Judge upholds Massachusettes ban on AR15s

[JERRYS.]

what will be next to be banned?

http://www.foxnews.com/us/2018/04/06...dge-rules.html

reasoning was that the 2nd Amendment does not cover military type small arms or small arms originally designed for the military.

[mehavey]

reasoning was that the 2nd Amendment does not cover military type small arms...

which is about as dumb a logic as could possibly have been conceived.

... and if that logic stands, there is no need for 2A appeal.
It has effectively been defined away.






Is there ANY modern firearm/design now being manufactured for general use that did not get its start as a military weapon
-- going back as far as the lever-action Henry and evolving through the `98 Mauser ?

.

[JERRYS.]

I did not read where this case was going to be appealed to a higher (and much wiser?) court.

as with new York state and its seven round magazine limit, or new jersey and its hollow point ammunition restriction..... the SCOTUS has not taken these sort of cases up.

[Evan Thomas]

The title of this thread is a tad misleading.

Just to clarify it, there's not much new here. The Massachusetts ban has been on the books since 1998; the District Court ruling upholds an existing law.

[mehavey]

Evan, it upholds an existing law, based upon a constitutional interpretation that is not only specious at best but.....

"...the judge pointed out that the design of semi-automatic AR-15's is based on guns
"that were first manufactured for military purposes" and
that the AR-15 is "common and well-known in the military."

"The AR-15 and its analogs, along with large capacity magazines,
are simply not weapons within the original meaning of the individual
constitutional right to 'bear arms,'"

That such a statement is patently ridiculous is beyond question of anyone who has a basic command of the English language (much less history) and further opens the option to ban ALL weapons... from the Brown Bess to the `98 Mauser ... w/o any recourse.

The implications are mind-boggling....

[Glenn E. Meyer]

It is not that SCOTUS has not taken them up. They have positively decided NOT to take them up. They have allowed the precedents for such bans to build up. Scalia, Thomas and Gorsuch dissented vigorously to no avail.

There is no higher court that is wiser.

The lower court opinions are taking Scalia's prose and ramming down the throat of the RBKA proponents. You may argue that he didn't mean this or that but that's not the way it's coming down. Heller was a very, very, mixed bag.

I also note, and have said before, that legislation was proposed to block state laws such as this. However, the ruling party had other priorities (guns were not one) and the national organizations had no strategy or tactics to hold the Congress' feet to the fire.

The motivations for this inaction are open to interesting interpretations.

[turkeestalker]

They have positively decided NOT to take them up.

Not saying that I'm right as Lord knows that's almost never, but I wonder if that may not be wise for the time being considering our current mix of Justices.
Things that build up eventually 'blow up'.
It is a gamble, but another constitutionally minded Justice or two could really work in the country's favor when it does 'blow up'.

[JERRYS.]

the national organizations had no strategy or tactics to hold the Congress' feet to the fire.
The motivations for this inaction are open to interesting interpretations.

indeed...

[riffraff]

Yep title is very confusing - MA is almost as bad as CA with gun laws and laws in general, really a terrible place I wish I did not live so close to.

[44 AMP]

"The AR-15 and its analogs, along with large capacity magazines,
are simply not weapons within the original meaning of the individual
constitutional right to 'bear arms,'"

This old red herring, trotted out once again...

The same logic also says that there is no protected speech if written on a typewriter, word processor, computer, internet, or any thing other than written on parchment with a quill pen and iron gall ink. And, so, therefore the government may censor or outright prohibit any speech using modern communications.

Is there ANY modern firearm/design now being manufactured for general use that did not get its start as a military weapon

I'd say that depends on how you define "get its start". And how specific you are about defining firearms designs. There are lots of designs that were made to sell to any customers, and the military is a big potential customer. Some designs caught on with the military right away, some took some time (and development) before the military(s) were interested. Some designs never did catch the military eye.

The military didn't buy many of Colt's first revolvers, but later, they bought a LOT of his following models. The first semi autos were ignored by the world's militaries, who later changed their minds as more suitable designs came along.

Tell me a Ruger No.1 got its start as a military weapon. It didn't. You can make a case for the general design of a falling block having been used as a military weapon in the past, but you can't claim the ruger as anything but a pure sporting arm.

The double barrel and pump action shotgun didn't get its start as a military weapon, and I'd venture to say neither did the semi auto.

