Category Archives: Rights

authoritarian swine, Courts, gun control, Law, Rights, Violence-Enabling Victim Disarmers

Prevailing Tyrants

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If you are a gun owner in California, get out.

David Codrea pointed out something very interesting in California’s SB 1327. This is the new law allowing private parties to sue gun dealers and manufacturers.

This bill would create a private right of action for any person against any person who, within this state, (1) manufactures or causes to be manufactured, distributes, transports, or imports into the state, or causes to be distributed or transported or imported into the state, keeps for sale or offers or exposes for sale, or gives or lends any firearm lacking a serial number required by law, assault weapon, or .50 BMG rifle; (2) purchases, sells, offers to sell, or transfers ownership of any firearm precursor part that is not a federally regulated firearm precursor part; or (3) is a licensed firearms dealer and sells, supplies, delivers, or gives possession or control of a firearm to any person under 21 years of age, all subject to certain exceptions, as specified. The bill would make these provisions inoperative upon invalidation of a specified law in Texas, and would repeal its provisions on January 1 of the following year.

I’m sure you knew about that, but bad as it looks, it’s far worse. We begin with this.

1021.11. (a) Notwithstanding any other law, any person, including an entity, attorney, or law firm, who seeks declaratory or injunctive relief to prevent this state, a political subdivision, a governmental entity or public official in this state, or a person in this state from enforcing any statute, ordinance, rule, regulation, or any other type of law that regulates or restricts firearms, or that represents any litigant seeking that relief, is jointly and severally liable to pay the attorney’s fees and costs of the prevailing party.

That looks fairly standard: Loser pays winner’s legal expenses. But there’s a catch. If you challenge any state or local gun control law…

(e) Any person, including an entity, attorney, or law firm, who seeks declaratory or injunctive relief as described in subdivision (a), shall not be deemed a prevailing party under this section or any other provision of this chapter.

One more time: Any person, including an entity, attorney, or law firm, who seeks declaratory or injunctive relief from [any statute, ordinance, rule, regulation, or any other type of law that regulates or restricts firearms] shall not be deemed a prevailing party under this section or any other provision of this chapter.

They’ve preemptively declared themselves the winners. By law. In any challenge to any victim-disarmament law.

I’d be interested in hearing what more attorneys think. I’m fairly sure this violate the heck out of the First, Second, Sixth, and Seventh Amendments.

Added: I realized that I was assuming readers would understand some details. That may not always be the case, so I’ll break it down for those who don’t make a hobby of law.

Under this sickening provision, you could still challenge a victim-disarmament law. But, and it’s a big but, you cannot ask the judge for “declaratory or injunctive relief.”

“Declaratory or injunctive relief” means you’re asking the judge to declare that the law is clearly wrong (declaratory), or that it’s likely the law is wrong and temporarily halts enforcement while the trial is underway (injunctive). If you are challenging a magazine ban, for instance, you would want “declaratory or injunctive relief” because you don’t want to have to destroys your magazines while you wait to see if you win your suit (prevail). Of course you want relief.

But now, if you ask for it, you automatically lose, and you’re automatically on the hook for the government’s legal expenses. If you want to win, you cannot ask for a hold on enforcement. You’ll have to get rid of your magazines or face arrest, and buy replacements after you win your case.

Maybe mags are no big deal to you. But what if you were challenging a law that affected something more expensive? Maybe California banned your entire collection of three thousand dollar rifles? Give ’em up, if you want even a chance of “prevailing.”

That’s a hell of an up-front “legal expense,” or as Mark Smith outs it, a “poll tax.”

 

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authoritarian swine, gun control, Law, Politics, Rights

Mid-Term Election Fraud: Another Data Point

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A couple of months ago, I noted that, historically, Dimocrats tended to avoid victim-disarmament bills during election years. And yet, for some strange reason, they felt safe pushing their Federal Firearm Licensing Act, with its troubling definition of “dealer.”

