Constitutional Law

A Canadian take on the NRA Convention

Posted on May 19, 2008
In the Toronto Star. Just got back, and am totally exhausted. Wayne said attendance was estimated at 60-70,000; they didn't have firm figures yet. There were somewhere around 3,000 booths. Got to meet a bunch of fellow gun bloggers -- Bitter and Sebastian, whom I'd met many times, Sharp as a Marble, SayUncle, The Smallest Minority, Joe Huffman and some others that now slip my tired mind.

GA broadens rt to carry

Posted on May 15, 2008
Story here. The legislation allows CCW holders to carry in restaurants that serve alcohol, on mass transit, etc..

Sandy Forman on the election and future Supreme Courts

Posted on May 15, 2008
Here's Sandy's latest Townhall column, on that subject. She makes some excellent points.

Exhibiting at NRA Convention

Posted on May 15, 2008
David E. Young and I will be at booth 1551 at the NRA Convention. I'll be promoting my documentary film, In Search of the Second Amendment, and he'll be promoting his books on the history of the right to arms. Drop on by if you're in the area!

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Solicitor General resigns

Posted on May 15, 2008
Paul Clement has resigned as SG. The Washington Times suggests that White House opposition to his position in Parker/Heller was a factor, although I'm unsure how much weight to give the suggestion. Hat tip to reader Jack Anderson...

Light blogging

Posted on May 13, 2008
Out of town on business yesterday afternoon and today--will have little to no chance to update anything...

NYC losing suppression mtns in fed. court

Posted on May 12, 2008
Story here. Gist is that NYC, in order to get the longer prison sentences that come under federal law, has arranged for felons in possession to be charged in federal court. But they've been losing cases right and left because the judges find the testimony as to why the person was searched incredible (in the bad sense of that term)...

Walmart and sportsmen

Posted on May 12, 2008
An interesting article. I didn't have time a while back to blog about Warmart's deal with Bloomberg to do things like videotape firearm sales. It was interesting, since (outside of Alaska) Walmart only sells hunting rifles and shotguns. I guess Bloomberg has bigger targets than urban handguns...

David Codrea interview of David E. Young

Posted on May 12, 2008
Over at The War on Guns. David Young's written two crucial books on the 2nd Amendment (one of which was quoted I forget how many times in Emerson v. US, and both of which were quoted in Heller amicus brief). He and I will be exhibiting at booth 1551 at the NRA Annual Meeting.

Opinion on Eagle Act, Religious Freedom Restoration Act, and Indians

Posted on May 11, 2008
Here, in pdf. Altho it construes a statute, it applies a number of constitutional standards. When I was at Interior, I worked with some of these issues. The Eagle Protection Act generally outlaws intentionally killing eagles or using their parts. Certain Indian tribes consider them essential to various religious services...

Meet the gun lobby....

Posted on May 11, 2008
69 year old lady carrying for two grandkids, but with 450,000 Florida members behind her. Story here.

It depends on whose ox is being gored...

Posted on May 11, 2008
Cash-strapped Massacchusetts (wonder why?) comes up with a plan. Fund social services, etc. by imposing a 2.5% tax on college foundations, to the extent their assets exceed a billion dollars. Yes, billion with a "b." Oh, the indignation! Via Instapundit...

ATF & FBI in turf fights

Posted on May 11, 2008
Story here. That's not unpredictable: "merging" two agencies by having them both report to one Cabinet official doesn't change anything. Where they overlap, it has a downside -- merging all intelligence functions means those above only get one "position" rather than 2-3 that might give better insight...

What would a narrow, pro-individual right finding in Heller mean?

Posted on May 11, 2008
A question raised by a comment a few days back, too busy just now to find it. Suppose, as I'd expect, the Supremes come down, perhaps narrowly, for an individual right, that there are some limits, but here we only need rule that a total federal ban on handguns is not a permissible limitation...

"We're all gun nuts now"

Posted on May 11, 2008
It's the title of an election-related

Where to comment on allowing CCW holders to carry in national parks

Posted on May 10, 2008
Here's the comment website. I'd cut and paste the Docket ID, FWS-R9-NSR-2008-0062, into the message just to make sure it gets to the right place. You can read the proposed rule as a pdf off the comment page, too. The admin rules are essentially: if the agency wants to change a rule, they must publish a proposed rule with explanation...

