We just won Palmer at the DC District Court!

Judge Scullin considering holding DC in contempt for their extremely restrictive "new" carry law.
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Not sure what this means, we have won the case. Do you mean 'rules in our favor on the pending motion for contempt? It is doubtful that this will result in an actual contempt of court charge. What is much less doubtful is that DC has lost and is now desperate.
 
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Well there seems to be two different levels of action going on here.

What's happened so far is that Scullin has ruled that there's a personal "bear arms" right that includes widespread carry. He relied heavily on the logic of the Peruta case in the 9th Circuit.

First, DC is claiming that they're going to appeal that to the DC Circuit.

But second, there's a wrangle going on still in Scullin's court level about what Scullin's ruling means. DC lawyers are trying to claim that extremely limited carry such as withstood three-judge panels in NY (Kachalsky), NJ (Drake) and MD (Woolard) should be OK. But Scullin didn't go with the logic of those cases, he went instead with Peruta (widespread carry instead of "may issue for a few elites").

I *think* Gura is forced now to wrangle with the DC attorneys back before Scullin and get a firm view from Judge Scullin on what his ruling means. If Gura doesn't do that, he may lose the ability to challenge the new heavily restricted permit law without filing a new case and starting the clock all over, which is also what the DC lawyers are saying he needs to do. But if Gura were to fall for that (or Scullin for that matter) then each time Gura "wins" the city can pass a new form of craptastic law (million dollar bonds, massive psych evals, who knows what!) and Gura would have to challenge each one in turn.

Gura would *like* to progress the fight up to the DC Circuit and then The Supremes I suspect, but he can't yet - DC passing this law has kept him wrangling before Scullin. Which is a bummer because DC is hoping the Peruta case gets overturned en banc (a genuine risk) so that the core of the logic of Scullin's DC ruling gets discredited. We can of course try to appeal Peruta to the Supremes but...they may or may not take it.

Scullin can help by doing a rapid and broadly worded slapdown of DC's ongoing restrictions, forcing DC to bounce higher to the DC Appeals court and a step closer to The Supremes.
 
Not sure what this means, we have won the case. Do you mean 'rules in our favor on the pending motion for contempt? It is doubtful that this will result in an actual contempt of court charge. What is much less doubtful is that DC has lost and is now desperate.
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Uhm, no. If that is a win I would hate to see what a loss looks like. It is a pyrrhic victory more damaging than helpful. Bloomberg's body guards, some retired cops, family members of cops, politicians, and people who can document a police reported and credible -- and current -- threat will get to carry. no on else.


And in case you guys missed it DC has tightened things even more since the contempt appeal was filed. I believe they now have all private property presumptive no gun zone unless posted otherwise
 
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"And in case you guys missed it DC has tightened things even more since the contempt appeal was filed. I believe they now have all private property presumptive no gun zone unless posted otherwise ."

I'd like to see a link to this. Chicago tried to pull the same stunt when the Illinois carry law was enacted. Nice of the City to conclude that everyone in town agrees that DC should be a gun free zone.
 
DC bill B20-0930 is still under consideration (last action November 25, 2014). See page 178 starting at line 285 for presumptions that private residences and places of worship are prohibited. The bill initially also presumed that other private property was prohibited for a 90-day transition period after September 23, 2014 (the date of passage of the emergency bill).
 
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Bill wouldn't load. Bummer. I must wonder why they think that this is constitutional. Would this bill mean that if you are a gun owner who keeps a firearm in city limits, you have to post that guns are permitted, or you will be in violation of the ordinance? This really is nothing more than a re-enactment of the gun ban overturned by Heller, attached to a "virtual no issue" carry bill.
 
Following is the relevant language from the current version of B20-0930. Interestingly, the PDF file was changed from when I linked to it yesterday.

(b)(1) Any private residence shall be presumed to prohibit the presence of concealed pistols unless otherwise authorized by the property owner or person in control of the premises and communicated personally to the licensee in advance of entry onto the residential property.
(2) Any church, synagogue, mosque, or other place where people regularly assemble for religious worship shall be presumed to prohibit the presence of concealed pistols unless the property is posted with conspicuous signage allowing concealed pistols, or the owner or authorized agent communicates such allowance personally to the licensee in advance of entry onto the property; provided, that such places may not authorize concealed pistols where services are conducted in locations listed in subsection (a) of this section.
(3) Any private property not a residence, the owner or person in control of the private property shall be presumed to permit a licensee carrying a concealed pistol to enter the owner's property unless the property is posted with conspicuous signage prohibiting concealed pistols, or the owner or authorized agent communicates such prohibition personally to the licensee.
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Would the District Court order be met if the District of Columbia revised its regulations to provide for the registration of handguns to be carried loaded, but not concealed, in public? Loaded Open Carry. Unless my memory further fails me, Peruta turned on the failure of California's statutory scheme to permit LOC.
 
I would say yes, it would satisfy the order according to the judge and to the plaintiffs. But DC will NEVER allow open carry over concealed.
 
Supposedly the city has filed its latest reply (as of 12/4), but it's not up on the Internet Archive. Does anyone have Pacer access to pull it and post a link?
 
Well, you have to read Gura's (typically well written) brief to get a good idea, but there are some pretty valid procedural points asserted, even though the newly enacted emergency measure is designed to allow carry by only a select view and not the average citizen, a result that flies in the face of the trial court's extensive reliance on Peruta for the proposition that we ALL have the same Second Amendment right to bear arms, and that the State must provide some method whereby the averages citizen is allowed the right to carry, whether openly or concealed, not a select few who have "special reasons" for desiring to be armed.
 
Barring a win in Palmer, it looks like the emergency measure will be as good as it gets for the near future. Muriel Bowser, the new mayor, has been making the rounds, and she had this to say recently:

You have a mayor who hates guns. If it was up to me, we wouldn’t have any handguns in the District of Columbia. I swear to protect the Constitution and what the courts say, but I will do it in the most restrictive way as possible.
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You have a mayor who hates guns. If it was up to me, we wouldn’t have any handguns in the District of Columbia. I swear to protect the Constitution and what the courts say, but I will do it in the most restrictive way as possible.
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Considering that the Constitution says there shall be NO restrictions, that should be easy.

[Disclaimer: I am one of those originalists who thinks "shall not be infringed" means "shall not be infringed."[/Disclaimer
 
For all the handwringing about levels of judicial scrutiny, the 2nd is the one Amendment written with its own level of scrutiny.

A point related to the interest balancing of rights vs public safety (which I see as the elephant in the living room) is that ALL firearms aren't just dangerous, they're lethal. The founders knew this very well and intended for lawful citizens to have free access to the most lethal weapons known to man.

An AR15 fires a projectile that, at best, is marginally as lethal . . . though certainly more accurate . . . than the .70 caliber balls fired by the muskets of the American Revolution.

As to the point of magazine capacity: There was, at the time of founding, an equanimity between adversaries created by the technological limitations of the period. In other words, everyone had to load their muskets one load at a time.

Since the entire POINT of the Second Amendment is to equalize the playing field between those who would use weapons for nefarious purposes and those who would oppose them, then an artificially imposed magazine capacity can ONLY benefit those who would ignore such a law, and can ONLY harm those who would obey it.

Such laws, FAR beyond the mere infringement that the amendment explicitly prohibits, are ANTITHETICAL to very intent and purpose of the amendment.
 
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