The Supreme Court announced Tuesday that it will not yet hear a challenge to Illinois’ ban on certain types of semi-automatic rifles, attachments and magazines, effectively leaving the law in place until lower courts decide the case.
In its final list of orders before its summer recess, the Supreme Court denied petitions to hear six cases challenging the so-called “assault weapons ban,” prompting a statement from Justice Clarence Thomas.
Thomas noted that the case came to the Supreme Court after the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals had already denied a request for a preliminary injunction against the law, ruling that the AR-15, one of the nation’s most popular semi-automatic rifles, does not enjoy Second Amendment protection.
“The Seventh Circuit’s decision shows why this court must provide more guidance about which weapons the Second Amendment covers,” Thomas concluded, adding, “If the Seventh Circuit ultimately upholds Illinois’ ban on America’s most common civilian rifle, we can and should reconsider that decision once the case reaches final decision.”
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An assault rifle that is currently banned for sale in Illinois is displayed at Freddie Bear Sports in Tinley Park, Illinois on January 11, 2023. (Scott Olson/Getty Images)
“The Court should not allow the Seventh Circuit’s decision to stand.” [to] Demote[e] “It makes the Second Amendment a second-class right,” Thomas said.
The Illinois law was enacted in response to the 2022 mass shooting at the Highland Park Independence Day Parade.
“We will definitely be back,” Hannah Hill, executive director of the National Gun Rights Association, one of the groups challenging the 7th Circuit decision, wrote to X following the announcement.
“But my heart breaks today for the people of Illinois,” she added, “whose rights have been denied by their own government and delayed by the Supreme Court, and the country will suffer as a result of today’s decision.”
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Levi Slater of Accuracy Firearms provides details about a Heckler & Koch brand rifle that he cannot sell to customers due to Illinois firearms laws that prohibit the sale and distribution of assault weapons and high-capacity magazines in Effingham, Illinois. (John J. Kim/Chicago Tribune/Tribune News Service via Getty Images)
In a statement, Thomas said the Supreme Court’s decision in District of Columbia v. Heller “ensures that the Second Amendment’s protections extend to all instruments that, on their face, constitute concealable weapons, including those that did not exist at the time of the nation’s founding.”
“And we note that ‘the Second Amendment does not protect weapons not ordinarily possessed by law-abiding citizens for lawful purposes,’ and recognize the ‘historic tradition prohibiting the possession of dangerous and unusual weapons,'” he wrote.
“But these minimum guidelines are far from a comprehensive framework for evaluating restrictions on weapon types, and fundamental questions remain, such as the criteria for determining whether a weapon is ‘tolerable,’ ‘dangerous’ or ‘unusual,'” Thomas added.
“If the Seventh Circuit ultimately upholds Illinois’ ban on America’s most common civilian rifle, it can and should reconsider that decision once the case reaches a final decision,” Justice Clarence Thomas wrote on Tuesday. (Photo by Jonathan Newton/The Washington Post via Getty Images)
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“In my view, the Illinois ban is highly questionable because it broadly prohibits common semi-automatic firearms used for lawful purposes,” he ultimately concluded.
