The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals upheld a federal judge’s ruling on Friday that deemed California’s “one-gun-a-month” law was a violation of the Second Amendment and therefore unconstitutional.
The law, initially passed in 1999 by the California Legislature, banned the purchase of more than one concealable handgun per month in an effort to curb “straw transactions” where firearms were bought and sold illegally. The law was later expanded to include all types of firearms.
The backstory: A group consisting of gun owners, sellers, and advocacy organizations filed a lawsuit against California in 2020, arguing that the law infringed on their Second Amendment rights.
- Following the precedent set by the U.S. Supreme Court in the New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen case, a Federal district court judge sided with the plaintiffs and struck down the “one-gun-a-month” law.
Inside the ruling: U.S. Circuit Judge Danielle Forrest, a Donald Trump appointee, wrote in the ruling, “California suggests that the Second Amendment only guarantees a right to possess a single firearm, and that plaintiffs’ rights have not been infringed because they already possess at least one firearm. California is wrong. The Second Amendment protects the right of the people to ‘keep and bear arms,’ plural.”
- California appealed the ruling, but during oral arguments, the state’s Deputy Attorney General failed to sway the court with arguments about historical analogues.
- The three-judge panel remained firm in their decision, asserting that government limitations on constitutional rights in such a manner were unprecedented.
- The ruling was supported by U.S. Circuit Judge Bridget Bade, also a Trump appointee, and U.S. Circuit Judge John Owens, an appointee of Barack Obama, issued a concurrence acknowledging the narrow scope of the opinion.
What they’re saying: Raymond Mark DiGuiseppe, the attorney for the gun advocates, praised the decision, calling the striking down of the law as “undoubtedly the correct result.”
- “The patent absurdity that the court exposes about the government’s rationale here demonstrates that striking down this law as unconstitutional is undoubtedly the correct result and indeed the only acceptable outcome in a society where all constitutional rights must stand on equal footing,” DiGuiseppe said in a statement to Courthouse News.
