Posted by Eugene Volokh:
California Supports Incorporation of the Second Amendment:
http://volokh.com/archives/archive_2009_07_05-2009_07_11.shtml#1246991754
See the California amicus brief -- signed by Attorney General Jerry
Brown, who was a former Governor and is talked about as a possible
future candidate for the Governorship as well -- supporting certiorari
in [1]NRA v. City of Chicago. The brief expresses support for a good
deal of gun regulation, but says:
The petitions in these cases should be granted to provide needed
guidance on the scope of the States� ability to reasonably regulate
firearms while extending to the states Heller�s core
Second-Amendment holding that government cannot deny citizens the
right to possess handguns in their homes.
And in explaining the state's interest as amicus, at the very start of
the brief, it says:
California has a strong interest in protecting the constitutional
rights of its citizens. But unlike many states, California has no
state constitutional counterpart to the Second Amendment. Unless
the protections of the Second Amendment extend to citizens living
in the States as well as to those living in federal enclaves,
California citizens could be deprived of the constitutional right
to possess handguns in their homes as affirmed in District of
Columbia v. Heller, 128 S. Ct. 2783 (2008).
Thirty-three other states also filed an [2]amicus brief supporting
incorporation, though they weren't the surprise that California's
brief was -- 31 of them filed [3]an amicus brief in Heller that also
endorsed incorporation (footnote 6). The two new additions are Maine
and North Carolina. One of the states that joined both of the
multistate briefs, Minnesota, is one of the six states that doesn't
have a right to bear arms provision in the state constitution;
California is another.
References
1.
http://www.nraila.org/media/PDFs/litigation/NRA_v._Chicago_Final_Amicus.pdf
2. http://www.nraila.org/media/PDFs/litigation/NRAAmicusFinal.pdf
3.
http://www.abanet.org/publiced/preview/briefs/pdfs/07-08/07-290_RespondentAmCu31States.pdf
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