Seventh Circuit Invalidates Ban on Carrying Loaded Guns in Public

[mr hawk]

Well, it's a start anyway.

Here is the link:

http://www.volokh.com/2012/12/11/sev...uns-in-public/

This site provides a link to the opinion.

[jpkotor]

I got about 30 pages into the actual opinions in the decision before having to do other things. Good read so far, I recommend it to anyone who has some time to kill (which none of us do since we're so busy browsing PAFOA).

[adyszel]

My favorite paragraph... Love the injection of humor at the end! Also, their argument really phrases the ridiculousness of the current law well. I'd be willing to bet that Illinois will try to implement a "justifiable need" clause like NJ and NY.

A woman who is being stalked or has obtained a
protective order against a violent ex-husband is more
vulnerable to being attacked while walking to or from
her home than when inside. She has a stronger self-defense
claim to be allowed to carry a gun in public than
the resident of a fancy apartment building (complete with
doorman) has a claim to sleep with a loaded gun under
her mattress. But Illinois wants to deny the former claim,
while compelled by McDonald to honor the latter.
That creates an arbitrary difference. To confine
the right to be armed to the home is to divorce the Second
Amendment from the right of self-defense described
in Heller and McDonald. It is not a property right—a right
to kill a houseguest who in a fit of aesthetic fury tries
to slash your copy of Norman Rockwell’s painting
Santa with Elves. That is not self-defense, and this case
like Heller and McDonald is just about self-defense.

[Curmudgeon]

Already being discussed...

http://forum.pafoa.org/national-11/1...carry-law.html

and here...

http://forum.pafoa.org/lounge-108/19...d-weapons.html



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[jpkotor]

Already being discussed...

http://forum.pafoa.org/national-11/1...carry-law.html

and here...

http://forum.pafoa.org/lounge-108/19...d-weapons.html



.

If the time stamps are correct on mine this one was first so go reign in the other threads.

[Rimfire]

I read the decision, it has some very good historical information in it. Here's a few of the points I liked:

Right to bear arms is not a property right. It is a right to self defense. “A gun is a potential danger to more people if carried in public…knowing that many law abiding citizens are walking the streets armed may make the criminals more timid.”

The available data about permit holders also imply that they are at fairly
low risk of misusing guns, consistent with the relatively low arrest rates observed to date for permit holders.

Interestingly, in the nineteenth century some states banned concealed carry, preferring open carry