OAN Staff Avril Elfie
12:35 PM – Monday, December 9, 2024
The Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) has rejected a challenge to Hawaii's handgun permit law, which makes it a crime to carry a handgun or ammunition in public without a license.
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Despite claims Monday that the Hawaii Supreme Court has not “properly read the Second Amendment,” three of the court's Republican justices said in a written statement that the state of the case remains with the Supreme Court. said that the intervention was not justified.
Justice Clarence Thomas, joining Justice Samuel Alito, found the Hawaii law to be “plainly unconstitutional,” but said, “Correcting the Hawaii Supreme Court's errors must wait another day.”
Justice Neil Gorsuch also wrote that the ruling “raises serious questions.”
Christopher Wilson appealed to the Supreme Court after he was arrested in December 2017 on suspicion of trespassing on private property with a handgun and 10 bullets fired into his front waistband. The firearm was unregistered and Wilson had not applied for a license to carry it.
Monday's order upholds a Hawaii Supreme Court ruling that rejected Wilson's argument that some of the charges violate his constitutional right to bear arms and allows the case to be heard.
The three conservative justices said Wilson could file a new appeal after the trial.
“Hawaii's Supreme Court has issued its decisions during the interlocutory appeals process, and in many cases, the court revisits and supplements its interlocutory rulings later in the process,” Gorsuch wrote. “Perhaps the Hawaii Supreme Court will take advantage of that opportunity in this case. If not, Mr. Wilson is free to seek review from this court even after final judgment.”
The decision condemned the Supreme Court's recent expansion of gun rights as “undermining an enduring law.”
“The Supreme Court orders state and federal courts to use a vague 'history and tradition' test to evaluate laws intended to promote public safety.” “This eliminates the traditional methods used by federal and state courts to review laws passed by the people to protect them,” the Hawaii court's opinion states. are.
“And by turning testing into history, we dismantle any viable way to interpret firearms law.” “All in order to advance the chosen mode of interpretation.”
The court held that Hawaii's “storage” violation, which makes it a felony to possess a handgun or ammunition outside a home or business without a license, is consistent with both the Second Amendment and the state constitution.
“States are not free to establish licensing systems that violate the Second Amendment and prosecute people who engage in constitutionally protected conduct for failing to comply with those systems,” Wilson's public defenders wrote in the Supreme Court's ruling. stated in the complaint.
The Supreme Court refused to hear the appeal, allowing Wilson to proceed to trial.
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