Constitutional Law

Outdoor Life's top conservationist poll -- vote for a hunter

Posted on December 21, 2009
Lowell E. Baier is one person being considered by Outdoor Life for designation as the top person who's who's had an impact on hunting, fishing, and conservation.. You can cast your vote here. I know Lowell --he's now president of Boone and Crockett, He started off by helping to found the National Capitol Area chapter of Safari Club International, and then became one of the founders of the Foundation for North American Wild Sheep...

equal protection and Nebraska's exemption

Posted on December 21, 2009
In order to get 60 votes for cloture, the Senators pushing the health care bill gave residents of Nebraska special and permanent Medicare benefits. It sounds to me as if it might be violative of equal protection (or the EP component of 5th Amendment due process)...

Bring on the clowns

Posted on December 17, 2009
There was a move to add, to an emergency budget bill, a provision allowing Amtrak passengers to store firearms in checked baggage, the same as airline passengers have long been able to do. It succeeded. Now there is word that the enrolling clerk fouled up, and wrote it as requiring the passenger and the gun to be boxed in stored baggage, and that is the version sent to the President and "signed into law...

Chicago case: divided argument

Posted on December 17, 2009
Petitioner's attorney, Alan Gura, has agreed to divide argument and give 10 minutes to the Attorney General of Texas, to argue on behalf of the 38 States that signed the amicus brief supporting Petitioner. Yes, I'd say this is going to be lively. Probably more so even than Heller...

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Probable cause and CCW with a permit

Posted on December 16, 2009
Licensed carrier carries concealed on Atlanta's MARTA mass transit, is detained for half an hour and released. A federal judge rules the detention was lawfully based on probable cause. Here's the rub: if the offense of CCW were worded as "it is unlawful to carry a weapon concealed without a permit," then lack of a permit is part of the offense, and until there is reason to suspect that, there is no probable cause...

Story on Chris Conte kidney transplant

Posted on December 16, 2009
Right here. Hat tip to reader Jack Anderson....

West Virginia U keep its rifle team

Posted on December 15, 2009
Story here. Interesting university politics. The University wasn't then short for money, and the rifle team's expenses were under 1% of the athletic budget. But the University concluded it'd be best to terminate a number of sports and concentrate the money on scholarships, etc...

Another myth passes

Posted on December 15, 2009
Ed Stone notes in the Atlanta Examiner that this is the first anniversary of a Georgia law allowing CCW licensees to carry on mass transit systems. Some Atlanta mass transit system operators had begged for bulletproof shields to protect them from their homicidal yet CCW licensed passengers...

Dick Riley passes on

Posted on December 14, 2009
Dick Riley, longtime NRA director, and former president, has died. He was president from 1990 to 1992, and I think his term as director goes back to the Cincinnati Revolt of 1977.

Poll results and the media

Posted on December 13, 2009
David Codrea has some pointed insights.

Washington Times op-ed on Chicago case

Posted on December 11, 2009
Here. I've mentioned before that there are three ways in which incorporation could be found: 1) Thru the Due Process Clause, as it's been done for a century or so. 2) Thru Privileges or Immunities, overruling back to Cruikshank (which held the first and second amendments were not privileges or immunities)...

Thought for the day

Posted on December 11, 2009
The modern antis' theme of "commonsense gun control".... Sometimes a theme comes upon a group or movement almost by accident. Decades ago I heard a statistician describing just how the pro-2A side must have read public opinion surveys and discovered that "enforce current laws instead" had more support than "enact more laws," and decided to make that a theme...

Sale on Second Amendment books by David E. Young

Posted on December 11, 2009
David E. Young is having a 50% off sale on his books, Origins of the Second Amendment and The Founders' View of the Right to Bear Arms. Sale ends after Bill of Rights Day, December 15. I have both ... or had, I lost the former, and will order another...

Guns in checked train baggage

Posted on December 10, 2009
The House just passed a big bill with a rider requiring Amtrak to allow firearms in checked baggage. Amtrak had resisted, doubtless fearful that a passenger would somehow get into the baggage compartment and hijack the train.

