Constitutional Law

.50 cal ban

Posted on February 26, 2008
A Hawaiian newspaper editorializes in favor of a .50 caliber ban. More nonsequiturs than I can easily count. The last one is simply, OK, it's not been used in crime, but we should ban it anyway rather than "wait for the carnage to occur."

An interesting graph...

Posted on February 25, 2008
Over at the Volokh Conspiracy. Basically, over the period studied of the Rehnquist Court, with the exception of Rehnquist himself, the Justices all cast about the same number of votes to strike down laws as unconstitutional. The total votes ranged from 57 ro 67...

Heller: ruling re oral argument

Posted on February 25, 2008
Today the Supreme Court issued an order: 1) The motion of Heller & the Texas Solicitor General, to divide argument and give Texas ten minutes of Heller's time is denied. 2) The (US) Solicitor General's motion for 15 minutes of argument is granted. Hard to read much into it, beyond the fact that it gives a tactical advantage to DC...

Oakland CA gun buyback

Posted on February 25, 2008
Via Instapundit comes this report. Oakland offers $250 per gun. So two gun dealers clean out all their old junkers and turn in 60 guns for a cool $15,000. Followed by a bunch of seniors at an assisted living facility nearby, who probably weren't doing much in the way of robbery or crack dealing...

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Nothing like "campaign reform"

Posted on February 24, 2008
The Demo National Committee, through Howard Dean, alleges that Sen. McCain is violating McCain-Feingold. The McCain campaign responds to the charge of hypocrisy with the charge that Howard Dean did the same thing in 2003.

This story needed a little editing...

Posted on February 24, 2008
The Newsday story is about Hillary Rodham Clinton and a criminal case she defended long ago: "Rodham was paid a $250 retainer for her services, minus 10 percent for court costs, records show. In her book, Hillary Clinton says the case spurred her to create the first rape hotline in Arkansas...

Newspaper runs a pro-gun show piece

Posted on February 24, 2008
"More Guns, Less Crime" Why a convention center in Wilmington was Ohio's safest place last weekend" in the Cincinnati Enquirer. If it'd been the Philadelphia Inquirer, we'd know the Seventh Seal had been opened. Hat tip to Dan Gifford... [update: spelling corrected, thanks]

More on ATF nominee Michael Sullivan

Posted on February 22, 2008
Via Red's Trading Post comes this story alleging that Sullivan put an FBI agent behind bars using perjured testimony (some from a mob hitman who got early release from imprisonment), tried to cover it up, and then, after he won a new trial, set up State charges against him.

Opposition to allowing carry in Nat'l Parks

Posted on February 22, 2008
It's from the National Parks Conservation Ass'm. A bit contradictory. On the one hand, it says it's supposed to prevent poaching. On the other, it says you only must unload and store the gun. That'd inhibit self-defense, but how does it prevent poaching?

Film festival to show "In Search of the Second Amendment"!!

Posted on February 22, 2008
My documentary (you can order from the ad in the left margin), "In Search of the Second Amendment," has been selected to show at the Backlot Film Festival in Los Angeles. Festival date is April 2-5, I don't have a specific date and time for my screening...

New VPC demand

Posted on February 22, 2008
Continuing in its quest for relevancy, or at least media coverage, the Violence Policy Center proposes to require FFLs to notify universities if a student buys a firearm. Hat tip to Joshua Berger... Update: SayUncle points out that VPC swiped the idea from Brady Campaign.

American Spectator on mass slayings

Posted on February 21, 2008
Article here. Quite balanced, I thought. At NIU, gun laws wouldn't have helped, and liberal CCW had only a small chance of helping; at Virginia Tech, liberal CCW had a much better chance of helping.

Campaign doublespeak

Posted on February 21, 2008
Ken Blackwell has an article on Obama in the NY Sun. "Senator Obama recently gave us a disturbing foretaste of the contradictory doublespeak we could expect under an Obama presidency" .... "Noting that some argue that the Second Amendment only grants state governments the power to arm National Guard units, Mr...

Nebraska considering ban on nonhunting guns

Posted on February 21, 2008
Or unduly dangerous guns. Or maybe military-looking guns. Anyway, whatever guns an appointed commission doesn't like. It actually has made it out of committee. The sponsor's statements talk about "inherently dangerous" -- which any gun safety instructor will tell you, either includes all guns (if mishandled) or no guns, in good repair (if properly handled)...