And, even those arms which were designed for military use aren't anything to be ashamed of. They are our right.

And that's their entire argument, that we shouldn't have military arms, period. This was also the opinion of the Crown troops attempting to quell those rowdy colonials in Massachusetts. On April 19th, 1775, they tried to do something about it. It appears that what they failed to do, then, is being done now by a Massachusetts judge...

[zukiphile]

Originally Posted by Glenn E Meyer

It is not that SCOTUS has not taken them up. They have positively decided NOT to take them up. They have allowed the precedents for such bans to build up. Scalia, Thomas and Gorsuch dissented vigorously to no avail.

This shows the importance of electing presidents and senators who will put more justices like Scalia, Thomas and Gorsuch on the court.

Originally Posted by Glenn E Meyer

There is no higher court that is wiser.

Though the court has one self-described wise latina woman, to slightly paraphrase, it isn't supreme because it is wise, it right because it is supreme.

Originally Posted by Glenn E Meyer

The lower court opinions are taking Scalia's prose and ramming down the throat of the RBKA proponents. You may argue that he didn't mean this or that but that's not the way it's coming down. Heller was a very, very, mixed bag.

Heller announced judicial recognition of an individual right. It struck the restriction before the court. It didn't do everything. It didn't incorporate the right, and it didn't decide matters not before it. That lower courts ignore it or misstate the reasoning in Heller isn't itself a comment on the text of Heller.

Originally Posted by Glenn E Meyer

I also note, and have said before, that legislation was proposed to block state laws such as this. However, the ruling party had other priorities (guns were not one) and the national organizations had no strategy or tactics to hold the Congress' feet to the fire.

"The ruling party"? Repubs have 50 Senates seats. That doesn't permit them to "rule" anything but committee chairs.

If a bill was going to lose a vote because a moral panic had gripped public conversation, why would a national organization want to see that vote taken?

People can complain now about the NRA not holding congressional feet to the fire, however following Newtown and this year's events, we saw people here decrying argument and adopting the beauty school standard for arguments - that it doesn't matter what one argues; it matters what opponents feel about what is said.

[In The Ten Ring]

It's MA.......what can you expect?

I've been thinking about this sad result off and on since I read about it but the pendulum swings the other way sooner or later.

[riffraff]

I'm not sure it will ever swing the other way in MA - place has gone from bad to worst to ridiculous over time.

MA has even gone as far as to bump jail sentences for many of their "misdemeanors" up to 2.5 years, for offenses where nobody has ever even served a day in jail in the history of the state, simply to create a federal felony & prohibit firearms access. The state does not actually prohibit the access, they just worked the system so the feds do it for them.

Weird stuff is illegal in MA as well - like I don't think you can even buy a Glock there, Boston has it's own set of firearms regs that differ from the rest of the state. Local police chiefs make decisions on LTC which can be denied for any subjective reason.

Tonight I was feverishly searching for a 15 round mag that I could not find, paranoid it had fallen into my truck somewhere and that I'd be driving around with it in MA. Luckily was just in a pocket in my shooting bag I forgot to empty - just living near the place adds stress to a gun owner.

[thallub]

1. The original MA "assault weapons" ban was not permanent.

2. The MA Gunowners Action League entered into a deal with governor Romney that made the ban permanent.

3. Many years later along comes a gun hating MA attorney general who re-interpreted the "assault weapons" ban to include guns without evil features like flash hiders and collapsible stocks.

4. A federal judge blessed the new interpretation of the law.

The MA AG:

https://www.nationalreview.com/corne...sault-weapons/

[357 Python]

What will be next? Any centerfire firearm that can hold more than 10 rounds regardless of the magazine. If the gun can hold a box magazine that could hold more than 10 rounds even though there are no such magazines in existence it will eventually be banned.

[LogicMan]

Originally Posted by Glenn E. Meyer

The lower court opinions are taking Scalia's prose and ramming down the throat of the RBKA proponents. You may argue that he didn't mean this or that but that's not the way it's coming down. Heller was a very, very, mixed bag.

Well in this ruling at least, the judge misquoted what Scalia said. But I honestly don't know why groups keep suing about these assault weapons bans. The lower courts have made it pretty clear that they will not strike them down and will utilize whatever specious reasoning is needed, while the SCOTUS has made it clear that it will not take such cases up right now.