Followup on Maricopa County case

Posted on December 10, 2009
The case involving the deputy who read over and grabbed the defense attorney's papers gets stranger by the moment, even allowing that the county attorney up there and the sheriff are reputedly, well, nuts. As noted earlier, the judge held the deputy in contempt...

Armed teacher stops knife attack

Posted on December 09, 2009
A teacher at a private school sees a stabbing of a student, draws his gun and stops it. I've heard the term "subculture of violence," and in my time as an attorney known a few who were in such a group, where physical violence was just a fact of life, nothing to get worked up about...

BATF manager ... uh... just read the story

Posted on December 09, 2009
Here. And he was Director of Industry Operations in the Houston area. Hat tip to Cbarles Heller....

Now, this is scary!

Posted on December 09, 2009
Considering I have a doctor's appointment this afternoon, my mother is in a nursing facility recovering from surgery, and Chris Conte is in the hospital after a kidney transplant .... this is seriously scary! An annual 1.5 million Americans are sickened or killed by medication errors; another 98,000 are killed by infections acquired while in the hospital...

Bob Ricker dead

Posted on December 08, 2009
Brady Campaign eulogy here. I knew him before he turned his coat and went with them, and he was a decent guy. The version they give is a bit sanitized... his change came more like the group he was was supported by gun makers, but got too close with the other side...

Development in the Maricopa County courtroom case

Posted on December 07, 2009
The deputy who removed a defense attorney's papers behind her back was jailed for contempt, and 20 courtroom deputies phoned in sick and a bomb threat was made.

New books

Posted on December 07, 2009
Off Road, a novel by a blogger and reader of this blog, said to be a great gift for antigun relatives. And several books by Joe White, an extraordinary gent. He flew in WWII, rose to high rank in Border Patrol, and served as Harlon Carter's right hand man in the early years of ILA.

14th Amendment article by prof. Aynes

Posted on December 07, 2009
Just got the hardcopy, and the pdf version, online. He specifically reaches the right to arms on pp. 1319-20,

Progun attorney going in for kidney transplant

Posted on December 06, 2009
Webpage here. It's Chris Conte, ILA Legislative Counsel, and he goes in the afternoon of December 8. UPDATE: his family posts that they're connecting the new kidney. Surgery is expected to last until 4:30 EST.

Thoughts on guns NOT to buy

Posted on December 05, 2009
Some thoughts on the subject.

Phoenix courtroom event

Posted on December 04, 2009
A while back I blogged a report that a Maricopa County detention officer had been caught on security cam rummaging thru a public defender's file while her back was turned, and taking something from it. Today's newspaper reports that the judge held the officer in contempt, and ordered him to apologize (lot of good that would do)...

Dave Kopel -- new book

Posted on December 04, 2009
Kopel's new book, Aiming for Liberty, is

VA man cleared to sue DC over gun arrest

Posted on December 04, 2009
Story here. Owner of a security firm is suing the District over an arrest warrant issued for him, charging him with possession of unregistered firearms.

Novel by a friend

Posted on December 03, 2009
A Tucson attorney and friend has authored a murder mystery, Immaculate Deception,

New article by Kopel and Cramer

Posted on December 02, 2009
The Keystone of the Second Amendment: Quakers, the Pennsylvania Constitution, and the Questionable Scholarship of Nathan Kozuskanich, forthcoming in Widener Law Journal. Gist of it is a critique of Nathan Kozuskanich's claims that the right to arms guarantee in the 1776 PA Constitution -- "the people have a right to bear arms for the defence of themselves and the state" --actually has a secret meaning relating to Quaker objections to military service...

A strange firearm purchase....

Posted on December 01, 2009
The FBI has announced its intent to purchase two 20mm rifles -- suppressed!'' Here's the piece they're buying. The announcement is necessary because the contract will be single-source, simply awarded to a firm rather than put up for competitive bidding...

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