Guns at the Supreme Court
SCOTUS denied cert in Peruta. One good thing to come of that is we now know where Neil Gorsuch comes down on guns, as he and Thomas dissented saying it’s time to put the issue to rest definitively.
And it wasn’t all bad, as the court did not grant cert in Binderup:
The case involved the loss of gun rights for individuals convicted of non-serious misdemeanors. The 3rd Circuit Court of Appeals had ruled that it violated the Second Amendment to deny such individuals their right to possess and purchase firearms. The Justice Department under former AG Loretta Lynch appealed that ruling.
June 26th, 2017 at 5:35 pm
Thomas and Gorsuch made good arguments for the court having to take the case based on longstanding principle. Apparently, principle doesn’t mean that much to the rest of the court.
We can fix Peruta’s problem by going hard on national right to carry reciprocity. The anti-gun states are going to have a hard time denying to their residents the rights that non-residents will be able to quietly and calmly enjoy.
Now, if their legislatures are going to seriously argue that their residents are morally or intellectually deficient and shouldn’t be allowed to exercise rights the way whole men and women can… that’s an argument that they can make without my support. It’d be proven one way or another by whether their residents let them get away with it.
June 26th, 2017 at 9:17 pm
Hopefully, we can replace Kennedy and Ginsburg with people more to Thomas and Gorsuch’s tilt — both of the former are rumored to be retiring soon, and over eighty years old. The GOP would have to royally fuck up to lose the Senate in 2018 just based on the map alone (and they’re trying hard, too…), so there’s a good chance to get four solid pro-gun justices, in addition to Roberts and Alito who, apparently, aren’t as keen.
(Or, perhaps, they didn’t want to trust that fink, Kennedy, to be the decider on this?)
June 27th, 2017 at 9:04 am
I was reasonably sure that when the supremes denied cert, there wasn’t a recorded vote, let alone an opinion. This seems out of the ordinary.
Keep in mind though that the #1 rule regarding the Supreme Court should probably be, “No one tells the Supreme court how it should conduct it’s business.”
June 27th, 2017 at 10:26 am
Kennedy probably thought shall carry was a bridge too far Now we know that Robert is the anti gun guy
June 27th, 2017 at 10:29 am
All this pressure for Kennedy and Ginsburg to retire makes them want to stay on
June 27th, 2017 at 12:48 pm
RAH, poor Buzzy… She was all ready to retire as soon as Hillary took office.
And I think Kennedy likes being the swing vote or he would have been gone years ago.
Never mind Roberts; where was Alito on this?