Posted on 12/11/2012 12:15:19 PM PST by E. Pluribus Unum
SPRINGFIELD-In a huge win for gun-rights groups, a federal appeals court in Chicago Tuesday tossed the state's ban on carrying concealed weapons and gave Illinois' Legislature 180 days to craft a law legalizing concealed carry.
"The debate is over. We won. And there will be a statewide carry law in 2013," said Todd Vandermyde, a lobbyist for the National Rifle Association.
In a split opinion (see below), the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals reversed a lower court ruling in two cases downstate that upheld the state's longstanding prohibition against carrying concealed weapons.
Illinois is the only state with an outright prohibition on concealed carry.
"We are disinclined to engage in another round of historical analysis to determine whether eighteenth-century America understood the Second Amendment to include a right to bear guns outside the home," Judge Richard Posner wrote in the court's majority opinion.
"The Supreme Court has decided that the amendment confers a right to bear arms for self-defense, which is as important outside the home as inside. The theoretical and empirical evidence (which overall is inconclusive) is consistent with concluding that a right to carry firearms in public may promote self-defense," he continued.
"Illinois had to provide us with more than merely a rational basis for believing that its uniquely sweeping ban is justified by an increase in public safety. It has failed to meet this burden," Posner wrote.
"The Supreme Court's interpretation of the Second Amendment therefore compels us to reverse the decisions in the two cases before us and remand them to their respective district courts for the entry of declarations of unconstitutionality and permanent injunctions," he continued.
"Nevertheless we order our mandate stayed for 180 days to allow the Illinois legislature to craft a new gun law that will impose reasonable limitations, consistent with the public safety and the Second Amendment as interpreted in this opinion, on the carrying of guns in public," Posner said.
In a minority opinion, Judge Ann Williams wrote that Illinois is within its rights to ban weapons in "sensitive places" like government buildings, churches and universities in the name of safety.
"The Illinois legislature reasonably concluded that if people are allowed to carry guns in public, the number of guns carried in public will increase, and the risk of firearms-related injury or death in public will increase as well," Williams said. "And it is also common sense that the danger is a great one; firearms are lethal."
Attorney General Lisa Madigan, who was defending the state's prohibition of concealed carry, remained silent on whether her office would appeal Tuesday's ruling to the U.S. Supreme Court.
"The court gave 180 days before its decision will be returned to the lower court to be implemented. That time period allows our office to review what legal steps can be taken and enables the Legislature to consider whether it wants to take action," Madigan spokeswoman Maura Possley said.
In 2011, gun-rights advocates lost a bid in the Illinois House to legalize concealed carry by a 65-32 vote. Seventy-one votes were necessary for passage.
The measure, sponsored by state Rep. Brandon Phelps (D-Harrisburg), would have enabled Illinoisans to carry concealed weapons if they had a firearm owner's identification card and underwent a firearms education course.
Under the failed bill, permit holders could not have been a patient in a mental institution in the previous five years nor have any felony, violent misdemeanor or drug convictions in the previous 10 years.
Concealed weapons also wouldn't have been allowed under the plan at government buildings, courthouses, schools, sports arenas and stadiums, amusement parks, libraries or college campuses.
At the time of the vote, the Illinois State Police estimated that 325,000 people would taken advantage of a concealed-carry program, which was projected to raise $32 million annually for the state through license fees.
7th Circuit Court overturns Illinois concealed carry ban
One day, the gun owners of this country won’t bother about leftist gun haters and obeying their attempts at infringement and outright banning. They will cast their vote in lead.
>> They will cast their vote in lead.
“Our Founding Fathers would by shooting by now...”
Perhaps CJ Red Roberts, through his ass holiness, has done America a service by making even the most sick and wrong socialist black robes too shy to be as stupid as before out of an aversion to be compared to the sick and wrong socialist sumbitch who empowered our first truly America hating Marxist to destroy what is left of what is good in our nation.
They will likely do what DC did with gun ownership, and implement a system that is so onerous that it will discourage people from jumping through the hoops to obtain a license.
“gave Illinois’ Legislature 180 days to craft a law legalizing concealed carry”
they already have one, the 2nd Amendment
Tough day for fascists in MI and IL today.
Why do things like this always seem to happen when I'm fresh out of crocodile tears and my micro-violin is in the shop for tweaks? I sure hope they'll be able to squeak by without my sympathy.
Hopefully this will be good riddance to IL’s law on banned concealed weapons.
If we assume that the Second Amendment only secured for Americans the same rights that they had under their original British governments and English common law, then one is forced to consider why our Founders would have included the Second Amendment at all.
As punishment for refusing to pay taxes, such as those at issue in the Boston Tea Party, and for refusing to pay damages that occurred, the government which passed those taxes ordered that Boston be occupied by regular army troops and that the weapons of the colonists be confiscated, and that such occupation would continue until the damages were paid.
This confiscation was being extended outward from Boston proper into its surrounding communities and met with violent objections at Lexington and Concord.
If the Second Amendment was intended only to secure those rights which were consistent with military confiscation of arms which led to the outbreak of hostilities which started the American Revolution, then our Founders would be creating a government empowered to tyrannize the population in exactly the same manner as prior to the Revolution.
That is simply nonsense. Our Founders were expecting something more of the Second Amendment. They had to have had in mind "infringements" and those infringements were no longer to be tolerated.
Thanks to the Fourteenth Amendment, such infringements by the states will also not be tolerated.
Egad, the woman's a genius!
"...and the risk of firearms-related injury or death in public will increase as well," Williams said.
That conclusion is, however contrary to actual data in some 38 states to date.
"And it is also common sense that the danger is a great one; firearms are lethal."
Dead criminals are not a bad thing, dear. Dead criminals are a good thing. BTT.
“Resistance to tyrants is obedience to god”!
And let’s not forget to mention that this leaves the whole FOID thing in place. Yeah, you shouldn’t have to have an ID to vote, but you have to have a special ID and approval from the State to exercise a basic right.
There is a *lot* wrong with that picture.
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