Arms and the Law

Ammo.com has an interesting analysis of crime rates and gun laws in the UK, Australia and New Zealand.

I recall once coming across a book, circa 1910, that spoke of crime rates in major American and British cities. (National level crime stats were then unavailable). New York and Detroit had much higher rates than did several British cities, long before any gun control worth mentioning in either nation.

Here, in pdf. I've skimmed it and it's a good one! I'd had my doubts about the Commerce Clause argument, but the brief lays that out clearly.

The one good thing about them is that no one can say "nobody is coming for your guns" anymore.

David Workman has a report. In the first, the Supreme Court denied New York's request to extend briefing schedules so that it could repeal the ordinances being challenged, and thus moot the case. That's why I've been slaving on an amicus brief rather than blogging...

New York did itself no favors when, in its request to the Court, it said it still believed in the utility of the ordinances. That left it open to a counter-stroke, which Paul Clement promptly and eloquently delivered, arguing NY's move was a transparent attempt to bail out of a lost case at the last moment.

I haven't been able to blog for days, working on an amicus for NYSRPA v. NYC, but here's travel tips for the NRA Convention Friday, when President Trump and VP Pence are due to speak.

Redstate report reports an incident, where an armed civilian stopped two guys beating an older man while people recorded it on their cell phones:

"Two things we can take from this...

For one, a good guy with a gun absolutely does see to it that violence is stopped....

The second, however, is that though the firearm stopped the fight, it would appear that this is where people decided the situation was disagreeable. This is a problem. If the man was aided against the two men then perhaps the gun wouldn't have had to come out. Sadly, no one did. He was forced to rely on the firearm.

Society seems to have less of a problem watching someone get beaten up than watching the would-be victim defend himself with the best means possible."

Every single bumpstock in the nation is lost in a boating accident.

"It's not clear why gun owners were taking their bump stocks boating. Some have theorized they were using them to fish, or just wanted to make sure they weren't stolen while they were away. Whatever the case, it's tragic that the bump stocks are now all at the bottom of lakes, rivers, and oceans from coast to coast."

He appears to have been serious. So often anti-arms ideas read like something from The Onion!

Duncan v. Becerra, striking down California's ban on magazines holding more than ten rounds. Chuck Michel claims the victory. I haven't done more than skim the opinion -- it's 86 pages long!

Of course, since this is the Ninth Circuit, don't hold your breath yet. But with New York State Rifle and Pistol pending in the Supreme Court, this may be part of the next wave of serious appellate challenges.

A summary of his testimony, and links to the full transcript, here, via Stephen Green of Instapundit. Green notes ""One crazy ex" is becoming the new standard of justice in Colorado."

Its government has made downloading or possessing the mosque killer's manifesto a crime, punishable by up to ten years' imprisonment.

Discussion here. Four very interesting cases. And that doesn't count NYSRPA v. NY, or the census question case (and the Supremes just asked for briefing on a new aspect of that, whether adding the question on citizenship violates the enumeration clause of Article I, sec. 2, which underlies the census, and simply refers to taking an enumeration of the people for allocating House seats.

A guess as to why the Court wants that added -- what if some Justices are of the mind that a power to take an enumeration of the people does not include doing anything else? You can count heads, but not ask much else?

Another possibility, and I'm not familiar enough with the case to know this.... might it challenge not only asking the question, but whether non-citizens should be excluded from the count? If so, there might be an issue as to whether a population is enumerated when certain persons are not counted. But if that was an issue, I'd have expected plaintiffs to raise it as Argument I, and not wait for the Court to raise the idea.

In any event, most Terms have a small number of interesting cases and a lot of uninteresting ones. It doesn't sound like October Term 2019 is going to be like that.

Some thoughts on when citizens become subjects, highlighted by case studies of various nations.

David Keene, former president of NRA and of the American Conservative Union, will be giving a talk with that title at the Heartland Institute, on Tuesday, March 26, at 5:30-7:30 CDT. The Institute is in Arlington Heights, IL. You can get tickets here, and it may be podcast.

Story here. Pretty surprising, given the increasingly burdensome laws there. Given that, if ownership is steeply increasing in a place like California, it logically is increasing where it's easier to become a gun owner, this is a rebuttal to survey-based claims that fewer households are owning guns.

Story here....

Press release here.

Four people create a home invasion in Yuma, armed homeowner shoots all four.

Would have to be told, by the Supreme Court, that dead judges do not get to vote. As the Supreme Court put it, "That practice effectively allowed a deceased judge to exercise the judicial power of the United States after his death. But federal judges are appointed for life, not for eternity."

Story here. ATF was clever here. The show requires exhibitors to remove firing pins from all displayed guns. So ATF asked all gunsmiths in the area to be on the lookout for anyone wanting to buy a firing pin. When they asked an FFL about a firing pin, giving some lame excuse, he tipped off the agency.

Ha--the first time I viewed the story, no problem. The second time the page gave notice that I was using an ad blocker (actually a popup blocker) and asked me to remove it in order to see the story. Never saw that sort of thing before.