Source.

An appeals court struck down a local law in the District of Columbia that banned gun magazines containing more than 10 bullets, describing the measure as unconstitutional.

The ruling Thursday from the District of Columbia Court of Appeals also reversed the conviction of Tyree Benson, who was taken into custody in 2022 for being in possession of a handgun with a magazine that could contain 30 bullets, according to The New York Times.

“Magazines capable of holding more than 10 rounds of ammunition are ubiquitous in our country, numbering in the hundreds of millions, accounting for about half of the magazines in the hands of our citizenry, and they come standard with the most popular firearms sold in America today,” Judge Joshua Deahl wrote on behalf of the two-judge majority in the three-judge panel.

“Because these magazines are arms in common and ubiquitous use by law-abiding citizens across this country, we agree with Benson and the United States that the District’s outright ban on them violates the Second Amendment,” he added.

“This appeal presents a Second Amendment challenge to the District’s ban on firearm magazines capable of holding ‘more than 10 rounds of ammunition.’ Appellant Tyree Benson argues that ban contravenes the Second Amendment so that his conviction for violating it should be vacated,” Deahl also wrote. “The United States, which prosecuted Benson in the underlying case and defended the ban’s constitutionality in the initial round of appellate briefing, now concedes that this ban violates the Second Amendment. The District of Columbia, which is also a party to this appeal, continues to defend the constitutionality of its ban.”

Chief Judge Anna Blackburne-Rigsby, the judge who dissented, wrote that, “The majority bases its common usage analysis on ownership statistics that show only that magazines holding 11, 15, or 17 rounds of ammunition are in common use.”

Uh huh. That last bit is why “common use” is such a dangerous argument, isn’t it? Should it be 11, or 15, or 17? Or should the government stay out of the business of the people?

Anyway, I don’t really care what’s in common use. I care that high capacity magazines are useful and that it’s the right of people to own what they want.

And I don’t care whether they are called high capacity magazines or standard capacity magazines. That’s irrelevant subterfuge.

And I don’t really care whether marijuana smokers get to buy guns. If people don’t have guns to use with these magazines, why does it matter? When is the supreme court going to take up an AR ban case? Everything else is just flotsam and jetsam, noisemaking, and smoke and mirrors.