Traditionally, Dims have avoided gun people control bills when elections are coming. It’s a campaign killer (right, Duke Nukem?). Certainly the money is on the same thing being the case this cycle.

But if you have no intention of allowing fair and honest elections (again), what’s the harm in pushing a bill to license gun owners register all firearms and owners via a “may issue” federal licensing system?

A fluke perhaps. But then we got hit with the BipartisanGand-Rape Safer Communities Act: Expanded preemptively-prove-your-innocence checks, red flag laws, a very dangerous redefinition of domestic violence, and more.

Sure enough, Dim, Congress, and Presidential approval keep dropping like rocks as they push this.

Now Breitbart reports that the Dims are going to move on H.R.1808 – Assault Weapons Ban of 2021, It had been stalled in subcommittee for over a year, but suddenly with the mid-terms looming they decided that a new “assault weapon” ban is just the thing that some hundred million gun owners — and specifically the owners of 20 million “assault weapons” — inexplicably want.

Surely someone swimming in the swamp over there remembers what happened last time time they tried this. 1994: assault weapon shortly before mid-terms, Republicans took the House, Senate, and picked up ten state governor seats.

Is “gun control” really all that popular? A brand new poll, purportedly showing that things aren’t quite as bad for the Dims as everyone thinks, says otherwise.

Q15. What do you think is the MOST important problem facing the ccountry today?

Overall, just 10%. Even among Dimwitocrats, it’s only 17%. Does this sound like gun control is a winning mid-term strategy?

Or does it sound like the Dims don’t give a rat’s a** about what real, live voters want; that they know the elections are already in the bag? Some very peculiar primary outcomes suggest they do: In Georgia, one of the most unpopular men in the state — responsible for the illegal balloting in 2020 — handily and unexpectedly won his primary. And in Colorado, everyone is baffled that a director for Zuckerberg’s Dim-supporting election money machine — who polled dead last — magically won the SOS Republican primary.

If the conspiracy-minded want to view those as test runs for the mid-term fraud machine, I won’t argue with you. That the FFLA and BSCA came in on the heels of those weird primaries gives the idea some creedence, at least.

AWB of 2021 suddenly moving reinforces it.

Oh, well. Go buy your ARs and magazines while you can. I would, if I had the money.

 

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authoritarian swine, Courts, gun grabbers, Law, Rights, SCOTUS

Amicus Brief: Torcivia v. Suffolk County, NY

Via David Codrea, I saw this amicus brief for TORCIVIA v. SUFFOLK COUNTY. It’s an interesting case, for the sheer police-state thuggery involved. The brief summarizes the circumstances.

Try to keep your blood pressure under control.

The defendant police officers testified that Petitioner would “‘yell and scream,’” “‘explode,’” “‘start ranting and raving and screaming….’” Id. at 349-50. That testimony was contradicted by the fact that the Petitioner’s wife remained asleep in the house during the entire encounter with the police. Id. at 349 n.4.

At some point, the police handcuffed Petitioner, and transported him to a hospital for an emergency mental health evaluation, which demonstrated that he was neither a suicide risk nor a risk to others, and recommended he be discharged. Pet. Cert. at 10. Nevertheless, while Petitioner was at the hospital, officers learned from a computer check that Petitioner possessed a New York State pistol license. Id. at 9-10. Although both Petitioner and his wife refused multiple requests for the combination of the firearms safe to facilitate their seizure, eventually Petitioner was coerced by the threat of continued confinement until he provided the combination for his firearms safe. Id. at 11. Officers returned to Petitioner’s home and seized his firearms without a warrant. Id.

I found this part very interesting, for reasons not specific to this case; it’s more of an extension of the amicus argument.

This case represents a growing trend in the lower courts to reduce Fourth Amendment protections when firearms are involved. There is no basis for courts to create various types of firearms exceptions to the Fourth Amendment. It is well established that the exercise of one constitutional right cannot be conditioned upon the forfeiture of another constitutional right.

