place, feel vindicated that your strawman has fallen...
Backwards.
Typical Rosco.
My position has always been the following:
Every man, woman, and responsible child has an unalienable individual, civil, Constitutional, and human right to obtain, own, and carry, openly or concealed, any weapon -- rifle, shotgun, handgun, machinegun, anything -- any time, any place, without asking anyone's permission. - L. Neil Smith. The Atlanta Declaration
You were trying to obfuscate things by bringing in active duty militia regulation under Art 1 Para 8 Militia "regulation" and trying to tie it to criminal gang activity.
Poor you... Still stupid after all of these years.
"...we're all supposed to have M-16s." --publiusF27
Silly stupid Roscoe. Too afraid of the gang bangers to bother with his own personal security.
You asked three people two dozen times whether Crips and Bloods are in the unorganized militia, and now your favorite question is completely irrelevant. Does your widdle fanny hurt? ;-)
My only comment to this is if ANYONE ATTEMPTS to take my guns... There will be blood.
They’re your heros, not mine.
Pathetic.
Scalia demolished your absurd answer. And you called me to the thread to spank you for it. I obliged.
Try to focus.
Don't get me wrong, I'm glad you changed your tune. It just seems that you are chasing your own tail here...
Does "all" mean "all"?
What next Mr. Clinton, arguing "is" again?
“...we’re all supposed to have M-16s.” —publiusF27
Backwards again. You’re the one squirming that “all” doesn’t mean all.
Didn't work for you before, isn't going to work for you now.
Or are you trying to say that every law abiding gun owner is a "criminal" and should not have access to the full expression of his individual Rights? That'd be just like you.
Crips aren't militia.
Scalia said nothing about § 311 or the composition of the militia, and you haven’t explained why Crips and Bloods are exempt from that law. I called you here to gloat because Scalia used the same reasoning I did w/respect to Miller when I sarcastically asked whether Miller was in a militia.
I thought gloating would be fun, because I figured you would know that your side lost in the Heller case. What I have found is much more interesting and amusing - you have adopted the individual rights position as if you held it all along. It’s kind of like you have some Orwellian internal mandate that whatever the current position of the government is, it must be right, and it must always have been right, and it must always have been your position. Doublethink in action. Just fascinating stuff. Keep it up!
Does the 2nd amendment apply to Crips in Chicago?
(That may become my new favorite question, which I’ll ask a couple of dozen times at least, and it’ll be relevant each time. ;))
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