The other major problem is that too many of the judges on these courts are lacking in basic gun knowledge. As has been pointed out, every gun is either military in its original design, or uses a military component, or was not military originally but later was adopted for military use. So the whole argument about "military guns," "weapons of war," etc...is a false front.

Another tricky part you have to watch that the New York judge used to uphold the New York state Assault Weapons Ban was that since "military-style features" make the weapon ergonomically more easier to use, then they thus make the weapon more deadly. That IMO is a nonsense argument for multiple reasons, but it is one that gun banners on the courts will use.

[turkeestalker]

"The ruling party"? Repubs have 50 Senates seats. That doesn't permit them to "rule" anything but committee chairs.

Correct.
Let's see where they stand come November 7th because I believe it will be in a very different place.

[Tom Servo]

Changed the thread title to accurately reflect the article.

reasoning was that the 2nd Amendment does not cover military type small arms or small arms originally designed for the military.

According to original intent, if the 2nd Amendment protects anything, it protects "military type small arms."

[Aguila Blanca]

In the wake of Sandy Hook, both New York and Connecticut adopted draconian new "emergency" gun control laws that included tightening up their existing AWBs. IIRC, both states basically redefined assault weapons so that the previous two evil features limit was reduced to one evil feature. The result was that most post-ban AR-15s became "assault weapons" overnight, with the stroke of a pen.

Pro-2A organizations in both states appealed. The two cases were heard together, because they were so similar. I think this was at the district court level, not the appelate level. When the case was heard, the judge did the same thing as the judge in Massachusetts -- he ignored the fact that the AR-15 is probably rthe single most ubiquitous long gun in the United States today, and he ignored the fundamental difference between an AR-15 and the M16, and he ruled that AR-15s (and other "assault weapons" are not protected by the 2A because they are military weapons and civilians don't need them.

So this ruling regarding the Massachusetts AWB is just following the same misguided footsteps that NY and CT have already been subjected to.

[candr44]

The reason the Gun Owners Action League [GOAL] brought the law suit against Massachusetts is because of the attorney general Maura Healy's actions. AR-15 rifles were legal under the Massachusetts assault weapons ban if they didn't have certain features but the attorney general re-interpreted the law to mean anything that looks like an AR-15. She effectively changed the law on her own and without warning. GOAL objected to the attorney general bypassing the legislature and secrecy of her intentions.

Having lived in Massachusetts for almost 2 years now I firmly believe the present attorney general needs to be kept in check. Her actions on guns go beyond gun safety and well into the realm of prejudice and contempt for gun owners and the second amendment. I believe if she had her way the second amendment would not be legal in Massachusetts. Unfortunately Massachusetts leans way too far left and is a long way from being kept in check by the right. In her press conference after the ruling she even bragged about the gun lobby being kept in check and not allowing them to change laws when ever they and how ever they want. That is exactly what she did by decree on AR-15 rifles.

Her ban on AR-15 rifles only applies to new sales of the rifle and not to anyone who owns one before her re-interpretation. However, after listening to her interviews on the subject, she considers the current owners of the rifle in violation of the law also but gave them a pass on legal action against them because they didn't know they violated the law before her new interpretation.

[thallub]

The CT and NY gun control laws were upheld at the appellate court level. SCOTUS turned away both cases. SCOTUS also declined the appeal of the MD "assault weapons" ban.

The court’s action underlined its reluctance to insert itself into the simmering national debate on gun control. The Supreme Court issued important rulings in gun cases in 2008 and 2010 but has not taken up a major firearms case since.

The justices declined to hear an appeal of an October ruling by the New York-based 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals that upheld laws prohibiting semiautomatic weapons and large capacity magazines in the two northeastern states.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-u...-idUSKCN0Z61JE

[44 AMP]

what's the old saying?? "power corrupts, and absolute power...is really neat!"

what bothers me is the unabashed double (triple? quadruple??) standard displayed. And the attitude of far too many officials, which is, essentially,

"the law means what I say it means, today..."

Amazing how any argument, even completely opposite arguments are just grist for the mill, as long as the end result is what they want.

And the end result they want is "you can't have it".

For decades we heard the argument that "we can ban X, because the 2nd Amendment only protects militia weapons (military weapons) and "X" isn't a militia weapon, and you (the public) aren't the militia, anyway..."

