Constitutional Law

Heller: other side manning lifeboats

Posted on April 02, 2008
Here's an article by a former staff attorney to the Brady Campaign. It doesn't talk a lot about the core issue, but winds up agreeing that "the justices? statements at the oral argument, as well as their previous comments and general ideological leanings, strongly suggest that at least five of them will endorse the view that the Second Amendment extends broadly to reach more than just military activities" It ends with hopes the Court will focus on standard of review, maybe uphold part of the DC law and strike other parts.

Lost our public defender

Posted on April 02, 2008
Bob Hooker. A few years back, the PD's office was a bunch of demoralized people. The two best defense guys in town, Hooker and Bob Hirsch, gave up private practice, took it over, brought in experienced people like my former law partner, and turned it around...

Call out the militia?

Posted on April 01, 2008
USA Today reports: "Facing tighter budgets, law enforcement agencies across the country are increasingly turning to civilians to respond to some calls that sworn officers and deputies are usually responsible for. That means people calling 911 to report a traffic accident, a burglarized home or a stolen car may be greeted by a civilian in a polo shirt instead of a gun-toting officer...

Sniping with an M-1 ... Abrams

Posted on April 01, 2008
Now, the 120mm gun has great stopping power, but the problem is you not only nail the target, you also get the building before which he is standing.

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Article on silencer prosecutions

Posted on April 01, 2008
In the Western Criminology Review. Basically, the conclusion is that most silencer prosecutions are for simple possession; when charges involve possession in connection with crime, it's usually a drug offense. Prosecutions for use in a violent offense are almost zero...

Worker's Compensation decision regarding officer

Posted on April 01, 2008
If I were the officer, I'd be hacked at the City of Tucson. Here's the court opinion, which rejected the City's position. Basically, an off-duty officer is riding his mountain bike, with friends in a rural area, at night, when he hears gunshots and suggests they leave...

"You're among friends, say what you really mean"

Posted on April 01, 2008
Hillary & Obama both stink and so does Ray Schoenke.

"In Search of the Second Amendment" at Los Angeles area film festival

Posted on March 31, 2008
My documentary film (if you want one, see the left margin) will air at the Backlot Film Festival in Culver City CA (west part of L.A.) this Saturday at 10 AM. Tickets are only $5, and if you're in that area, I'd encourage you to attend. There's a chance the media will pick it up, and that increases if there is a sizeable attendance.

Nichelle Nichols (aka Lt. Uhura) on Lady Magdalene's

Posted on March 31, 2008
I'll post a bit more on this when I have time -- J. Neil Schulman's movie, "Lady Magdalene's" will be showing Thurday at the Backlot Film Festival in Culver City, CA. My own "In Search of the Second Amendment" will show Saturday. Neil has posted this video of Nichelle Nichols, who plays the lead role in his film...

Did TSA rules cause the cockpit pistol discharge?

Posted on March 30, 2008
Here's the story, in the Washington Times. Transportation Safety Admin. was extremely reluctant (downright passive-aggressive) on allowing pilots to carry. The story is unclear, but it sounds as if TSA required any gun to be trigger-locked every time the cockpit door is opened, which can be ten times per flight...

Clinton and Obama on the 2A

Posted on March 30, 2008
Alphecca has a post on the subject. Who'd ever have dreamed that someday the two leading Democratic presidential candidates would be claiming they supported the Second Amendment individual right? (Both have fallen back to "but we can regulate it"). I've been involved in this issue for decades, and so have a long term view...

Did Sirhan Sirhan kill RFK?

Posted on March 30, 2008
There are now two forensics experts arguing to the contrary. He clearly tried to kill him, but the fatal shot may have been a bodyguard's "friendly fire." I heard a presentation on this at the U of AZ College of Medicine back in the 70s, so at least one of the issues isn't new...

DARPA testing new scope

Posted on March 30, 2008
Interesting scope design that would use lasers to assess wind conditions downrange. I rather doubt they'll allow it in competitive shooting!

Reader's experience at Heller

Posted on March 29, 2008
Reader Victoria Lloyd sends her impressions of the Heller Experience, pasted in extended remarks below. Her experience with the Marshalls is typical. A court-watcher in the line next to me (who'd done one of the amici for DC) told me that the present Clerk, who came in under Rehnquist, has worked hard to make the Court user-friendly...

Video special on Front Sight Academy

Posted on March 29, 2008
A four-part video report on training at the Front Sight Academy is available via VBS TV.

