CA: Historic Briefs Second Amendment “Incorporation” Filed

[308Mike]

From NRA-ILA:

[center]California: Historic Briefs on Second Amendment “Incorporation” Filed[/center]

Friday, October 03, 2008

A California law suit that has been bouncing back and forth in the court for almost ten years has become the unlikely vehicle by which the question of whether the Second Amendment is “incorporated” so it restricts state and local gun control efforts may be answered.

Following on the heels of the June Supreme Court ruling in District of Columbia v. Heller that the Second Amendment does protect a fundamental individual right and restricts federal action restricting the right to keep and bear arms, today members of an NRA led coalition of self-defense civil rights groups filed a flurry of “friend of the court” amicus briefs in the case of Nordyke v. Alamenda. The Nordyke case is now before the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. It was filed by gun show promoters challenging an ordinance that bans guns on county property (effectively banning the gun show at the county fairgrounds).

Joining the NRA’s efforts are the California Rifle and Pistol Association, Second Amendment Foundation, Gun Owners of California, The National Association of Arms Shows, and dozens of esteemed law professors from law schools across the country. Briefs arguing against the right to keep and bear arms were filed by the California State Sheriffs Association, the California Peace Officers Association, the California Police Chiefs Association, San Francisco, Oakland, the Legal Community Against Violence, the Brady Center, and other anti gun owner groups.

All of the briefs, along with a history of the case, are posted at www.calgunlaws.com.

With the supplemental briefs on the incorporation issue filed today, the Court will now set a date for oral argument. The Court will almost certainly have to decide the incorporation question, and then (assuming they find that the Second Amendment applies to the states) either decide whether the gun show ban ordinance violates the Second Amendment or send the case back (remand) to the trial court to make that determination.

[mekender]

without reading the briefs, it sounds like a shaky case to try to get incorporation...

no way this one will pass the courts... a case before the 9th circuit that rules against this law would mean that EVERY city, county and state in the nation cannot prohibit guns on their property... it would open up schools to carrying nationwide...

no way it will pass.

[Draven]

Nordyke doesn't have to 'pass through the courts'. It is already at the district level.

Also, the 'trick' in Nordyke is that they are violating equal protection. They won't allow guns on the grounds for a gun show, but they will allow some reenactment group who uses live firearms loaded with blanks to perform on the same grounds. Their basis is not that the second forbids the city from saying it, it is that that policy constitutes unequal treatment of citizens.

[NVGdude]

Sounds like a 14th amendment "equal protection" case to me. If it gets high enough, the court will rule on those grounds and punt on the incorporation question.

[Netpackrat]

Either way it is worth doing, if the case is solid on equal protection grounds, and there is still the off chance that we will get a 2nd amendment incorporation ruling faster than starting from scratch in the lower courts.