On Saturday, Judge Frederick J. Scullin Jr., who normally sits on the federal bench in New York, struck down DC’s gun law which restricts possession of these deadly weapons to the home. You can read the ruling here.
I could go into all the reasons this ruling is an abomination. It is an affront to home rule. Communities with minimal gun safety laws and more guns have higher incidents of gun related homicides. Because of our leaky policy on background checks, people who should not have guns can get them all sorts of ways, be it at gun shows, on line or by way of straw purchases.
As Scotusblog reports, this ruling on a DC law was signed on a Thursday night in Syracuse, New York. The ruling wasn’t made public to the people of DC, who are most directly effected by it, until Saturday.
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The legal history of this case points to long delays in the courts, perhaps because the GOP in Congress did all they could to prevent judicial appointments to the DC bench. Fewer judges usually means delays in cases getting heard.
Lyle Denniston summarizes the history that led to a New York judge ruling on a law passed by the one governmental body in which Americans living in DC actually have some semblance of effective representation.
Written by a judge brought in from outside the city, the case had gained notoriety as the challengers to the D.C. law tried repeatedly to get a ruling, even asking a federal appeals court to step in to command that the case be decided. The ruling came more than seven months after the appeals court refused to get involved, saying it was confident the district court ”will act . . . as promptly as its docket permits.” Frustrated, the challengers renewed that plea in May, and that was still pending when the judge ruled.
Moreover, Gottlieb and the other plaintiffs argued that restricting the issuance of gun licenses to residents of DC is discriminatory.
Sure, if you dispense with the fact that in some places gun licenses are deemed an acceptable form of voter ID, one could loosely argue about the injustice that DC does not issue gun licenses to anyone who shows up. I’m sorry, but the same people who argue that gun licenses amount to a firewall to statistically non-existent in person voter fraud, now want DC to issue gun licenses to non-residents. Really?
Then there’s the reality that the same people who think it’s unfair of DC to restrict gun licenses to people who live in DC also believe that background checks are unfair.
There is definitely a post worth of material on the insanity of imposing the shoot ’em up culture on the streets of Nation’s Capital.
The more interesting story lies in some of the abnormalities about this ruling – aside from the fact that it was made by a Judge for a Northern New York Federal Court and as of Saturday night, it was unclear whether all the parties in the case got notice of the ruling. It may not be that big a deal, if there wasn’t a Federal Court in DC and if there wasn’t a rule requiring notice to all of the parties.
Then, it isn’t as if the gun culture crowd cares about things that stand in the way of displaying what passes for their manhood.
One of the parties to this case is an organization called Second Amendment Foundation, Inc. The founder of that organization is Alan Gottlieb of Bellevue, Washington.
That’s right, one of the plaintiffs doesn’t live in DC, and the judge who ruled in this case sits in New York. Both of these individuals are right wingers who are so big on state’s rights that they gave the middle finger salute to the DC version, aka “Home Rule.”
However, back to Gottlieb. His obsession is with bringing the rules of the gun jungle mentality to every corner of the United States – whether the locals want it or not. Next to the NRA, Gottlieb’s group is the most powerful gun agenda group in the country. He has broken a rule or two.
There is his conviction for tax evasion for which, according to Source Watch, he spent seven months in prison.
Then there is his indulgence in circulating a fake letter from a U.S. Congressman back in the 1990’s.
According to a site called Sweet Liberty, Gottlieb sent a gun agenda mass mailing that appeared to come from Representative Philip M. Crane, (R-ILL). The envelope had a replica of the Congressional seal and in large, bold letters identified the sender as The Honorable Philip M. Crane Rep. Crane, Member of Congress. The return address was Bellevue. What’s more, the letter inside bore a forgery of Congressman Crane’s signature. Then there is the content of the letter according to Sweet Liberty.
“Dear Friends,” the letter started off, “I recently asked Alan Gottlieb, Chairman of the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms, for the names of a few selected Americans with whom I could communicate directly on a matter of great importance to our gun rights.
Yours was one of the names Alan gave me.
Will you join with me and U. S. Senators Bob Dole, Orrin Hatch, Trent Lott, Don Nickles and other distinguished Americans as a member of the National Advisory Council of the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms?
After telling the reader that “over a 100 members of the United States Congress serve” on the advisory council, the letter warns in upper case that “ANTI-GUN FORCES NOW CONTROL THE WHITE HOUSE AND BOTH THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES AND THE UNITED STATES SENATE.”
“I’m amazed,” reads another paragraph, “that many gun owners I talk to don’t seem to understand that handgun ban laws are the first steps toward stripping Americans of their right to own and use all firearms.”
The Crane letter contains an intimidating questionnaire which, among other things, demands an “X” before one of two questions:
[] YES, I’ll help you in this urgent battle by rushing you my most generous contribution today: [$20 to $500].
[] NO, even though the powerful “ban the gun” crowd is at this very moment mounting an attack on my gun rights, I can’t join your National Advisory Council
Given Gottlieb’s history of skirting the law and bending the truth, with the usual far right paranoia about the government coming after their guns, I’m not sure he is in much of a position to argue what ought to be law in DC or anywhere else.
If ever there was a case begging for appeal at the federal appellate court for the District of Columbia, this is it. Unfortunately, the way the judicial system works, if this gets appealed a court in New York will be ruling on DC law.
Ultimately, this is more of the same Republican style imperialism that imposes rules on the people who reject the far right’s collective psychosis.
Image: CBS
Former contributor.
