Where a Hispanic Catholic, and a Computer Geek write about Gun Rights, Self Defense and whatever else we can think about.
Another week gone bye-bye.
There are so many cases percolating right now, I’m just waiting to see which opinion drops next.
Hagar should be posting more often.
And on the fun side of things, these just showed up in my mail. If you’d like some, please let me know, and we’ll figure out costs and some way for you to purchase them.
B.L.U.F. Does bad law live on? What happens to all the opinions issued by circuit courts on Second Amendment cases before Bruen.
On June 23, 2022, a year ago, the Supreme Court issued the Bruen decision. The Bruen reaffirmed Heller. The Second Amendment is an individual right, it is not a second class right. The way to properly adjudicate a Second Amendment challenge is we hold that when the Second Amendment’s plain text covers an individual’s conduct, the Constitution presumptively protects that conduct. To justify its regulation, the government may not simply posit that the regulation promotes an important interest. Rather, the government must demonstrate that the regulation is consistent with this Nation’s historical tradition of firearm regulation.
—New York State Rifle & Pistol Assn., Inc. V. Bruen, 142 S.Ct. 2111, ¶ 1 (U.S. 2022) This fantastic opinion opened the gates to regaining our Second Amendment protect rights.
The court then proceeded to GVR four other Second Amendment cases. One of those cases was in the 4th Circuit Court.
The Forth Circuit Court has not found an infringement that they couldn’t find a reason to find constitutional. They are horrible on Second Amendment rights. While the Ninth Circuit gets all the news, the Fourth is actually worse.
There are fourteen judges on the panel. Only one of them found that there was a constitutionally protected right to keep and bear modern semi-automatic rifles. Thank you, Judge Traxler.
The United States jurisprudence is based on common law. Once a law is passed, it is up to the courts to apply that law in a common way across all instances. Since the laws as written often have edge cases or might just be poorly written, the courts are required to say what happens in those edge cases or badly worded situations.
Consider the following. A government employee is granted a security clearance. They gain access to some classified material. Because they are pressured to complete some work regarding that classified material, they copy that material on to a thumb drive and take it home with them.
At home, they copy the documents on to their home server, stored in the spare bedroom. At a later time, they leave government employment. In the process of debriefing, they mention that they had a copy of a paper on their computer that they would remove.
They have just admitted to a crime. There is an investigation and they go to jail.
Any government employee who did a similar action, take classified material out of a secure location and put it on an insecure home server, would be guilty of the same crime and would be punished in the same way.
Common law is what makes this possible. Every court in the land has access to the law, as written, to the court cases involving that law, and what the holdings were for each of those cases. The courts then apply the law in a common way across all people.
This is true of the G.S.-5 who was charged with editing her bosses classified memo as to the S.E.S. former Secretary of State. The law is applied in a common way across everybody.
Kolbe is one of the fundamental pieces of case law that controls how Second Amendment challenges are adjudicated within the 4th Circuit Court. It is also used in other Circuits, though it is not binding on other circuits. Many cases on the East Coast were resolved based on Kolbe.
B.L.U.F. Trial is held, state asks for a Judgement
On June 1, 2023, the judge revised his order and granted the defendants (bad guys) motion to dismiss as-applied challenges to Ballot Measure 114. The state argued, and the court found persuasive, that since the permitting provisions are not implemented yet, there is no violation. The plaintiffs (good guys) are allowed to refile once the permitting provisions are actually implemented.
There are two types of challenges, “as-applied” and “facial”
The Court’s order says that there is no violation of the plaintiffs’ rights because nothing has happened. To use a different type of example, consider a suspect that is being interviewed regarding a crime. He asks for a lawyer, but the cops keep asking him questions.
There is no constitutionality issue regarding the police interviewing suspects. If the suspect challenges that there is a constitutional issue, it is only his rights that were violated, not yours, not mine. This would be an “as-applied” case.
As-applied cases normally do not have far-reaching implications. On the other hand, sometimes they do: —Kolbe v. Hogan, 849 F. 3d 114 (4th Cir. 2017)
The other side of the coin is the “facial” challenge. In a facial challenge, the entire law or regulation can be found to be unconstitutional. This is one of the issues the government is arguing in —id. at 130. Rahimi was convicted for being a prohibited person in possession of a firearm. He had a domestic violence restraining order against him, which made him a prohibited person.
Rahimi’s lawyers made a facial challenge against —Bruen, 142 S.Ct. 2111. The 5th Cir. found for Rahimi. The state would like this to be an “as-applied” because that would mean it the ruling doesn’t extend to anybody else.
Today’s tune is brought to you by the Blue Haired Faerie. She of the M3 grease gun.
It’s also just one of my favorite songs from grade school.
It makes me happy.
— The Blue Haired Faerie
B.L.U.F. The argument from the mouths of the oldest group dedicated to removing your right to keep and bear arms.
