By Tanya Metaksa
What’s New—SCOTUS—Bevis & NAGR v. Naperville: Waiting for SCOTUS to consider this case; Caulkins v. Pritzker: SCOTUS conference date of Jan. 5; NRA . Vullo: The American Spectator has a worthwhile article on this case and Vullo is seeking to extend dates; California: May v. Bonta: On Dec. 20, the hearing on this case challenging SB2 will be held; Jones v. Bonta: Preliminary injunction denied because 18-20 year olds can rent guns at a range and other exemptions; US Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit-Langley v. Kelly: An appeal for an en banc review was Denied;
SCOTUS
Illinois: Bevis & National Association for Gun Rights v. Naperville:On Nov. 27, NAGR submitted an application for a writ of injunction to Justice Amy Coney Barrett, to which she replied by issuing an order that directed the defendants in this case, including the state of Illinois, to submit an argument or a brief explaining why an injunction should not be entered that would shut down Illinois’s assault weapon ban law. On Dec. 4 the defendants filed their brief. The next day, appellants responded with their arguments which states:
“The State admits that the Act bans certain semi-automatic handguns. Resp. 30. This is fatal to the State’s case because D.C. v. Heller, 554 U.S. 570, 629 (2008), held that handgun bans are unconstitutional. The State argues its handgun ban should nevertheless survive because ‘Heller did not say anything about semiautomatic handguns in particular.’ Resp. 30.2. But “[t]he vast majority of handguns today are semi-automatic.” Heller v. D.C., 670 F.3d 1244, 1286 (D.C. Cir. 2011) (Kavanaugh, J., dissenting). And it would be truly astonishing if Heller’s holding that handgun bans are unconstitutional does not apply to the vast majority of handguns. Nothing in Heller even hints that its holding should be cabined in the way the State suggests.”
Now we wait to see what SCOTUS will do.
For background on this case please check out last week’s Judicial Report.
Illinois: Caulkins v. Pritzker: SCOTUS has distributed this case for the Conference of Jan. 5.
For background on this case please check out last week’s Judicial Report.
New York: NRA v. Vullo: On Dec, 9, the NY Times had a headline—The A.C.L.U. Has a New Client: The National Rifle Association. In the article the ACLU’s David Cole makes sure to emphasize his group’s distaste for Second Amendment rights, but it is supporting the NRA in its case against NY state’s lawsuit entitled NRA v. Vullo. I described this case in Grassroots Judicial Update #43 in detail. This case is actually supposed to answer the following question:
“Does the First Amendment allow a government regulator to threaten regulated entities with adverse regulatory actions if they do business with a controversial speaker, as a consequence of (a) the government’s own hostility to the speaker’s viewpoint or (b) a perceived “general backlash” against the speaker’s advocacy”?
On Dec. 7, Marie Vullo petitioned SCOTUS to get extra“Time to file its opening brief be extended to and including January 9, 2024. We further request that Respondent’’s time to file her response brief be extended to and including February 20, 2024. Petitioner would file its reply brief on or before March 8. As extended, that briefing schedule would permit the case to be heard during the Court’s March sitting”.
With this likely timetable this case won’t be heard until at least March, thereby pushing the decision to a June date.
Courts of Appeal
The US Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit on Dec. 8, issued an opinion in a ruling that encompassed four different cases challenging various sections of New York’s 2022 law (CCIA). These cases had been heard in tandem this past March 20. The four cases are: Antonyuk v. Chiumento, Hardaway v. Chiumento, Christian v. Chiumento and Spencer v. Chiumento.
According to the opinion:
“In Antonyuk, the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of New York (Suddaby, J.) enjoined enforcement of more than a dozen such provisions. In Hardaway, Christian, and Spencer, the U.S. District Court for the Western District of New York (Sinatra, J.) separately enjoined a subset of the laws previously enjoined in Antonyuk, though based on slightly different reasoning. We stayed the various injunctions pending appeal, expedited the appeals, and in light of the substantial overlap among the cases, heard argument in tandem on March 20, 2023.”
These cases challenged several parts of the NY CCIA law which was passed immediately following the SCOTUS decision in June 2022 in the NYSRPA v. Bruen. Since SCOTUS struck down the New York law that allowed issuing authorities the right to make it almost impossible to procure a carry permit,Gov. Hochul and the NY legislature tried to making the State of New York a gun-free zone including private property and decided to try and make the issuance of carry permits as difficult as possible.
According to attorney Mark Smith of Four Boxes Diner on Youtube.com the three judge panel was an “absolutely terrible panel” regarding gun rights. The three-judge panel did rule in favor of Second Amendment rights on several questions: 1.) it struck down the requirement that applicants for a concealed carry permit must disclose their social media accounts; 2.) it invalidated the provision that required private property to be posted if it allowed firearms; and 3.) it stopped the ban on gun possession in places of worship for the plaintiffs.
In a follow-up video Attorney Smith takes the three-judge panel to task for relying on a law that never existed. The judges spend several pages talking about a 1792 North Carolina law as an analogue for NY’s sensitive places ban. However, in 2021, a paper entitled Faux Histories of the right to Bear Arms, in reference to Young v. Hawaii, Stephen P. Holbrook, noted Second Amendment attorney, writes on page 22 how this is from a false history that has been deemed “utterly unworthy.”
Illinois: Seventh Circuit
Harrel v, Raoul, Federal Firearms Licenses of Illinois v. Pritzker, Caleb Barnet v. Raoul, and Langley v. Kelly: now known as Langley v. Kelley: An appeal for an en banc review was denied, meaning the case goes on at the District level. Background: This lawsuit began as a complaint against the new Illinois gun law. Judge Kendall of the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois eastern division denied the plaintiffs motion for a preliminary injunction. On May 1 the case was appealed to the US Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit and the plaintiffs filed a motion for an injunction pending appeal. On April 18, the Court of Appeals denied the motion.The state of Illinois appealed to Seventh Circuit. In an interlocutory appeal a three-judge panel ruled in a 2-1 (with Judges Easterbrook and Wood) ruling the US Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit vacated the District Judges Preliminary Injunction. Judge Brennan wrote a 44 page dissent.
District Courts
California: Ninth Circuit
Jones v. Bonta: This case was heard by Judge M. James Lorenz. After 3 ½ years a new District Judge ignores NYSRPA v. Bruen and requires a year of briefings and supplemental briefing to decide that because “California’s statutory scheme expressly provides, alternate means for individuals aged 18 to 20 to acquire, possess, and use firearms,” he denies a preliminary injunction and then denies summary judgement because it was not briefed.
Background: Jones v. Bonta: Originally Jones v. Becerra was filed originally on July 1, 2019. The US District Court for the Southern District of California “held that California’s ban was a severe burden on the core Second Amendment right of self- defense in the home.” After California appealed to an “en banc” panel of the Ninth District Court of Appeals, the Ninth Circuit granted the request and then vacated and remanded the case “consistent with the US Supreme Court’s decision in NYSR&PA v. Bruen.
