Posted on 07/11/2007 2:31:55 PM PDT by neverdem
D.C. Mayor Adrian M. Fenty yesterday said he is close to a decision on whether city officials will appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court a federal court ruling that would repeal the District's 30-year-old handgun ban.
"We're planning to make that announcement within the next week," Mr. Fenty said yesterday. "We're still exploring all of our options."
The Supreme Court appeal must be filed within 90 days of May 8, the date a federal appeals panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit declined to reconsider its earlier ruling in the case.
That gives Fenty administration officials roughly until the end of the first week in August to file the appeal.
On March 9, a three-judge panel of the Court of Appeals ruled 2-1 to reverse a lower-court decision against six D.C. residents who sued to keep their guns for self-defense.
The ruling repealed much of the city's ban on handguns, but the ban has remained intact through the appeals process.
Metropolitan Police spokeswoman Traci Hughes said if the mayor does not appeal the ruling to the Supreme Court and the D.C. Council does not enact any legislation restricting the sale or use of handguns, residents can begin legally purchasing guns after the appeal period expires.
If the mayor does not appeal the ruling, the ban will expire while the council is in recess, which could delay the introduction of new legislation regulating the sale and use of handguns.
Mr. Fenty, a Democrat, made the remarks after an appearance on Capitol Hill with a handful of other big-city mayors for an initiative called Mayors Against Illegal Guns.
Mr. Fenty was among a dozen or so other mayors from across the country to speak out against the so-called "Tiahrt Amendment" — named for its sponsor, Rep. Todd Tiahrt,...
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtontimes.com ...
Short version: no appeal and they’re trying to find a way to say so and not catch hell from the psychotic Left.
I don't know. Both sides are scared and justifiably so. If they don't appeal, folks in Washington D.C. will have greater rights than folks in other places. I don't see how that stands. SCOTUS can duck it for only so long. And Parker is about as good as it gets.
How would this mayor defend “no sovereign individual rights” for the 2nd, while the entire US Constitution is all about individual rights. He’d need to twist into a pretzel while claiming he’s a piece of straight rope.
This rat is cornered, trapped and the fat lady is singing the requiem.
Appeal it you gutless commie!
The SCOTUS will kick you down the storm drain of History.
Or we will.
No,just let the time run out on the appeal process.Then D.C. residents can effectively demonstrate the fallacy of the restrictive gun laws.I want one more original construction judge on the Supreme Court before they rule on this one.
“Appeal it...”
As an ocassional resident in the D of Criminals, I have to say I’d rather take the decision and let it lie...
the SC is not a reliable protector of rights and is way too likely to make some chicken-scratch distinction to narrow freedoms.
Remember, all the Supremes live in the area and many are inclined to be NIMBYism and politically correct outcomes over Constitutional principle (sadly even Scalia in his anti-federalist sellout on the ‘medical marijuana’ issue—but then again he was angling for Chief Justice at the time, oh well).
Take the money and run, I say...
Let them rule their tonsils out.
Thbey either rule with us, and what’s right,
or we fix things.
We also note that at least three current members (and one former member) of the Supreme Court have read "bear Arms" in the Second Amendment to have meaning beyond mere soldiering: "Surely a most familiar meaning [of 'carries a firearm'] is, as the Constitution's Second Amendment ('keepand bear Arms') and Black's Law Dictionary . . . indicate: 'wear, bear, or carry . . . upon the person or in the clothing or in a pocket, for the purpose . . . of being armed and ready for offensive or defensive action in a case of conflict with another person." Muscarello v. United States, 524 U.S. 125, 143 (1998) (Ginsburg, J., dissenting, joined by Rehnquist, C.J., Scalia, J.,and Souter, J.) (emphasis in original). Based on the foregoing, we think the operative clause includes a private meaning for"bear Arms."
I think there's room for cautious optimism, IMHO.
“D.C. Mayor Adrian M. Fenty”
That name: it sounds so...so... fenty, don’t you think?
;^)
By itself, Parker doesn’t do us much good. It says that the second amendment protects an individual right, but it doesn’t put much of a limit on government regulation of it. It says you can’t prohibit handguns. It affirms that states can regulate them, which means the gun permit schemes in New York and Massachussetts still stand. It would be nice for the Supreme Court to say that the second amendment is an individual right, as it did in U.S. v. Miller, but we need more than that. If this does get to the SC, hopefully it will be consolidated with some other cases that decide against New Jersey’s refusal to issue carry permits, and California’s stupid litany of laws.
They’ll say you don’t have the right to fix things yourself, Gillman.
If the appeal is filed with the SCOTUS and the Court decides to hear it, I wonder if the decision will be another 5-4 with Kennedy casting the deciding vote either way....
See comment# 10.
By itself, Parker doesn’t do us much good. It says that the second amendment protects an individual right, but it doesn’t put much of a limit on government regulation of it. It says you can’t prohibit handguns. It affirms that states can regulate them, which means the gun permit schemes in New York and Massachussetts still stand.
Good legal progress is made with solid, narrow holdings like Parker. A solid brick on which to rebuild gun rights.
I don't agree. Practically every gun case of importance decided by the Ninth Circus Court has depended on a false reading of the Second Amendment; that no individual right exists and that the Second Amendment only protects the state's right to arm a militia.
Once the Supreme Court has ruled that the Second Amendment does protect an individual right, then the Ninth Circuit will have to adopt a different stance; that the right is not "fundamental" and that the protection from infringement in the Second Amendment is not "an immunity of United States citizens" as described in the Fourteenth Amendment.
This will be a hard sell given the significant position of that right in the Bill of Rights and that a majority of states recognize the right of the people to keep and bear arms in their own constitutions.
"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus
I think we're sitting pretty, IMHO. See comments# 4 & 10.
New York City can continue to issue premises permits, which mean that you can have it, but not shoot it unless you go to the range during a set of specified hours on one or two days a month. And it doesn’t address the one class of firearms the second amendment was written to protect - the military styled stuff. I agree that it’s a positive step, but look at how the wording of U.S. v. Miller has been twisted in the past 70 years. In order for it to really set a limit on government power, they’ll have to consolidate it with some other issues, like an RTC case and an EBR case.
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