I agree, they do research. It is not clear if that research is good, nor is it clear that the research is unbiased, nor is it clear that they present their research in a balanced manner. I have yet to see a single bit of educational work from Brady that wasn’t about removing firearms from The People.
They do seem to do a whole hell of a lot of legal advocacy. All of it anti-gun, anti-gun rights, anti freedom.
The thing you should take notice of is …and to protect the rights of governmental bodies to…
. The government has no rights. You have rights. The states have rights regarding the federal government. The government does not have “rights”. They are allowed certain enumerated powers.
The horrible thing about “commonsense” is that so few people have it. Bubble wrap helps prevent damage. Therefore, it is “commonsense” to wrap everything valuable in bubble wrap? Brady always argues from the point of “just a small inconvenience to get what could be a huge improvement in safety”
The wonderful thing about an opinion running to dozens of pages is that somewhere in all of that verbiage, the opponents of freedom will find a phrase or short grouping of words to turn the entire opinion upside down. Here we find that a small carve out for the NFA being used to justify just about anything, and a short passage in a concurring opinion being used to justify the UHA.
There are subtle changes in wording that are designed to support that swap: whether the provision at issue regulates conduct
—Bruen, 142 S.Ct. 2111.
In —New York State Rifle & Pistol Assn., Inc. V. Bruen, 142 S.Ct. 2111, ¶ 1 (U.S. 2022) the District Judge issued multiple TROs blocking New Jersey’s Chapter 131 Bruen response bill. She then consolidated the case with Siegel and on May 16, 2023, the court issued a preliminary injunction, blocking parts of Chapter 131. The same day, the District Court issued the preliminary injunction, the state filed for an emergency stay with the 3rd Cir. Court of Appeals. See —Kolbe v. Hogan, 849 F. 3d 114 (4th Cir. 2017).
At the end of May, the Siegel plaintiffs (good guys) filed a response with the Circuit Court, explaining why the state should not get a stay. The Third Circuit Court has issued notice that they will be hearing the case on an accelerated basis, but has not (yet?) issued a stay pending appeal.
The gist of the response to the state is that the state didn’t do the appeal correctly and that the state won’t succeed on the merits.
and
In reading this response, I was struck with how they slammed Patrick J. Charles. And as that is a name that keeps coming up in these cases, I decided to look into his work.
We are being invaded by squirrels. They are eating the bird food. Wife has declared war on the damn things.
I have four scopes. They range in age from 30 years old to “who the heck knows?” One came on the M1. It is a fixed four power. It is currently dismounted. The scope on the Rem. 700 is a beautiful Nikon scope, but that is not moving. The “varmint” scope that I picked up to go on a flat top AR-15 from the 1990s is a cheap one. There was another scope which I pulled off a donated .22.
I started with the donated scope. It was OK, but I did not like it. I switched to the varmint scope. That sort of worked. I had to put a 20MOA base under it and then managed to foobar things.
As I’ve said, I normally use iron sights. I’ve got red dots which are all co-registered with the backup up iron sights. And I have that Rem. 700 that was sighted in 30 years ago at 100 yards and just works.
What I ended up doing is messing things up badly. When the target is at the exact correct distance, then the varmint scope put round after round through the same hole exactly where I was aiming.
On the other hand, if the distance was anything other than that “correct” distance, the point of aim and point of impact were way off. All of this is because the scope is 2 inches above the bore.
Now, this scope has a very delicate and precise point of aim. It is a small, very small, dot in the center held there by two very fine crosshairs. The crosshairs are so fine it is difficult to see them. The center dot is very small too. And there is a muddiness to the image that bothers me.
I bought a cheap scope. Vortex Optics Crossfire II Second Focal Plane, 1-inch Tube Rifle scope.
First, it is much shorter than the other scopes. Second, the objective is 40 mm vs something smaller on the varmint scope. Third, it is freaking clear. It is only a 3-9×40, while the varmint was 8-32. I had the varmint at 8x, while I’m running the Vortex at 5x.
I purchased the “Dead-Hold BDC” This gives me hash marks on the crosshairs. This allows me to easily figure out my hold based on distance.
The turrets are cleaner and feel nicer to the touch.
And for those that suggested that bore sighting with that cheap-ass laser wouldn’t work well, the first rounds were on paper, 0.5 inches right of point of aim. The elevation was spot on. I made the adjustment for windage and then proceeded to put 10 rounds through a dime size hole.
The other big thing I noticed is the speed of target accusation. With the old scope, I would spot my target, shoulder the rifle, then spend time searching for the target.
With this new scope, I shoulder the rifle and everything just lines up. The target is in the center of the crosshairs.
If you have been considering a low-cost rifle scope, check the Vortex out. Make sure you get the right reticle for you.