http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/marylan...story.html

Quote:A federal appeals court dealt a potentially serious blow to Maryland's landmark 2013 gun control law and similar measures across the country, ruling Tuesday that a lower court was wrong when it upheld the state's ban on assault rifles.

In a 2-1 decision applauded by gun rights advocates, a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit concluded that the semiautomatic weapons and high-capacity magazines banned by Maryland's Firearm Safety Act "are in common use by law-abiding citizens." As a result, they don't fall under the exception to the right to bear arms that applies to "unusual" weapons such as machine guns and hand grenades, the court said.

Quote:The judges sent the challenge to Maryland's gun law back to the U.S. District Court with instructions to apply the difficult constitutional test of "strict scrutiny" when considering whether the ban violated the Second Amendment. Previously, U.S. District Judge Catherine C. Blake had found the ban constitutional under the less-stringent test of "intermediate scrutiny."

If the appeals court's decision reaches the Supreme Court, the ruling could have national importance because it would give justices the opportunity to settle the question of whether states can ban assault weapons and magazines that hold a large number of bullets.

Good stuff

Strict scrutiny analysis lobs a huge grenade into the anti's arguments on this topic. No way an arbitrary mag capacity number passes that sniff test.

(02-05-2016 03:05 PM)rath v2.0 Wrote:  Strict scrutiny analysis lobs a huge grenade into the anti's arguments on this topic. No way an arbitrary mag capacity number passes that sniff test.

well done.... edit: somebody told me lobbyists aren't an issue....

your sig and post reminded me of this one....





then this one...

(02-05-2016 03:05 PM)rath v2.0 Wrote:  Strict scrutiny analysis lobs a huge grenade into the anti's arguments on this topic. No way an arbitrary mag capacity number passes that sniff test.

They will also have a hard time showing that the mag that the gun comes standard with somehow poses such a "safety" hazard.

This is a good ruling....but, there are a lot of liberal activist judges out there.

Personally, I would allow the Maryland law to remain in force, under the states-rights doctrine. But the federal judiciary has already shown (in the marriage cases, and elsewhere) that it considers that doctrine to be meaningless. So I would expect this law to be thrown out.

(02-06-2016 11:45 AM)Native Georgian Wrote:  Personally, I would allow the Maryland law to remain in force, under the states-rights doctrine. But the federal judiciary has already shown (in the marriage cases, and elsewhere) that it considers that doctrine to be meaningless. So I would expect this law to be thrown out.

States rights are usually a consideration when talking about unincorporated amendments and reserved powers. The 2nd Amendment is fully incorporated.