The Briefing Room
General Category => National/Breaking News => SCOTUS News => Topic started by: Elderberry on December 03, 2019, 12:16:13 am
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SCOTUSblog by Amy Howe 12/2/2019
This morning the Supreme Court heard oral argument in a challenge to the constitutionality of a New York City rule that barred gun owners from taking their licensed guns outside the city. The gun owners argued that the rule violated their right to “keep and bear arms†under the Constitution’s Second Amendment. But it’s not clear that the justices will reach the merits of the gun owners’ complaint. Instead, it seemed possible (although far from certain) that they could throw out the case because the dispute is now moot – that is, no longer a live controversy – after the city repealed the rule last summer.
The lawsuit before the justices today was filed by New York City residents who have licenses to have guns at their homes. The gun owners wanted to be able to take their guns to target ranges and weekend homes outside the city, but they were barred from doing so by the city’s transport ban.
After a federal district court and the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit upheld the ban, the gun owners went to the Supreme Court, which agreed to review the case in January. That announcement was significant, because the justices had not taken on a Second Amendment case for nearly a decade. But over the summer the city urged the justices to dismiss the case before it could be argued, explaining that because it had repealed the ban and the state had changed its laws, the gun owners had received everything that they had asked for. The justices declined to do so, instead setting the case for oral argument today.
More: https://www.scotusblog.com/2019/12/argument-analysis-justices-focus-on-mootness-in-challenge-to-now-repealed-new-york-city-gun-rule/#more-290537 (https://www.scotusblog.com/2019/12/argument-analysis-justices-focus-on-mootness-in-challenge-to-now-repealed-new-york-city-gun-rule/#more-290537)
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Hopefully they are smart enough to see through the last second stunt that New York tried to pull.
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Hopefully they are smart enough to see through the last second stunt that New York tried to pull.
Somebody already declined to moot the case. Circuit Court?
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Somebody already declined to moot the case. Circuit Court?
@Cyber Liberty
2nd Circuit upheld the ban. When the gun owners and the New York Gun Club decided to go to the SCOTUS is when NYC decided to try and alter the rule in order to claim the case was moot.
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@Cyber Liberty
2nd Circuit upheld the ban. When the gun owners and the New York Gun Club decided to go to the SCOTUS is when NYC decided to try and alter the rule in order to claim the case was moot.
Gotcha. So "Mootness" is not decided. Well, this will be interesting. Looks like a golden opportunity for SCOTUS to just punt.
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Gotcha. So "Mootness" is not decided. Well, this will be interesting. Looks like a golden opportunity for SCOTUS to just punt.
@Cyber Liberty
I hope to God they don't.
Justice Thomas is spot on in his anger at the SCOTUS ducking 2nd Amendment issues since Heller. It's bad enough the lower courts thumbing their nose at the ruling but we've also we've got so called experts like the one that runs around here totally misrepresenting case law that Heller represents.
It's past time time for the SCOTUS to once again remind some of their fellow black robed jurists as well as some others exactly what "shall not infringe" means.