How much longer are we going to take stuff like this? Please review ALL of the reasons that the Second Amendment was written. Let's don't forget that part about an over-reaching government!
Posted on 12/23/2005 4:38:26 PM PST by neverdem
Defenseless on the Bayou
New Orleans gun confiscation was foolish and illegal.
During the weeks after Hurricane Katrina, the government of New Orleans devolved from its traditional status as an elective kleptocracy into something far more dangerous: an “anarcho-tyranny” that refused to protect the public from criminals while preventing people from protecting themselves. On the orders of New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin, the New Orleans Police Department, the National Guard, the Oklahoma National Guard, and the U.S. Marshals Service began breaking into homes at gunpoint, confiscating lawfully owned firearms, and evicting the residents. “No one is allowed to be armed,” said P. Edwin Compass III, the superintendent of police. “We’re going to take all the guns.”
Those thousands of New Orleanians huddled in the Superdome and the New Orleans Convention Center got a taste of anarcho-tyranny. Everyone entering those buildings was searched for firearms. So for a few days, they lived in a small world without guns. As in other such worlds, the weaker soon became the prey of the stronger.
In the rest of the city, some police officers abandoned their posts, while others joined the looting spree. For several days, the ones who stayed on the job did not act to stop the looting that was going on right in front of them. When homes or businesses were saved, the saviors were the many good citizens of New Orleans who defended them with their own firearms.
These people were operating within their legal rights. The law authorizes citizen’s arrests for any felony, and in the 1964 case McKellar v. Mason a Louisiana court held that shooting a property thief in the spine was a legitimate citizen’s arrest.
The aftermath of the hurricane featured prominent stories of citizens defending lives and property. Most of New Orleans lies on the north side of the Mississippi River, while the neighborhood of Algiers is on the south. The Times-Picayune detailed how dozens of neighbors in one part of Algiers had formed a militia. After a carjacking and an attack on a home by looters, the neighborhood recognized the need for a common defense; residents shared firearms, took turns on patrol, and guarded the elderly. Although the initial looting had resulted in a gun battle, once the patrols began the militia never had to fire a shot. Likewise, the Garden District of New Orleans, one of the city’s top tourist attractions, was protected by armed residents.
The good gun-owning citizens of New Orleans and the surrounding areas should have been thanked for helping to save some of their city after Mayor Nagin, incoherent and weeping, had fled. Yet instead these citizens were victimized by a new round of home invasions and looting, these government-organized, for the purpose of firearms confiscation.
The mayor and Gov. Kathleen Blanco do have the legal authority to mandate evacuation, but failure to comply is a misdemeanor; so the authority to use force to compel evacuation goes no further than the power to effect a misdemeanor arrest. The pre-emptive confiscation of every private firearm in the city far exceeded any reasonable attempt to carry out misdemeanor arrests for persons who disobey orders to leave.
Louisiana statutory law does allow some restrictions on firearms during extraordinary conditions. One statute says that after the governor proclaims a state of emergency (as Blanco did), “the chief law enforcement officer of the political subdivision affected by the proclamation may…promulgate orders…regulating and controlling the possession, storage, display, sale, transport and use of firearms, other dangerous weapons and ammunition.” But the statute does not, and could not, supersede the Louisiana Constitution, which declares that “the right of each citizen to keep and bear arms shall not be abridged, but this provision shall not prevent the passage of laws to prohibit the carrying of weapons concealed on the person.”
The power of “regulating and controlling” is not the same as the power of “prohibiting and controlling.” The emergency statute actually draws this distinction in its language, which refers to “prohibiting” price gouging, sale of alcohol, and curfew violations but only to “regulating and controlling” firearms. Accordingly, the police superintendent’s order “prohibiting” firearms possession was beyond his lawful authority. It was an illegal order.
A week after the confiscations began, the National Rifle Association (NRA) and the Second Amendment Foundation (SAF) filed a joint lawsuit in federal court. The parties were represented by Stephen Halbrook, one of the nation’s leading Second Amendment attorneys. (Documents from the suit can be found at stephenhalbrook.com.)
Attorneys for Orleans Parish (New Orleans) and St. Tammany Parish (which also confiscated guns) capitulated, under the judge’s threat that he would issue a preliminary injunction against them. The parishes and the plaintiffs signed a consent decree in which the parishes asserted (implausibly) that there was never an official government policy of confiscating guns, and also admitted that they had no authorization to confiscate guns pursuant to Louisiana’s emergency powers statute. The parties agreed to accept that the court’s injunction forbids them from confiscating guns, and orders them to return all guns which have been confiscated.
There will doubtless be many lawsuits that will seek to discover precisely which uniformed looters were responsible for the theft of which guns. (Like the other looters, the uniformed thieves did not give their victims receipts. ) And all over the country next year, there will be bills introduced in state legislatures to make sure that emergency powers cannot be abused to confiscate guns when good people need them most.
After Katrina struck, we saw an awful truth in New Orleans: There is no shortage of police officers and National Guardsmen who will illegally threaten peaceful citizens at gunpoint and confiscate their firearms. We also saw some noble truths: that citizens with firearms will defend law and order even when the government fails. And that our federal courts, as well as civil rights organizations such as NRA and SAF, continue to play an important role in defending constitutional rights against the depredations of lawless “law enforcement” officers.
Dave Kopel (david@i2i.org) is research director of the Independence Institute.
After the Storm
Hurricane Katrina and the failure of public policy.
Jesse Walker, Dave Kopel, Kerry Howley, Ronald Bailey, Jeff A. Taylor, Jacob Sullum
Tell me again how these guys will refuse to obey illegal and unconstitutional orders.
Wait until a real terrorist strike or natural catastrophe happens. Then we'll see real violation of rights.
from my cold dead fingers. New Orleans?? Should plow five furrows around the bloody place... burn it to the ground and plant it in late rice.
My cold dead fingers etc.
How much longer are we going to take stuff like this? Please review ALL of the reasons that the Second Amendment was written. Let's don't forget that part about an over-reaching government!
How could this have happened? None of those agencies had the courage to tell hizzhonor his orders were illegal, then refuse to carry them out?
Where is the rest of the story. What would we think if this had been done 10 years ago? I want to see the names of those in the federal government and national guard who were in on this gun confiscation.
So do I. Names and specific agencies/organizations.
Sad isn't it. On one hand we have those in uniform who swore to uphold the law of the land. At the same time their leaders display less comprehension of the law than your average public high school graduate.
Both you and I know what is going to happen if something like a hurricane should occur on a national scale. Half the people who post on FreeRepublic do not have the knowledge necessary to defend their own home, let alone a country.
Semper Fi
Sure you have. It's in the silence.
Hang him with a sign around his neck.
"Sic semper tyrannus."
Somewhere in there is don't aim at anything you don't want to hit.
Hey NM,
What could we expect from New Orleans finest. The commie get caught without his finest and resolved to withdraw his analytist.
What more cou we expect from the commies and leave out the dramies.
We Dare Defend Our Rights.
NSNR-FTATDF&S
Actually, one elderly woman holding an antique pistol did make a stand. The police on the scene body slammed her and took her pistol.
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