UPDATE: SCOTUS to Hear Arguments In McDonald v.Chicago

[joe817]

The date has been set on a precedent setting case we've all been awaiting, since the repeal of the D.C. handgun ban.

"Friday, December 04, 2009:
The U.S. Supreme Court is scheduled to hear oral arguments in the McDonald v. City of Chicago case on Tuesday, March 2, 2010. "

Details from an email I received this morning from NRA-ILA:

http://www.nraila.org/Legislation/Feder ... px?id=5237" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

One thing that caught me by surprise in reading the article:
"Briefs were filed by an overwhelming, bipartisan majority of members of the U.S. House of Representatives and the U.S. Senate, a large bipartisan group of state legislators and other elected officials from all 50 states, and more than three-fourths of state attorneys general."

I was aware of the State Attorney Generals' in filing briefs, but certainly not the House AND Senate. And certainly not and overwhelming BIPARTISAN majority of both the House and Senate. This is the first I've heard of it(overwhelming bipartisan,etc).

Has anyone heard a similar claim?.....or is NRA exaggerating a bit? I honestly do not know.

[WildBill]

Has anyone heard a similar claim?.....or is NRA exaggerating a bit? I honestly do not know.

I guess it depends on the definition of "overwhelming". I counted 57 signatures of U.S. Senators supporting the amicus brief.

[joe817]

Thank you Seamus for sending me this link of the amicus filings:

http://www.chicagoguncase.com/wp-conten ... ngress.pdf" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

I count 58 Senators and 251 House members are signed up on this. Pretty impressive.

[WildBill]

Has anyone heard a similar claim?.....or is NRA exaggerating a bit? I honestly do not know.

I guess it depends on the definition of "overwhelming". I counted 57 signatures of U.S. Senators supporting the amicus brief.

Thank you Seamus for sending me this link of the amicus filings: I count 58 Senators and 251 House members are signed up on this. Pretty impressive.

I demand a recount! Getting 58 Senators to agree on anything, is a major accomplishment.

[C-dub]

Definitely thank you for posting. I'll put it in my calendar to remind me.

[casingpoint]

I'll put it in my calendar to remind me

Just stay tuned here and you can't miss it.

[joe817]

bump, just to remind me.

[joe817]

Update: "the U.S. Supreme Court granted the National Rifle Association’s motion to allow it to participate in the upcoming oral argument in McDonald v. City of Chicago. Former U.S. Solicitor General Paul Clement will be representing the NRA at oral argument, which will occur on March 2. "

http://www.nraila.org/News/Read/InTheNews.aspx?ID=13337" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[Ashlar]

I'm not exactly happy about the NRA butting in here. Their brief left me less than enthused. Taking time away from Gura is a mistake, IMHO.

(If the NRA had their way, Heller would have been handed back to the lower level court with instructions to use a tighter level of scrutiny, rather than declaring the second an individual right.)

[Rex B]

I'm not exactly happy about the NRA butting in here. Their brief left me less than enthused. Taking time away from Gura is a mistake, IMHO.

As of today, it seems a darned good thing NRA got involved.
Gura's P&I argument was dismissed out of hand, while the NRA's Due Process argument looks like it will win the day.

[Texgun]

Alan Korwin disagrees. see gunlaws.com

EYEWITNESS REPORT
Mar. 2, 2010

[Out of D.C. and now on a ranch in Texas; didn't have time to get this report out before catching my flight; this is only partial, will need details and fill in many blanks, that will have to come later, better to get the basics out now, thanks for understanding.]
This case was way more complicated than Heller.

Both attorneys faced hostility from the bench. Chicago's lawyer got hit from all sides with little in the way of what you might call support. But the surprise was the way Alan Gura got blasted, even by the best friend gun-rights has up there, Justice Scalia.

Whoever or however we believed the Court might be ready to review the Privileges or Immunities clause of 14A was totally wrong. Every Justice had problems with the scope of such a decision, and poor Gura had to withstand withering assaults on his reasoning and approach.

I definitely need a transcript to go over what exactly happened, I thought audio was weak in chambers, complexity was way large, and in chatter afterwards found I wasn't the only one. How those aging Justices keep up -- and they did, note for note, cite for cite -- is a bloody miracle.

BOTTOM LINE -- it looks like the Heller majority may hold together for this case, and the Second Amendment will be incorporated against the states, under the familiar selective incorporation of Due Process. The same 2A that controls federal activity will apply to the states, no more, no less, though that issue of degree got a lot of attention. Not that the scope of 2A is all the well defined, but there was animus to the idea that incorporation would yield a "shadow" version for the states.

Gura may get the win, but not for any brilliant strategic planning -- there was open hostility to the idea, central to his arguments, of 2A being a Privilege or Immunity of citizenship (I'll discuss soon). The win, if there is one, may be more of a result of the bench being unprepared to treat 2A as some special bastard child the states do not have to follow, unlike the rest of the Bill of Rights that has been incorporated so far.

And let me tell you, thank God for the NRA. They took a lot of heat for asking for and getting some of Gura's oral argument time, using Paul Clement who had argued the government's unsavory position for a low standard of scrutiny in Heller, getting their hat in the ring. That turned out to be baloney, they were life savers. Considering the ferocity with which Gura and P&I were attacked, we were lucky to have at elegant, articulate, eloquent voice to apply 2A through Due Process. (Don't get me wrong, Chicago fared just as poorly, but for different reasons.)

Clement's arguments were so well made and so compelling, he got to speak at length without interruption, with the Justices in rapt attention. I asked him about that afterwards and he said yeah, it was really nice getting some "air time."

There's so much more to tell, the back-and-forth over substantive and procedural due process, and the -- un-frickin-believable -- lengthy consideration by the Justices of how much RKBA we'd enjoy if there was "no Second Amendment" (protected instead as a privilege or immunity), plus Breyer's astounding hostility towards guns in general ("guns kill!"), and Stevens' 'parading around with guns' concerns... it'll have to be later (been on the go since 5:30 a.m., probably when I return to Phoenix, beginning of next week.

It was an honor and a thrill witnessing it all.

Alan.

[Rex B]

Looks to me like Alan confirms what I wrote "Thank God for the NRA"

[Mike1951]

Sounds like a probable win that we'll all be disappointed in.

Now for the wait.

[chabouk]

I'm not exactly happy about the NRA butting in here. Their brief left me less than enthused. Taking time away from Gura is a mistake, IMHO.

As of today, it seems a darned good thing NRA got involved.
Gura's P&I argument was dismissed out of hand, while the NRA's Due Process argument looks like it will win the day.

Gura didn't craft his oral argument in a vacuum: he knew the NRA was coming right behind him with a due process argument.

[Ashlar]

Ehn, Gura had the SDP argument in his back pocket, see his brief.

I see it as haggling.. you start at a point you're willing to compromise on, and what you actually want becomes the 'middle ground'.