Defense of others in Dallas

Posted on May 10, 2008
Video here. I see an officer carrying an AR-15 variant, not clear if that's what was used, or if it was the officer's gear.

Comcast continuing...

Posted on May 09, 2008
I told the person yesterday, when the tech people are coming out, call my office number, here it is. Do not call the home number, the one on the account. They were supposed to be here between 10 and 12: nobody showed up. So I call back in... and am told the tech called me...

Mayor Bloomberg has problems with 1st as well as the 2nd amendment

Posted on May 09, 2008
According to the New York Sun, Mayor Bloomberg has moved, in the suit against a GA gun dealer, to forbid the defense from mentioning the Second Amendment. As the paper notes, "While trials are often tightly choreographed, with lawyers routinely instructed to not tell certain facts to a jury, a gag order on a section of the Constitution would be an oddity...

GA court strikes down Atlanta ordinance on guns in parks

Posted on May 09, 2008
Story here. Congrats to the plaintiff, GeorgiaCarry.org.

NYC police gunfights

Posted on May 08, 2008
A summary of studies. Two figures -- only 13$ of shots fired him, and only 34% of the time was the person being fired on hit at all -- aren't too astonishing. One of the revolutions in training came years back, when they realized that people trained on shooting from a good position at a well-lit target in a fixed location, when in fact gunfights usually occurred under conditions too dark to see the sights, while you were trying to take cover, the other guy was doing anything but standing still facing you, and your blood was full of adrenalin, often with bullets whizzing past...

Atty interested in talking to private investigators in Chicago

Posted on May 08, 2008
Just got a relayed email from an attorney who has represented several private investigators and security folks in that city. Even though state law says they're exempt from many gun regulations, the city police have been busting them or confiscating their guns...

Video of Len Savage on CNN re:BATF

Posted on May 08, 2008
Right here. At least I think so. On dialup I can't do very much to watch video.

Comcast ... grrrr...

Posted on May 08, 2008
Some Comcast workers are out front, installing a new distribution box or whatever it's called. High speed internet goes down (it did so temporarily yesterday while they worked). OK, it's called working on the system. I look out and notice everyone's gone...

Brady Campaign campaigning

Posted on May 08, 2008
Against the Ill. Firearm Owner ID card. They want background checks in addition to the firearm permit, because the permit spans ten years. (I think there is a requirement, for a gun permit system to exempt the holder from background checks, that the permits not go beyond a certain time, or have a way to revoke if the holder is convicted of something disabling).

CCW and NRA meeting

Posted on May 08, 2008
Snowflakes in Hell is reporting that CCW permit holders can carry in the convention center, anyway. Maybe I'm old and overly cautious, but I'm not going shod. I wouldn't count much on a newspaper article (Sebastian already notes one correction to the story; this may or may not be true as to the celebration of Amer...

S&W integral trigger lock failures

Posted on May 08, 2008
They're being discussed at the Smith & Wesson Forum. Quite a few reported -- trigger lock engaging under recoil, if dropped, etc.. Link via Xavier's Thoughts, reporting his own gun lockup.

Burglar fights with police, shoots self by accident

Posted on May 07, 2008
Story here.

Pro-gun media pieces

Posted on May 07, 2008
1. Just got tipped that Lou Dobbs, CCN at 7 PM, will be doing a pro-gun piece. Could be tonight or tommorrow night, or perhaps later. 2. Howard Nemerov will be on NRANews.com tonight, at 11:40 PM EDT. Apparently the topic will be Brady and VPC's system of ranking states...

McCain announces Justice Advisory Committee

Posted on May 06, 2008
Story here. I have no knowledge of what such a critter does, but the story says it would advise him on judicial appointments. What stands out to me is that it includes: Sandy Froman, the Tucson attorney who is former NRA President. Prof. Eugene Volokh, a quite pro-2nd Amendment academic and operator of the Volokh Conspiracy; Prof...

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