West Virginia Senate passes Castle Doctrine

Posted on February 20, 2008
Vote was 32-0.

Articles on Heller and upcoming argument

Posted on February 20, 2008
Legal Times reports on the question of dividing argument time, which appears to have become rather contentious. Law.com has a story on the history of the case. Since it's subscription only, I'll post segments in extended remarks below. Hat tip to reader Jack Anderson...

This is the Chicago Sun-Times?

Posted on February 19, 2008
For the second time this week, I am thunder-struck: "Daley unveils annual gun control legislation Moved by the shooting deaths of five students at Northern Illinois University, Mayor Daley today unveiled his annual package of gun control legislation, even as a State Senate sponsor acknowledged that none of the bills could have prevented the tragedy...

Allowing firearm carry in National Parks and Forests

Posted on February 19, 2008
From Christian Science Monitor: "Drug smugglers, armed robbers, and hard-partying or alienated city dwellers are setting up camp in the deep woods and clashing more with rangers, US Forest Service personnel say. What such incidents have in common is an urban grittiness, they say...

Violence Policy Center -- interesting study

Posted on February 19, 2008
Reader Howard Nemerov has written an interesting study of VPC, its structure, and funding (pdf, not large). UPDATE: Howard will be on NRANews.com about it, at about 10:20 PM EST.

Fun at Knob Creek

Posted on February 19, 2008
Video here. Link corrected -- thanks...

Article on history of Heller case

Posted on February 19, 2008
Right here.

Interesting response to genocide

Posted on February 18, 2008
At Concurring Opinions. I suppose by that rationale, one could prosecute the French resistance, and the Russian partisans, for failure to adhere to the rules of war. So much for international law... Via Instapundit...

RIP Grits Gresham

Posted on February 18, 2008
NSSF reports that Grits Gresham has passed on: "REMEMBERING GRITS GRESHAM . . . Grits Gresham, one of America's best-known outdoorsmen and a longtime friend to NSSF, died today in his hometown of Natchitoches, La., at age 85. Gresham enjoyed an extraordinary career that included serving as field host and producer for the "The American Sportsman" TV series on ABC and as a magazine writer and editor, book author, conservationist and television personality...

Double standards

Posted on February 18, 2008
Red's Trading Post asks why the double standard on recordkeeping? ATF's NFA records are hopelessly messed up, yet an FFL is written up, or revoked, over quite minor human errors.

Can't believe this is in the MSM

Posted on February 17, 2008
Newsweek, no less. How far have things come!

Hillary Clinton's undergrad paper.

Posted on February 17, 2008
This is strange. Just found it, but when I put the link in and tested it, it fails. Doublechecked it. It's been taken down in the last hour. I'll paste it in extended remarks below. Online here. I think she ought to have taken to heart one quote from its subject: "There are two roads to everything--a low road and a high one...

Mass killings -- a modest proposal

Posted on February 17, 2008
Via Instapundit comes this post. "Nearly all of the mass shootings of late have been in "gun-free zones." And the ones that weren't -- at the New Life Church in Colorado and the Appalachian School of Law in Virginia -- were stopped by private citizens (and members of the community being attacked) with their own weapons...

David E. Young on DC's historians' amicus

Posted on February 17, 2008
At History News Network. An excerpt: "It is not that the amicus historians fail to mention numerous historical facts. The problem is they often miss the significance of such facts in their rush to separate the Second Amendment from its actual private-rights-protecting nature...

NRA elections

Posted on February 17, 2008
It's that time of year again, and Col. Brown has his endorsements. I'd agree with all of them. Steve Schreiner would be a great addition to the Board. He's on a committee right now, and if he's ever missed a board meeting, I can't remember it. Bill Dailey, a Harvard-educated attorney who prefers to practice in Moline ILL, is just indispensable to NRA...

Wisdom of the Founding Fathers

Posted on February 16, 2008
From an antifederalist tract, "Letters of Cato," Essays on the Const. of the US 262 (Paul Ford, ed). "The ten miles square, which is to become the seat of government, will of course be the place of residence of the president and the great officers of state; the same observations of a great man will apply a court of a president possessing the powers of a monarch, that is observed of that of a monarch -- ambition with idleness -- baseness with pride -- thirst of riches without labor -- aversion to truth -- flattery -- treason -- perfidy -- violation of engagements -- contempt of civil duties -- hope from the magistrate's weakness; but above all, the perpetual ridicule of virtue...

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