Medford, OR – Once upon a time, when the U.S. Supreme Court ruled on an issue, that was the final legal word on the matter.
Apparently, not anymore.
Times have become so partisan in America, even Supreme Court precedence doesn’t matter to some lower federal courts, and that is especially true of the oft-overturned Ninth U.S. Circuit Court.
Despite previous rulings on the matter by SCOTUS, Ninth Circuit courts have ruled that Hawaiians’ Second Amendment rights don’t extend beyond their personal residences, a goofy ruling that flies in the face of the landmark Supreme Court decision in 2008, District of Columbia v. Heller.
As noted by The Epoch Times, nearly two dozen other states are now coming to the assistance of Hawaii residents, including from the deep-red state of Texas:
Texas joined 21 states asking the Supreme Court to uphold Hawaiians’ Second Amendment rights to bear arms following a ruling from the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals last year that upheld Hawaii’s ban on residents bearing arms outside their homes.
The states filed an amicus brief with the high court to help resolve a split among the federal circuit courts of appeal after several of the courts ruled against the 2008 District of Columbia v. Heller case, a landmark gun-rights ruling.
“One of the highest responsibilities of a state is to safeguard the rights of its citizens,” the states wrote last week in their collective brief, “including the right ‘to keep and bear arms’ under the Second Amendment.”
“Law-abiding citizens keep firearms for self-protection—both inside and outside of their homes. Amici seek to ensure that their residents will not be deprived of their Second Amendment freedoms,” the brief said, as states further argued that the Second Amendment right includes being able to carry and utilize firearms outside of homes.
“The plain text of the Second Amendment protects the right to bear arms, not just to keep them,” according to the brief. “Yet Hawaii’s firearm carrying regulatory regime functions as an outright ban on the right to carry guns outside the home for most people. It therefore violates the Second Amendment.”
Following District of Columbia v. Heller and a 2010 SCOTUS ruling, McDonald v. City of Chicago, the brief said that “lower courts have applied inconsistent standards in Second Amendment challenges to state firearm restrictions.
The states also point out that the First, Seventh, and D.C. circuit courts have all have ruled that the Second Amendment right to bear arms exists outside of homes. However, other appeals courts have issued rulings that are inconsistent with, or directly conflict with, that established precedent.
“Inconsistent decisions by the lower federal courts have left States uncertain as to the precise boundary between permissible and impermissible restrictions,” said the brief. “These inconsistencies have also prevented citizens of amici States from exercising their right to carry and bear arms across State lines.”
The Republican attorney general of Texas, Ken Paxton, said last week the Lone Star State would be joining the brief.
“The blatant misinterpretation of the Second Amendment by the Ninth Circuit must be remedied,” Attorney General Paxton said.
“We are asking for the Court to simply uphold the Second Amendment as it is written. The lower courts have flagrantly disregarded the Supreme Court’s instructions in Heller, leaving the right to bear arms in jeopardy,” he added.
“We must have a clear and concise ruling that protects the Second Amendment from lower courts’ hostility to gun rights to prevent this type of infringement from happening yet again,” he said.
Again, we thought we had clear rulings on this issue.