FLA house passes gun in the car at work provision

Posted on March 26, 2008
Story here. Basically, the measure would let CCW licensees keep a firearm in a locked car while they were at work, despite employers attempting to forbid it (i.e., in a company owned parking lot).

Clayton Cramer's candidacy and an Army of Davids

Posted on March 26, 2008
Comment here. This may just have serious meaning for us all. Perhaps running for office is no longer limited to people who have devoted their lives to that one pursuit, and those who have loads of money.

Profound and well-written piece on political thought

Posted on March 26, 2008
By David Mamet. No, it's not about the election. A few samples of his insight: "'I observed that lust, greed, envy, sloth, and their pals are giving the world a good run for its money, but that nonetheless, people in general seem to get from day to day; and that we in the United States get from day to day under rather wonderful and privileged circumstances?that we are not and never have been the villains that some of the world and some of our citizens make us out to be, but that we are a confection of normal (greedy, lustful, duplicitous, corrupt, inspired?in short, human) individuals living under a spectacularly effective compact called the Constitution, and lucky to get it...

Comment on clarity of the 2A

Posted on March 25, 2008
Over at Brett's Constitution. I think the meaning of the 2A is only ambiguous if a reader assumes (as did the Court in Miller) that the two clauses must somehow interrelate at a substantive level. If one recognizes (as I suggested in a 1985 law review article, see the left sidebar for it, The Second Amendment and the Historiography of the Bill of Rights) that the two clauses had different constituencies, ancestry, and purposes, the meaning becomes much more clear...

Demo candidates may have interesting debate coming up

Posted on March 25, 2008
April 16 debate in Philadelphia. details here. Hard to duck the gun issue in that venue -- a city whose political leaders want lots more control, in a State where gun ownership and NRA membership is remarkably high.

Ebay?

Posted on March 25, 2008
Ebay won't let a person use it to sell a firearm (and I've heard of them giving people trouble about selling even dummy ammunition, but apparently it's happy to sell switchblades. The interstate shipment of which happens to be a federal offense... Yep, here is Ebay's policy page...

Commentary on Heller and US v. Hayes

Posted on March 25, 2008
Over at Sentencing Law and Policy, there are numerous posts on Heller. This particular one tries to draw some conclusions from the fact that the Court recently granted cert. in US v. Hayes, a case under the federal ban on gun possession by persons with a DV conviction...

Clayton Cramer runs for ID state senate

Posted on March 25, 2008
Here's his webpage. (His official url, www.cramerforsenate.org, hasn't percolated to my end of the internet yet). For any who don't remember, he's the parttime historian who brought Bellesiles down, and just released a book documenting how extensively Americans were armed at the time of the Framing...

Updates on Heller

Posted on March 24, 2008
Alan Gura is interviewed by Jurist. And here's a YouTube interview. A lot of other views are linked there, too. In this interview he responds to arguments he didn't forcefully assert his position. The fact is that there is a distinctive Supreme Court style, which is calm, restrained, and dispassionate...

Lawsuits against shooting range end

Posted on March 24, 2008
The last of three lawsuits against the Metacon Gun Club shooting range in Connecticut has resulting in a ruling for the club.

Prof. Dorf on Heller

Posted on March 24, 2008
Article here. Hat tip to Joe Olson, followed by many others...

Safety tip: do not hide a gun in the oven

Posted on March 23, 2008
And if you do, make sure to tell the rest of the household so they don't turn the oven on. Story here. Hat tip to reader Carl in Chicago...

Personal note

Posted on March 23, 2008
Just passed the 23rd anniversary of losing my best friend, and father in law, Bill Avery. Died of a heart attack on March 20, 1985. I found this photo of him in my former wife's effects (she died of cancer May 22, 2003). Bill was a brilliant linquist, founded the Dep't of Classical Languages at the University of Maryland...

Aye, an' he must have given the Blarney Stone a big smooch!

Posted on March 23, 2008
It looks as if Obama... or perhaps it should be O'Bama... is actually an Irishman! Someone play "Danny Boy" at one of his rallies so we can see if he breaks down in tears. That'd seal it!

Canadian paper calls for crackdown on pellet guns

Posted on March 23, 2008
Editorial here. "Yet it seems the danger pellet guns pose has not yet spurred enough public outcry to spark new laws. Perhaps that's because in many pellet gun incidents, injuries were absent or minor. But even when the trigger isn't pulled, these makeshift weapons can be used to rob, abuse and otherwise break the law as effectively as the real thing...

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