The Heller decision shot part of that argument in the butt, but only part of it.

Today we hear that "you can't have it because it is a military weapon" or "was designed as a military weapon" along with the supposed justification that we don't "need" it.

So, which is it? And does it matter?

It does matter, but not as much as you might think, in this case, Once again, the focus is aimed at the gun, in this case the AR and everything like it, and NOT on the bigger, underlying issue that the MA Attorney General changed the interpretation of a law, on her own authority, which the AG does not have the legal authority to do, and changed it to suit her personal whim.

The biggest problem I see with the court ruling about the AR is that (from the information available to me) the court DIDN'T say the AG was wrong to do that. The court really only said that the AR (etc.) didn't meet their standard to be a protected arm,

and since its not, in that judge's opinion, something protected by the Founder's intent (via the 2nd Amendment) they don't give a snit what the AG does about them, or HOW...

This is not American jurisprudence at its finest, not by a long shot.

One does wonder, if a public official goes outside their legal authority to change the interpretation of the written law about guns, etc.,(and, gets away with it) what ELSE are they doing and how, when it comes to the rest of things that affect our lives??

When a public official, at any level, gets to rule by personal fiat, and isn't challenged about that, they are thumbing their nose at the very principles that put them in the office they hold, in the first place.

that's not the way representative republics are supposed to work. It's not even the way democracy is supposed to work. Its the way fascism works.

Its good to be king (or in this case, Queen), or Fuehrer, you get what you want, and the laws only apply to the common folk...

That does not, however make it right...

[Aguila Blanca]

Originally Posted by thallub

The CT and NY gun control laws were upheld at the appellate court level. SCOTUS turned away both cases. SCOTUS also declined the appeal of the MD "assault weapons" ban.

Correct. The NY and CT laws and cases were so similar that, IIRC, the two cases were combined at the appellate level and heard together. Again IIRC, what both NY and CT did was to redefine what constitutes an "assault weapon," changing the criteria from a detachable magazine plus one other "evil feature" to just a detachable magazine. So any post-ban configuration AR-15, such as a plain-vanilla basic rifle with just a 10-round magazine and a pistol grip -- no bayonet lug, no flash hider, no telescoping or folding stock -- went from being an ordinary rifle to an evil "assault weapon" at the stroke of the governor's pen. Connecticut allowed people who had post-ban ARs to keep them, but they had to register them with the state police by a certain date. I don't remember if NY had a similar registration scheme.

The noose is tightening. My only AR-15 is a post-ban legal model that was bought while the federal AWB was in force. With these new laws, it would not be legal for me to bring it into Connecticut, New York, Massachusetts, California (of course), and (I think) Maryland. I'm not a 3-gun competitor but, if I were, I don't think it would even be legal for me to bring it into one of those states for a weekend to shoot a match.

[Aguila Blanca]

Originally Posted by 44 AMP

When a public official, at any level, gets to rule by personal fiat, and isn't challenged about that, they are thumbing their nose at the very principles that put them in the office they hold, in the first place.

that's not the way representative republics are supposed to work. It's not even the way democracy is supposed to work. Its the way fascism works.

Too true.

This reminded me that someone mentioned not too long ago that there's a similar situation in Connecticut. I don't have specifics, and it's not just my failing memory. It's a highly technical/legalistic situation, on which apparently two entities within the Connecticut state government don't even agree. It's something about pre-ban (and I don't know if this refers to pre federal AWB or pre Connecticut AWB, both of which happened at about the same time) configuration AR-15s. One side says they're legal, they were always legal, and there's no problem. The other entity just recently came along and said they are NOT legal, they were never legal, and people who possess them are in violation -- and since the registry was closed years ago, they can't even register them now if they wanted to.

It doesn't affect me so I haven't followed it. The two FFLs I know from Connecticut are good guys, but both have given me incorrect information in the past regarding gun laws, so I haven't felt inclined to ask them.

I just found this, which seems to indicate that it's the state police that say pre-bans are legal. But this dates to 2013, which is before the controversy erupted. I can't find anything that tells me who's on the other side, or what the counter-argument is.

[LogicMan]

Originally Posted by Aguila Blanca

I don't remember if NY had a similar registration scheme.

We do here, but I think it only got like an estimated 20% or 30% compliance.