“It is well established that the exercise of one constitutional right cannot be conditioned upon the forfeiture of another constitutional right.”

the Second Circuit may not use Torvicia’s exercise of that constitutional right to render him vulnerable to government searches and seizures of his firearms which violate Fourth Amendment protections

You can’t violate his privacy and property rights because he chose to exercise his Second Amendment protected right.

And yet, New York already had, even before this unlawful and unconstitutional firearm confiscation.

The state violated Torcivia’s Fourth Amendment rights when they required him to register himself and his pistol before allowing him the “privilege” of exercising the right to keep and bear that pistol. How secure  are your “ persons, houses, papers, and effects” when you have to provide a list of them to the state in get permission to have them.

And this case shows exactly how dangerous forfeiting your privacy is: the state used that no longer private information to steal an innocent man’s property. Registering his exercise of the 2A did “render him vulnerable to government searches and seizures of his firearms.” Torcivia was not “secure” the instant he got a pistol license, and the state used that vulnerability against him.

Any one right does not exist in a vacuum. All constitutionally protected rights are fundamental and individual, and they interact. HELLER Established the the Second Amendment is an individual right. And from NYSRPA v. Bruen:

The exercise of other constitutional rights does not require individuals to demonstrate to government officers some special need. The Second Amendment right to carry arms in public for self defense is no different.

Second Amendment rights are no different than other rights… and Fourth Amendment rights are no different than the Second.

Licensing and registration force one to choose between giving up your constitutional Fourth Amendment right or surrendering your Second Amendment right. At your peril, either way.

 

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Courts, gun control, Law, Rights, SCOTUS

Dick Heller Is Suing DC Again

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Over ammunition limits this time. From Heller’s filing:

25. Subsequently on March 6, 2015, the Chief issued a Notice Of Second Emergency And Proposed Rulemaking , N0051986, 62 DCR 2803, which without comment or explanation,doubled the allowable ammunition a concealed pistol licensee could carry on his person. This regulation read, “A person issued a concealed carry license by the Chief, while carrying the pistol,shall not carry more ammunition than is required to fully load the pistol twice, and in no event shall that amount be greater than twenty (20) rounds of ammunition.”

Yes, NYSRPA v. Bruen (seeing lots of these cases now) is cited.

There appears to be nothing in the text, history or tradition of the Second Amendment that supports limiting the amount of ammunition that a person may carry for his or her self-defense.

Upon seeing that, I immediately thought of the Militia Act of 1792, which actually specified a minimum amount of ammunition to be carried, not a maximum. And very much more than a single loading of the firearm (also required).

Sure enough, Heller knows that. As I continued reading, I saw this.

What regulations did exist around the time of the founding of the SecondAmendment required Americans to be armed as detailed above and required militia members to be equipped with aminimum amount of ammunition.

Here’s the relevant section of the Militia Act.

That every citizen, so enrolled and notified, shall, within six months thereafter, provide himself with a good musket or firelock, a sufficient bayonet and belt, two spare flints, and a knapsack, a pouch, with a box therein, to contain not less than twenty four cartridges, suited to the bore of his musket or firelock, each cartridge to contain a proper quantity of powder and ball; or with a good rifle, knapsack, shot-pouch, and powder-horn, twenty balls suited to the bore of his rifle, and a quarter of a pound of powder; and shall appear so armed, accoutred and provided, when called out to exercise or into service, except, that when called out on company days to exercise only, he may appear without a knapsack.

So the only historical and traditional precedent is for a minimum of 44 rounds; 2.2 times the arbitrary maximum that DC imposed. Or 22 times the amount needed to “fully load the [musket of the day] twice.”

[Correction: See comments below. That’s 24 cartridges if the militia had a musket, or 20 rounds if he had a rifle; not a total of 44. I apologize for misreading that.]

I rather hope this goes to the Supreme Court, since it provide a nationwide — not just the District of the District of Columbia — judicial precedent to argue against magazine limits (Hey, California…).

