Archive for the 'Supreme Court' Category

Good. It is a stupid rule anyway.

I remain convinced that it should be possible to simply swap out the Fifth Circuit for the SCOTUS. I have long advocated for that.

🚨BREAKING🚨

The Fifth Circuit just struck down the unconstitutional federal ban on purchasing handguns across state lines.

“The Ban sullies the plain text of the 2A & is inconsistent with the nation’s tradition of firearms regulation, dating back to the founding era.” pic.twitter.com/1yLcSokXNT

— Gun Owners of America (@GunOwners) September 18, 2026

Source.

The consolidated cases in Viramontes v. Cook County and Grant v. Higgins will deal with whether assault weapons bans, which typically outlaw the purchase of AR-15 and similar semiautomatic rifles, are constitutional under the Second and 14th amendments. The two cases are over laws in Cook County, Illinois, and Connecticut, but are similar to laws in various other states that will be affected by the high court’s eventual ruling. A brief filed to the Supreme Court arguing the laws are unconstitutional warns that broadly banning popular modern firearms, such as AR-15 style guns, would be incompatible with federal law and set Second Amendment rights back hundreds of years.

“Advances in firearms have always been part of the American experience,” said the brief filed by the National Rifle Association, American Suppressor Association, and Independence Institute, noting how modern semiautomatic firearms are the latest iteration of weapons the founders wanted to protect with the Second Amendment.

“To hold that Americans’ most popular firearm is in fact not an ‘Arm’ at all defies reason,” a brief filed by several pro-gun groups, led by Gun Owners of America, said. “AR-15s and other semiautomatic rifles ‘fall squarely’ within the Second Amendment’s basic definition of ‘Arms.’ That is all that is needed for the bans under review to be ‘presumptively unconstitutional.’”

The Trump administration threw its weight behind the bid to strike down “assault weapons” bans, with Solicitor General D. John Sauer arguing that the laws are flatly unconstitutional. The Department of Justice brief asserts that the bans do not comport with the country’s history and tradition of firearm regulation and violate the Supreme Court’s 2022 decision in New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen.

“The AR-15 rifle is unquestionably in common use among law-abiding citizens for lawful purposes,” Sauer wrote. “Today, AR-15s are lawful at the federal level and in 40 States. The overwhelming majority of AR-15 owners possess those rifles for the lawful purposes to which they are adapted, such as self-defense in the home, hunting, and target shooting. A ban on possessing such rifles thus violates the Second Amendment.”

There it is again, that phrase: “In Common Use.” I don’t care if there’s only a single AR-15 extant in the world. The 2A forbids the banning of it.

And leave it to the FedGov to use that argument rather than the militia argument we’ve discussed before. Finally, the article doesn’t even bring up that issue – I don’t think Jack Birle did a very good job with this article.

Lol. The Roman Catholic Church weighs in asking the court to inveigh against these weapons. As if I have some reason to care what the RCC says about anything. However, a lot of the justices are catholic so there’s that. Hopefully they’ll see through this. The RCC has also weighed in on AI. That’s like asking me what I think about colorectal surgery. Can’t they just shut up?

David Codrea.

“Arms that bear a reasonable relationship to the preservation or efficiency of a well regulated militia…  lie at the core of the Second Amendment’s protection, and a State may not prohibit them,” the brief concludes. “A prohibition imposed because those arms are useful for the common defense is contrary to the Second Amendment’s text, purpose, and history.”

Yes. Exactly. The entire premise that they get to regulate arms because they too much resemble military weapons turns the second amendment on its head. It is precisely those arms which are protected by the 2A.

Besides, not only is the above correct, but I have previously pointed out the subterfuge of trying to distinguish between military and civilian weapons.

This notion of military style weapons is and always has been a misdirect and a bald and stupid emotional appeal. There is no such thing as a non-military style weapon. Every weapon was at one time a military style weapon, from rocks to spears and then to knives and swords and then on to bows and then to muskets, bolt action rifles, and semiautomatic and fully automatic rifles.

