NYSRPA v. Bruen: Amicus Curiae brief from 176 Representatives

[Tom Servo]

It looks like this may our next big Supreme Court case. At issue is New York's Sullivan Law, which requires very strict and discriminatory permitting to carry a firearm outside the home.

You can read it here [pdf].

Here are a few choice quotes:

There is no serious argument that the pre-existing right to keep and bear arms, as recognized and preserved by the Second and Fourteenth Amendments, does not extend beyond the home.

The question “whether the State’s denial of petitioners’ applications for concealed-carry licenses for self-defense violated the Second Amendment” requires the Court to decide whether a government authority can arbitrarily ration a Constitutionalright, by allowing only a privileged few to exercise it.

New York’s regulation of Second Amendment rights smacks of elitism. It transforms a fundamental right guaranteed to the people into a special privilege to be enjoyed by only an elite few deemed worthy by a government official exercising unbridled discretion. But that is the opposite of what the framers of the Fourteenth Amendment intended.

They also go into the (highly racist) history of the Sullivan Act, which is nice to see.

[BobCat45]

Thanks for the quotes and the big grin.

[Howland]

That the petitioners disavow that bearing arms beyond the confines of your own home is a right could be the fatal flaw of this case. To keep arms implies possession and is not limited by location. To bear arms means to carry arms about. To suggest that bearing arms is limited to within one's own domicile is absurd and contradicts the common understanding by those who drafted and ratified the Article.

[44 AMP]

The question “whether the State’s denial of petitioners’ applications for concealed-carry licenses for self-defense violated the Second Amendment” requires the Court to decide whether a government authority can arbitrarily ration a Constitutionalright, by allowing only a privileged few to exercise it.

I'm not certain it does...
It depends on whether or not the act of concealed carry is a right, or as the state believes, a privilege. That is the first and primary point the court needs to rule on.

Do remember the general belief and attitudes about firearms during the era of the Founders is drastically different then the general attitude today.

Before, during and for a long time afterwards the general attitude was that honest people don't conceal their arms. Only those up to no good would conceal their arms. In fact, it was generally regarded that a concealed weapon was reasonable grounds for suspicion, and something the govt SHOULD act on.

This is almost the exact opposite of the situation today. Today we have the public holding a general fear of visible arms, and, while laws about open carry are still on the books, doing so in many places, while legal invites police intervention, and sometimes even results in a level of public panic.

Some of us believe that the right to "bear arms" includes both concealed and open carry other people believe that while open carry is Constitutionally proteted concealed carry is not.

And that has been the state in many states for many, many years.

SO, I'd say that before one can rule that denying applications for concealed carry permits is a denial of a constitutionally protected right, one must first rule that concealed carry IS a 2nd Amendment protected right.

What "everyone knew" and accepted during the days of the Founders is no longer accepted as true without a modern court ruling supporting it. Not because it isn't true, or that its any less true today than it was then, but because so many people have been taught otherwise, and don't recognize the errors of their education.

That the petitioners disavow that bearing arms beyond the confines of your own home is a right could be the fatal flaw of this case.

if you are referring to this...

There is no serious argument that the pre-existing right to keep and bear arms, as recognized and preserved by the Second and Fourteenth Amendments, does not extend beyond the home.

As I read this, what I get is not that the claim is that the right does not exist beyond the home, but that the ARGUMENT that the right does not exist beyond the home is not and cannot be a serious argument.

[zukiphile]

Originally Posted by 44 AMP

As I read this, what I get is not that the claim is that the right does not exist beyond the home, but that the ARGUMENT that the right does not exist beyond the home is not and cannot be a serious argument.

Indeed, incorporating two negatives makes casual reading a danger.

The question “whether the State’s denial of petitioners’ applications for concealed-carry licenses for self-defense violated the Second Amendment” requires the Court to decide whether a government authority can arbitrarily ration a Constitutionalright, by allowing only a privileged few to exercise it.

Emphasis added. That's a signal that the issue is framed for a negative answer.

[KyJim]

One of my rules in brief-writing has been to re-draft a sentence if I or someone else has to read a sentence more than once to make sense out of it. That's not to say I have never violated this rule. Sometimes the press of time blurs the ability to spot these sorts of drafting issues.