From AP via Fox News

     WASHINGTON —  District of Columbia officials said Monday they plan to petition the Supreme Court as they seek to defend the city's 30-year-old ban on most handguns.

     A federal appeals court panel struck down the law in March, rejecting the city's argument that the Second Amendment right to bear arms applied only to militias. The full appeals court refused to reconsider the decision in May. The law has remained in effect during the appeals process.

 Read it all here

     So D.C. goes for another bite of their losing apple, not surprising.  They fear that they will be looking at a mountain of lawsuits and massive settlements if they lose.  When the 2^nd Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the D.C. handgun ban was unconstitutional they effectively threw out all convictions under it since it went into affect in the 1970's.  What is even more disgusting than that is that they Mayor of D.C. is claiming that this piece of $h!t law has actually saved lives.  This when D.C. consistently has one of the highest murder rates and overall violent crime rates in the U.S.

     One of three things is going to happen here, the least likely is that D.C. wins on appeal.  The current court os decidedly conservative, and given that on conctitutional issues to which the U.S. government is not party to it is routine for the court to ask for the position of the U.S. from the solicitor general.  The current position is that the second amendment is an individual right and subject to the protection that entails.  Furthermore this case could well see the 2^nd amendment incorparted through the equal protection clause of the fourtteenth amendment, meaning that similar state laws would be struck down.  Even of that is not the case it will force those state to modify their laws to come into compliance with the standards the court will set for what is constituional.  The second option is D.C. loses yet again, this is probably what will happen (results detailed above) if it actually gets Cert**.  But the two scenarios above will only happe if the SCOTUS* agrees to hear the case, if they allow the 2^nd circuit ruling to stand is a victory, but a smaller one in that it means that SCOTUS agrees with the lower court ruling and finds no reason to reopen the matter, but the ruling will only be enforcable as precident in the 2^nd district, but it still sends a clear message to the other districts as to thinking of the court.  Now to watch and wait.

NRA  Go check it out, and join, they help make lawsuits like this possible.

*SCOTUS=Supreme Court Of The United States

**Cert.=Certiari, Latin for to hear, menaing that the court agrees to hear the case.  The Supreme Court hears only a couple hundred cases a year out of thousands of petitions.

Posted by: raging tachikoma at 11:21 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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