2 years ago New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. BruenIn 2017, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the constitutional right to carry a gun in public for self-defense. But in Illinois, it’s a misdemeanor for someone with a concealed-carry permit to carry a handgun while riding public transportation. The ban applies to Chicago-area Metra commuter rail, buses and trains operated by the Chicago Transit Authority (CTA), and all associated facilities, including parking lots. Last Friday, a federal judge ruled be considered These restrictions, when applied to the four permit holders, are unconstitutional.
under Blue EnThe government bears the burden of proving that laws restricting conduct described in the “plain language” of the Second Amendment are “consistent with the nation’s historic tradition of firearms regulation.” “The Court finds that Defendants have not met that burden,” U.S. District Judge Ian D. Johnston wrote. Schoenthal vs Raul“The failure is decisive.”
The provisions at issue in the 2013 Illinois concealed carry law are: Blue En In testing, Cook County State’s Attorney Kimberly Fox cited several historical precedents, but Johnston didn’t think any of them were sufficient. She argued, for example, that the 14th-century Northampton Statutes, which prohibited “armed force disturbing the peace” and the riding or entering “fairs” or “markets” “armed,” established a tradition of public weapon restrictions that continued in early American gun control laws.
in Blue EnJohnston points out that the Supreme Court “held that the Northampton Act did not impose a general prohibition on the possession of weapons, but rather made it a crime to possess a weapon for oneself.” Scare others“That motivation is reflected in the laws of the corresponding states,” he says. For example, a 1786 Virginia law made it a crime to “run armed at any fair, market, or other place, by day or night, with a view to terrorizing the county.”
In contrast, the Illinois plaintiffs: Hidden “The concealed concealment statutes prohibit plaintiffs’ Second Amendment rights from carrying firearms for self-defense. Thus, the concealed concealment statutes violate plaintiffs’ Second Amendment rights for entirely different reasons than Northampton’s law and similar state laws,” Johnston wrote. “Carrying a firearm is not fearful, it is concealed. Thus, these historical statutes do not serve as an appropriate historical analog.”
Fox also cited an 1821 Tennessee law, an 1837 Arkansas law and an 1871 Texas law that restricted public possession of weapons. Texas law required that anyone possessing a handgun have a good reason to “fear unlawful attack.” Blue EnJohnston said the Supreme Court considered the law and two state court decisions that upheld it to be “exceptions,” providing “little insight into how post-Civil War courts viewed the right to bear protected arms in public.” Fox “presents no opinion to the contrary,” he said.
Arkansas law prohibited carrying a concealed handgun “except while traveling.” Tennessee law prohibited carrying a “handgun in a belt or pocket” but made an exception for travelers, which the Illinois plaintiffs argued was relevant to their case. Johnston said he didn’t need to address that argument. “Left with only the Tennessee and Arkansas laws, defendants have not met their burden of proving state tradition,” he wrote.
The government also argued that 19th century gun restrictions on railroads were similar in context to Illinois’ prohibition. “The private nature of these restrictions thwarts the state defendants’ attempt to show a national tradition supporting anti-gun laws,” Johnston said. “The Second Amendment protects against government, not private, infringement of rights and liberties.”
Finally, the government argued that public transportation vehicles and facilities are “sensitive locations” and therefore can ban guns without violating the Second Amendment, though the Supreme Court has been vague about which specific locations fall into that category.
in District of Columbia v. HellerIn a 2008 case in which the Supreme Court first explicitly recognized a constitutional right to armed self-defense, the Court stated, “In our opinion, nothing in the case calls into question the longstanding prohibitions against carrying firearms in sensitive places such as schools and government buildings.” Blue En“The historical record reveals relatively few ‘sensitive places’ (such as legislative assemblies, polling stations, and courts) where weapons were banned outright in the 18th and 19th centuries, but there are also no known controversies regarding the legality of such bans.”
Fox and the other Illinois defendants “argue that modern public transportation is a sensitive space because it is a congested space that is publicly accessible and publicly owned or operated,” Johnston said, but he thinks that argument clearly goes too far.
in Blue EnNew York argued that banning gun possession in “places where people ordinarily assemble and where law enforcement and other public safety professionals are likely to have access” does not violate the Second Amendment. The Supreme Court concluded that “expanding the category of ‘sensitive places’ to all places of public assembly that are not isolated from law enforcement would define the category of ‘sensitive places’ too broadly.” The Court stated that its argument “would effectively exempt cities from the Second Amendment and eviscerate the general right to openly bear arms for self-defense…Simply put, there is no historical basis for New York State to effectively declare Manhattan Island a ‘sensitive place’ simply because it is crowded and generally protected by the New York City Police Department.”
Given that “caveat,” Johnston said, “being crowded alone is not enough to consider a site sensitive.” He also added that public access and public ownership or control make it “more sensitive.” Blue en. “These two additional conditions would still ‘effectively exempt cities from the Second Amendment and eviscerate the general right to openly bear arms for self-defense,'” he wrote. “After all, the streets of Manhattan, or, closer to home, the streets of Chicago, are busy, open to the public, and public property.”
The defendants liken the ban on guns for public transport riders to historic bans on guns in Congress and polling places. “This argument fails to hold up in light of the restrictions’ objectives,” Johnston wrote. “The defendants ask the Court to determine that the restrictions are relevantly similar because of their shared objective of protecting public order.” But “it casts the net too broadly to treat as sensitive places where the government wants to protect public order and safety,” he wrote. “This would seem to justify almost any gun regulation.”
Mr Fox also argued that government-run buses and trains were “sensitive areas”.
“Because they are enclosed moving vehicles with no escape route,” Johnston points out, but “this argument fails because there is no analogy to listed sensitive sites or evidence to support the creation of a new ‘sensitive site’ category.”
Johnson pays little attention to the practical impact of Illinois’ gun laws. But lead plaintiff Benjamin Schonthal, who lives in DeKalb County, points out that he “uses Metra to get to Northwestern Medicine Delnor Hospital, DuPage County, and downtown Chicago.” Mark Wroblewski, who lives in Woodridge, Illinois, “uses Metra to get to Chicago.” Joseph Bethel, who lives in LaGrange, Illinois, “has not used public transportation in at least two years, despite living within a half-mile of a Metra stop, but would like to use the CTA and Metra more frequently.” Douglas Winston, who lives in Waukegan, Illinois, “has taken Metra to get to St. Louis (from Ogilvie Station),” but “rarely uses public transportation.” Like Bethel, Winston said he would use public transportation more frequently if there were no gun laws.
Not only does the ban discourage permit holders from using public transport and make them feel unsafe when doing so, it also means that they have to leave their firearms at home for routine outings such as catching a bus or train during the day, which creates serious practical problems and makes it difficult to exercise their constitutional right, particularly as the ban applies to car parks. Blue En.
Other states have run into similar problems with “sensitive site” regulations. Blue EnStates that required applicants for gun permits to demonstrate a “special need” had to revise their laws. Several states responded by making permits easier to obtain but much harder to use, banning guns in a long list of newly identified “sensitive locations.” The list includes not only public transportation but also parks, playgrounds, zoos, libraries, museums, banks, hospitals, places of worship, stadiums, athletic facilities, casinos, bars, and restaurants that serve alcohol. Some states went so far as to ban the possession of firearms in all private business establishments, including parking lots, unless the owner explicitly allows it or posts a conspicuous sign to that effect.
Constitutional challenges to these laws have been filed in New York, New Jersey, Maryland, Hawaiiand CaliforniaThe reason for this is easy to see: rights that exist only in theory are not really rights at all.
