One of the most horrific consequences of having this far right Supreme Court is going to be the expansion of gun rights even though the country is awash is bloody gun violence. It’s enough to make you sick:
The biggest surprise in Wednesday morning’s arguments in New York State Rifle & Pistol Association Inc. (NYSRPA) v. Bruen, a major Second Amendment case before the Supreme Court, is that conservative Justice Amy Coney Barrett appeared open to many of New York state’s arguments defending its restrictions on where individuals may carry a gun.
Even if Barrett does side with New York, however, her vote is unlikely to matter. Four justices — Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito, Neil Gorsuch, and Brett Kavanaugh — left little doubt that they will read the Second Amendment expansively. And, while Chief Justice John Roberts appeared to disagree with most of his fellow conservatives about how the Court should approach Second Amendment cases, his disagreement appears to be largely academic. He also appears likely to strike down New York’s law.
NYSRPA, in other words, revealed methodological disagreements among the conservative justices, but those disagreements are unlikely to have much practical impact: The case is likely to end with the curtailment of states’ ability to regulate where people can carry guns.
The case involves a 108-year-old New York law that requires anyone who wishes to carry a gun outside of their home to demonstrate “proper cause” before they can obtain a license allowing them to do so. In practice, it’s relatively easy for New York residents to obtain a limited license permitting them to carry firearms, particularly in areas that are not densely populated — indeed, two of the plaintiffs in NYSRPA already have a license permitting them to carry a gun to hunt, for target practice, or while in areas not “frequented by the general public.”
But they want an unlimited license — a license that, as Barrett indicated, would allow them to carry a concealed gun into Times Square in the middle of New York City’s famous New Year’s Eve celebration. That possibility, at the very least, appeared to give Barrett some pause.
Yet while Roberts also expressed concern about reading the Second Amendment so broadly that it would allow civilians to bring a firearm literally anywhere, he also appeared skeptical of New York’s restrictions. The chief justice seemed committed to the approach the Supreme Court took in District of Columbia v. Heller (2008), itself a precedent-setting case that undermined at least eight decades of Second Amendment jurisprudence and held that the Second Amendment protects an individual right to own a gun for personal “self-defense.”
Roberts suggested that, under Heller’s framework, gun rights should be even more expansive in cities than they are in rural areas. As Roberts put it during an exchange with New York Solicitor General Barbara Underwood, “How many muggings take place in the forest?”
The bottom line appears to be that, while there is an off chance Underwood convinced Barrett that the Second Amendment should be read to permit greater gun regulation in cities, she does not appear to have convinced Roberts. And that means she is unlikely to find five votes to save New York’s law.
Get a load of Alito. He’s just …
Vigilante America.