Riots in the courts over gun laws after the judges’ decision

The U.S. Supreme Court’s landmark Second Amendment decision strikes down gun laws nationwide, divides judges and sows confusion over what restrictions on firearms can stay in place.

The Supreme Court ruling, which sets new standards for evaluating gun laws, has left many questions open, experts say, leading to more controversial rulings as lower court judges struggle to figure out how to enforce it.

Bruen’s so-called Supreme Court decision changed the yardstick that lower courts have long used to evaluate appeals against firearms restrictions. Judges say judges no longer have to consider whether a law serves the public interest, such as improving public safety.

Under the Supreme Court’s new test, a government that wants to keep firearms restrictions in place must look back to history to show that it is in line with the country’s “historic tradition of gun regulation”.

In recent months, courts have declared unconstitutional federal laws designed to keep guns out of the hands of rapists, convicted felons and marijuana users. The judges struck down a federal ban on gun ownership with serial numbers removed and restrictions on gun ownership for young people in Texas, and blocked the enactment of Delaware’s ban on owning homemade “ghost guns.”

In several cases, judges considering the same laws have reached opposing views as to whether they are constitutional following a decision by a conservative majority of the Supreme Court. The legal turmoil caused by the first major gun ruling in a decade will likely cause the Supreme Court to intervene again soon to give more guidance to judges.

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“There is confusion and confusion in the lower courts because not only do they not come to the same conclusions, they just apply different methods or the Brune method in different ways,” said Jacob Charles, a professor at Pepperdine University School of Law who specializes in firearms laws. .

“This means that not only are new laws being repealed… but also laws that have been on the books for over 60 years, and in some cases 40 years, are being repealed – where before Bruen – the courts unanimously agreed that they were constitutional.” he said.

The legal wrangling continues as mass shootings continue to blight the gun-infested country, and law enforcement officials across the US work to combat the rise in violent crime.

This week, six people were fatally shot at multiple locations in a small rural Mississippi town, and a gunman killed three students and badly injured five at Michigan State University before taking his own life.

Dozens of people have died in mass shootings in 2023, including in California, where 11 people were killed while celebrating Lunar New Year at a dance hall popular with older Asian Americans. There were more than 600 mass shootings in the United States last year, in which at least four people were killed or injured, according to the Archive of Gun Violence.

The decision opened the door to a wave of lawsuits from gun rights activists who saw an opportunity to overturn laws on everything from age restrictions to semi-automatic weapons like the AR-15. For gun rights advocates, Bruen’s decision was a welcome development that lifted what they see as unconstitutional restrictions on Second Amendment rights.

“This is a true reading of what the Constitution and the Bill of Rights are telling us,” said Mark Oliva, spokesman for the National Shooting Sports Foundation. “It absolutely gives the lower courts clarity on how the constitution should be applied when it comes to our fundamental rights.”

Gun control groups are raising the alarm after a federal appeals court said this month that under new Supreme Court standards, the government cannot bar people who have domestic violence restraining orders from owning guns.

The Fifth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans held that the law “embodies beneficent policy goals designed to protect vulnerable people in our society.” But the judges concluded that the government failed to point to a predecessor from early American history comparable enough to modern law. Attorney General Merrick Garland said the government would seek further review of the decision.

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Gun control activists have condemned the Supreme Court’s historic test, but say they remain confident many gun restrictions will stand the test. For example, since this ruling, judges have consistently supported the federal ban on gun ownership by convicted felons.

The Supreme Court noted that cases involving “unprecedented social challenges or dramatic technological change may require a more subtle approach.” And the judges have made it clear that the right to bear arms is restricted to law-abiding citizens, said Shira Feldman, a forensic counsel for the gun control group Brady.

The Supreme Court review has raised questions about whether judges are suited to the study of history and whether it makes sense to judge modern laws based on rules – or lack of them – from the past.

“We are not experts on what the whites, the wealthy and the male owners thought about the regulation of firearms in 1791. However, we are now expected to play historians in the name of constitutional justice,” wrote U.S. District Judge Carlton Reeves, President Designate Barack Obama, in Mississippi.

Some judges “really look at history very closely and say, ‘These laws are not analogous because historical law worked a little differently than modern law,'” said Andrew Willinger, executive director of the Duke Firearms Law Center.

Others, he says, “have done a much more flexible study and are trying to say, ‘Look, what is the purpose of this historical law, how can I understand it?’

Many pending cases are closely monitored by gun rights and gun control groups, including several complex state laws banning certain semi-automatic weapons and high-capacity magazines.

A federal judge in Chicago on Friday rejected a motion to block an Illinois law banning the sale of so-called assault weapons and high-capacity magazines, holding the law constitutional under a new Supreme Court test. However, a state court has already partially blocked the law, allowing some gun dealers to continue selling guns, amid a separate lawsuit.

Some gun laws passed after the Supreme Court decision have already been rejected. A judge declared unconstitutional several parts of New York City’s new gun law, including rules restricting the carrying of firearms in public parks and places of worship. The Court of Appeal later suspended that decision while the case was pending. And the Supreme Court has allowed New York to apply the law for the time being.

Some judges upheld the law to prevent persons charged with criminal offenses from buying guns, while others declared it unconstitutional.

A federal judge has issued an order barring Delaware from enforcing provisions in a new law that bans the manufacture and possession of so-called “ghost weapons,” which have no serial numbers and are virtually impossible for law enforcement to trace. But another judge dismissed a challenge to California’s “ghost gun” rules.

In the California case, U.S. District Judge George Wu, appointed by President George W. Bush, appears to be interested in how other judges are interpreting the Supreme Court’s direction.

The company filing the complaint – “and presumably some other courts” – would like to treat the Supreme Court’s decision “like a ‘word salad’, picking an ingredient on one side of the ‘plate’ and a completely separate ingredient on the other.” another until there is nothing left but a completely bulletproof and unrestricted Second Amendment,” Wu wrote in his ruling.

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texasstandard.news contributed to this report.

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