The DC District Court is going to hate this. It has generally been very supportive of DC’s rights-infringements, but NYSRPA v. Bruen is very, very clear.

Well done, Mr. Heller.

 

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Courts, gun control, Law, Rights, SCOTUS

Auto Key Card: Motion to Dismiss

Here’s another important Second Amendment case to watch.

The case is US v. Matthew Raymond Hoover. Hoover was arrested and charged with an NFA violation; specifically that he was selling Auto Key Cards, pictures of parts that could be assembled into a “lightning link,” and subsequently installed in an AR-pattern rifle converting it into a machinegun. Others have been similarly charged for selling pictures.

Every news outlet that included pictures of the Auto Key Card in their reports should also be watching this case.

Hoover has moved to dismiss the charges in light of NYSRPA v. Bruen.

“[W]hen the Second Amendment’s plain text covers an individual’s conduct, the Constitution presumptively protects that conduct. The Government must then justify its regulation by demonstrating that it is consistent with the Nation’s historical tradition of firearms regulation. Only then may a court conclude that the individual’s conduct falls outside the Second Amendment’s ‘unqualified command.'”

Having explained the reasoning of NYSRPA v. Bruen to the court, they demonstrate the applicability to this case.

Further, the TAF’s decision that the tchothke at issue — a stainless steel card with some lines lightly thereupon engraved — was a machinegun came completely by administrative fiat, absent even notice and comment. Our Nation’s history and tradition does not, and cannot, support a finding that an alleged drawingof a part is that part merely because an elected bureaucrat unilaterally willed it to be.

I was just discussing this morning the fact that the NFA of 1934 was completely unprecedented in prior legislation. Because the applicability of NYSRPA v. Bruen to the NFA is extremely obvious.

However, since they mentioned an “elected bureaucrat unilaterally” usurping Congress to make their own “laws,” I would also have cited West Virginia v. EPA, in which the Supreme Court slapped down the EPA for doing exactly that.

I can’t see an honest court upholding these charges in view of NYSRPA v. Bruen. But we have a major problem with American courts, in that respect. So I won’t be terribly surprised if this ends up going to SCOTUS eventually. For a change, and elimination of federal bureaucratic power and abuse, as dramatic as tossing the NFA, this pretty much has to go the the Supremes.

Added: I almost missed it, but this is one of the Firearms Policy Coalition‘s cases. It’s another example of why I’ve long believed they deserve the support of those believe in the Second Amendment.

 

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gun control, Law, mindset, resistance, Rights, spirit of rebellion

Ghost Gun In The News

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I’m sure this will result in calls for commonsense plumbing control.

Former Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has been assassinated. And the assassin used an evil “ghost gun.”

The assassin of Shinzo Abe has been identified as 41-year-old Yamagami Tetsuya, who used a homemade black powder shotgun.

No Ghost Gunner CNC mill.

No 3D-printer.

No unfinished receiver.

No “parts kit.”

No ammunition to register and regulate.

From that picture and description, it looks like some pipes, a board, and a lot of electrical tape. They specify “black powder,” so I imagine the assassin made that, too. No word on the projectiles, but I don’t think he’d have had much trouble finding ball bearings or other round shot.

Japan has some of the most restrictive gun control laws in the world, and it still could not stop a killer with 1950s homebrew technology.

So what will the victim-disarmers try now? NFA tax stamps for plumbing and electrical supplies?

A ban on charcoal?

Well, they’d probably like that last one. Of course, to enforce it, it you’d need to ban trees and combustion.

To regulate the nitrates, they’d have to ban urination. Tricky, that.

Sulfur is a bit tougher unless you live near a sulfur spring; but there’s always drywall for the chemically-inclined.

The rights-haters would need to ban technology that’s been around for more than a thousand years. That should work well.

Then they’s have to figure out what to do about bows.