The U.S. Marine Corps used Benelli shotguns for room clearing in Now Zad, Afghanistan, and I can prove it …

Door gunners used revolvers in Vietnam, and I can prove it …

MACV-SOG used revolvers and Marlin .444 lever action rifles in Laos, and I can prove it.

And bolt action rifles are still in use today with snipers …

This is about disarmament. This isn’t about military versus civilian weapons. There is no distinction.

I proved my case. The correct answer is not in doubt. I am right. Everybody knows I’m right. I enjoy being right. I am so right that there is no further purpose in arguing about it.

But being right doesn’t necessarily mean much when the politics of the court gets in the way.

See SCOTUSBlog.

Whether the Second and 14th Amendments guarantee the right to possess AR-15 platform and similar semiautomatic rifles … Petition GRANTED. The petition for a writ of certiorari in No. 25-566 is granted as to the question presented by the petition in No. 25-238.

The supreme court order is found here.

I have long advocated that the supreme court take up an AR ban case and decide this issue once and for all. Delaying this has done nothing good for either citizens or jurisprudence.

However, there is no reason to necessarily conclude the supreme court will decide this issue in the affirmative, especially with Barrett and Roberts having to be persuaded. But what it will do is stop this incessant whining in state legislatures over the issue. Either the supreme court judges in the affirmative and the issue of decided, or they don’t and states pick off God-granted rights one by one and citizens have to decide whether to fight the political battle (rather than reflexively lean on that tired platitude that “we aren’t voting our way out of this”), or decide to be ready when the SWAT teams come to the front door in the middle of the night.

This will be an extremely clarifying moment in American history.

The attorneys arguing the case are Cooper and kirk.  They did the Peterson 5^th circuit NFA case and a bunch of others, including Vanderstok, which lost. I don’t know much about them beyond that.

But I do know that if they argue the ridiculous trope about ARs being just some other firearm with extra cosmetic features and that those cosmetic features don’t really have any effect on the use of the weapon, they will lose. It’s not about that. It was never about cosmetic features. It’s about effective firearms for the amelioration of tyranny. “Their swords, and every other terrible implement of the soldier, are the birthright of Americans. The unlimited power of the sword is not in the hands of either the federal or state governments, but where I trust in God it will ever remain, in the hands of the people.” – Tench Coxe, an American political economist and delegate to the Continental Congress, best known for his passionate defense of the right to bear arms. In a 1788 article published in the Pennsylvania Gazette under the pseudonym “A Pennsylvanian.”

This notion of military style weapons is and always has been a misdirect and a bald and stupid emotional appeal. There is no such thing as a non-military style weapon. Every weapon was at one time a military style weapon, from rocks to spears and then to knives and swords and then on to bows and then to muskets, bolt action rifles, and semiautomatic and fully automatic rifles.

The U.S. Marine Corps used Benelli shotguns for room clearing in Now Zad, Afghanistan, and I can prove it.

Door gunners used revolvers in Vietnam, and I can prove it.

MACV-SOG used revolvers and Marlin .444 lever action rifles in Laos, and I can prove it.

And bolt action rifles are still in use today with snipers. Make no mistake about this issue. It’s about disarming the public, not “military style weapons.”

And it’s about far more than just all of the above. A high-powered optic will convert a bolt action deer rifle into a sniper rifle if certain gun controller states get their way.

Source.

A federal appeals court’s Thursday ruling could force the Supreme Court to decide if suppressors and magazines fall under the definition of “arms.”

The United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit ruled Thursday in Comeaux v. United States that suppressors fall under the category of “arms” and are protected under the Second Amendment. The Second Amendment Foundation noted the “circuit split,” when two appellate circuits disagree on similar cases, in a series of posts on X, while SAF Director of Legal Research and Education Konstadinos Moros specifically mentioned the Ninth Circuit case Duncan v. Bonta.

“There is now a circuit split on whether suppressors are arms,” Moros posted. “This is of critical importance to those of us in states that totally ban them. While everyone else is arguing about whether registration is constitutional, we can’t even register them under the NFA if we wanted to!”

