Your National Foundation for Gun Rights has filed an Amicus Brief in the case United States v. Rahimi. This is a prohibited persons case that has much wider implications than the plaintiff Rahimi himself.
In our brief we have asked the Supreme Court to readdress several areas of the Bruen decision to provide clarity to the lower courts in how they are to apply the decision in their rulings. You can read our brief here.
First among these misapplications comes the burden of proof question in the first step of Bruen. Even in a cursory reading of Bruen it is plain to understand that an individual’s conduct of owning or bearing an arm is presumptively protected by the Second Amendment, which many lower courts have not been following.
The second item we have requested the Supreme Court to address is common use. Many of the lower courts have been applying common use tests submitted by governments and anti-gun groups that have skewed the test to “actual” use rather than intended use.
In other words, these courts have been applying a metric that if you own an AR-15 with a 30-round magazine for the intended purpose of self-defense but have been lucky enough to not fire the rifle at an attacker, your rifle is not “used” for self-defense and therefore is not in common use.
Third, and possibly most important, we asked the Supreme Court to reiterate and emphasize that means-end scrutiny tests are not permitted in Second Amendment cases. Many lower courts have been inserting such tests under the guise of “history and tradition” or through other means to get the ruling they want.
Finally, we asked for the Court to provide clarity on weapons useful for militia service. In our lawyer’s words,
“(I)t would be extremely anomalous if Heller were interpreted to mean that (1) weapons in common use brought for militia service are protected by the Second Amendment, but at the same time (2) all weapons useful for military service are not protected by the Second Amendment.”
Our Amicus Brief provides important requests for clarity and reemphasis on these matters and will hopefully guide the Supreme Court in maintaining and securing our Second Amendment rights.