Will, meet way.
— D. Dietz

 

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Courts, gun control, Law, Rights, SCOTUS

SCOTUS Remands Remaining Second Amendment Cases

Today’s orders list is out. The Supreme Court granted certiorari for several 2A cases, vacated them, and remanded them back to the Circuit courts “further consideration in light of New York State Rifle & Pistol Assn., Inc. v. Bruen, 597 U. S. ___ (2022).”

Excellent! This is definitely the Court putting the Circuits on notice that they darned well better treat the Second as a fundamental constitutional right not subject to “compelling government interest” means testing. And we mean it this time!

 

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authoritarian swine, gun control, Law, Rights

For Life, Sometimes; For US

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But not for thee, says the Vatican. The Vatican News ran a column on the Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health ruling, but they couldn’t leave it at that.

For life, always
Being for life, always, also means defending it against the threat of firearms, which unfortunately have become a leading cause of death of children and adolescents in the US.

We can hope, therefore, that the debate on the US Supreme Court ruling will not be reduced to an ideological confrontation, but will prompt all of us—on both sides of the ocean—to reflect on what it means to welcome life, to defend it, and to promote it with appropriate legislation.

And the Vatican will show us the way by taking away the Swiss Guard‘s halberds and SG-550 full-auto assault rifles, and equipping them with powder puffs and super-soakers?

You know what didn’t happen yesterday? 100+ million American gun owners with some 400 million firearms did not murder anyone. But based on CDC data on defensive gun use, 4,000 people probably defended themselves and others using firearms.

How many of those thousands might be dead if their defensive tools were taken away through “appropriate legislation“? Most of us lack the pope’s 24/7 heavily armed security or the option of armored transportation; nor even massive defensive walls, from behind which to lecture others on open borders.

We would prefer to have the ability to defend ourselves and families because we still think we have something to lose.

Perhaps instead of focusing on the inanimate implement, the Vatican should consider what sets the comparatively few murderers apart from the tens of millions of honest, peaceable gun owners who do not murder.

 

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authoritarian swine, Courts, gun control, gun grabbers, Law, Politics, Rights, SCOTUS, spirit of rebellion

246 Years Of Slippery Slope Make A Great Power Source

Here’s a post from my personal blog. I wanted to share it with TZP readers. Imagine trying to explain GCA ’68, Brady Bill, Lautenberg Amendment, and the past week’s 2A shenanigans to James Madison.

246 Years Of Slippery Slope Make A Great Power Source
[…]
Have you ever been trolled and harassed on social media by some girl you dated? She’s a domestic violence offender. Twitter trolling is annoying, but it hardly seems worth depriving someone of her fundamental, constitutional, individual rights for life. Just block her.

Imagine James Madison hearing about what we’ve done to the Bill of Rights in the 21st century.

“You deprive citizens of their g-d-given right to arms for mean letters?”
[…]

 

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Courts, gun control, Law, Rights, SCOTUS

NEW YORK STATE RIFLE & PISTOL ASSOCIATION v. BRUEN

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The long anticipated Supreme Court decision on New York’s insanely restrictive “good cause” requirements for a concealed carry license has tossed the state requirements, in favor of NYSRPA. For those interested only in this single case, here is the meat of the decision:

New York’s proper-cause requirement violates the Fourteenth Amendment in that it prevents law-abiding citizens with ordinary self-defense needs from exercising their right to keep and bear arms. We therefore reverse the judgment of the Court of Appeals and remand the case for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.

I had feared that, even if they ruled in favor of NYSRPA, it would be a very narrow ruling; touching only on “show good cause” may-issue licensing. But the respondents — Bruen et al screwed up by stupidly presenting what they thought would historical precedents supporting their licensing system. This gave the Court a chance to make strong statements on a number of 2A-related things.

So “proceedings consistent with this opinion” are going to be very, very interesting. Justice Clarence Thomas wrote the opinion; when I saw that, I knew it was going to good. He goes into history in surprising detail. This opinion could be used as an American history textbook for a complete school year. Homeschoolers take note.

Continue reading NEW YORK STATE RIFLE & PISTOL ASSOCIATION v. BRUEN →

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