So what? The cowardly SCOTUS will ignore the circuit split just like they’ve ignored trampling 2A rights by failing to grant certiorari to AR ban cases.

Reminder: I still favor a complete 1-for-1 swap between the Fifth Circuit and the supreme court.

Ammoland.

The Minnesota Gun Owners Caucus sounded the alarm on social media on April 27. “ALERT: The Minnesota Senate is holding a hearing TOMORROW on an omnibus gun control bill that crams nearly every anti-gun wishlist item into one package,” the organization wrote. “What’s in it? Ban on future sales of semi-automatic rifles. ‘Ghost gun’ ban. Binary trigger ban. More funding for Red Flag (ERPO) enforcement. ‘School safety’ funding tied to gun control mandates. In other words: the usual ‘we swear this one will make you safer’ starter pack.”

Well, why not? States from Illinois to Maryland have theirs, who why not Minnesota? After all, the SCOTUS is too cowardly to stop it.

Yeah, it’s sad, believe me Missy
When you’re born to be a sissy
Without the vim and verve
But I could show my prowess
Be a lion, not a mowess
If I only had the nerve

The worst part is that they aren’t even embarrassed.

Ammoland.

If carry can be banned in a place because it is busy, enclosed, or hard to exit, the list of so-called sensitive places will never stop growing. Today, it is buses and trains. Tomorrow, it is train stations, public parks, entertainment districts, events, and any other place politicians decide feel is too populated for ordinary citizens to exercise a right. That is exactly the kind of interest balancing that Bruen was supposed to stop.

And to date, not a single AR ban case has been granted certiorari.

That of course means that Ms. Amy Coney Barrett, whom professor Mark Smith loves so much, believes in gun control, just like chief justice Ms. Roberts (and presumably Kavanaugh and Gorsuch).

So much for the fine list of justices named by Trump. Great recommendations from the federalist society, or whomever.

Because of the cowardly actions of the supreme court, this sort of stuff keeps happening. And it will get worse and worse with time. They’ll turn your bolt action hunting rifle into a super accurate and incredibly dangerous sniper rifle.

The SCOTUS has run from this issue for years. It’s time to turn and face the music.

In oral arguments today at the First Circuit, a judge asked Massachusetts if the state's argument that AR-15s are unprotected by the Second Amendment because they're neither used in nor suitable for self-defense means that hunting guns also aren't protected (@ 14:30)

The state…

— Firearms Policy Coalition (@gunpolicy) March 2, 2026

As you probably know, our friend Stephen Stamboulieh on behalf of the GOA, along with a number of others, have challenged the NFA in court based on the lack of fee associated with suppressors and SBRs. Of note, the real failure here was by John Cornyn and John Thune for allowing the senate parliamentarian to dictate the terms of legislation (partly because Cornyn is a gun controller, as is Thune).

Here is Stephen’s brief. Here is the DOJ response.

Twice the DOJ argues that the NFA is in place primarily to regulate “weapons of war.” To which we may respond, “But the second amendment is in place specifically to protect weapons of war, and it came first.”

As always, Mark Smith is rather Pollyanna about the whole thing and believes that the DOJ is arguing for the NFA because they want this to go to the SCOTUS at which point they will argue with the plaintiffs that the NFA is now unconstitutional as it pertains to suppressors and SBRs because of the change in the tax code.

I think Mark is dead wrong about this, but you should make up your own mind about his claims.

Oh sure they can. They ignored the Snope case (Maryland AWB) until it just went away. They can continue that as long as they are cowardly, which is to say, indefinitely. Will they? I don’t know.

But isn’t it interesting how we’ve been conditioned concerning the SCOTUS? They only want to hear cases where there is a circuit split, so we’re told. There must be a circuit split.

Bhah! There are plenty of SCOTUS decisions on cases where there weren’t circuit splits. Besides, is it not reasonable for the supreme court to take cases where all of the inferior courts are trampling the God-give rights of American, recognized in the constitution?