Justices reject challenge to local assault weapons ban

The Supreme Court seems to be the only political institution disinterested in a potential rewrite of gun laws. In that case, the Circuit Court found that gun-owners still had a number of options on weapons they could use to protect themselves with the ban in place. Such weapons had been used in several mass shootings across the country, including the killings of children and staff members at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut and 12 people at a Colorado movie theater.

Mass shootings “occur too frequently in the United States”, the city argued. The Supreme Court decision preserves a Highland Park gun ban that is similar to those in Maryland, California, Connecticut, Hawaii, Massachusetts, New Jersey and NY, according to the Washington Post. By refusing to hear the appeal, the court ruled that the laws will remain effective.

Gun-control supporters argue that the recent shootings demonstrate the need for tighter controls.

“Let’s wait and see if certain measures of gun control pass. Let’s wait and see if states respond by passing even stricter measures of gun control”.

Because the court decided not to consider the appeal, the justices in the majority did not issue a written opinion.

The weapons ban “is highly suspect because it broadly prohibits common semi-automatic firearms used for lawful purposes” wrote Justice Thomas. But as Thomas pointed out, “If a broad ban on firearms can be upheld based on conjecture that the public might feel safer (while being no safer at all), then the Second Amendment guarantees nothing”.

In a filing to the Supreme Court, Friedman and the Illinois State Rifle Association said the Highland Park ordinance’s definition of “assault weapons” amounted to “an imaginary and pejorative category”.

The Court denied a petition backed by the Illinois State Rifle Association that sought a review of the ban on assault weapons and high-capacity magazines in Highland Park, Illinois.

Last year, the justices declined to take up challenges to two laws that restrict handgun ownership by young adults – a federal law barring the sale of handguns to customers under 21 and a Texas law forbidding anyone under 21 to carry a handgun in public.

If Kansas were to have an assault weapons ban, it (the Supreme Court decision) would still only be just a persuasive argument for any court that would have jurisdiction. Large-capacity magazines, the ordinance said, are those that can accept more than 10 rounds.

“Why else are they the weapon of choice in mass shootings?” he asked. Republican opposition helped kill a Democratic effort to expand background checks for gun purchases made online, as well as a proposal to demand more scrutiny of gun sales to those on the U.S. “terror watch lists” over due process concerns. “The American people have had enough of gun violence”, he said. “We’re not quitting”, he added referring to a case in the IL state courts challenging a similar law passed by the Cook County Board which was on hold while the Supreme Court was considering the Friedman case.