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Answer Brief on the merits filed in Norman v. State Open Carry case

California Right To Carry

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The brief can be read here -> http://blog.californiarighttocarry.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/2015-650_brief_1188051.pdf

Amusingly, the state's brief cites Heller extensively in support of the state's claim that states can ban Open Carry. The now vacated and sharply divided three judge panel decision in Peruta v. San Diego, which the court of appeals relied upon is not mentioned in the state's answering brief.

Answering briefs are supposed to be limited to the arguments raised in the opening brief on appeal. Norman extensively argued in support of the Second Amendment Open Carry right and that concealed carry is not a Second Amendment right and yet the state did not cite any case or other authority in support of its claim that Open Carry is NOT a right under the Second Amendment. Indeed, the state in one of its citations to Heller, replaced Heller's explicit approval of prohibitions on concealed carry with ellipses.

The Initial Brief on the Merits as well as a video of Norman's arrest can be found at my website -> http://blog.californiarighttocarry.org/?page_id=2318

Norman's Reply Brief is due in fourteen days.

Everytown for Gun Safety has filed a motion to enter as an Amicus. Some of you may be aware that "Everytown" filed an Amicus in the 9th Circuit en banc case of Peruta/Richards out of California in which it argued that there is no right to bear arms in public.

This time, Everytown claims:

"Everytown’s brief will present this Court with a broad array of
historical materials that were overlooked by both the court below and the Peruta
panel. These materials show that Florida’s law—which allows concealed carry
under a shall-issue permitting regime—falls well within a seven-century Anglo-American
tradition of regulating the public carry of firearms."

Interesting that in the 9th Circuit Everytown claims that there is no right to bear arms in public but here in Florida, "shall-issue" concealed carry is fine and dandy.
 

countryclubjoe

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I can see this turning into a public safety issue. Law enforcement agency's simply do not want to train personal in the proper handling of a person with a weapon call... Their are as we know many anti and or ignorant citizens out there.. I am wondering if the law makers are equating our 2nd amendment right to keep and bear arms and bear said arms" openly" to the age old first amendment maxim that alto we have the right of free speech, we cannot holler "fire" in a crowed venue, for fear of creating a public safety disaster.... It begs the question again, does public safety trump the US Constitution?

My .02

Regards
CCJ
 

StogieC

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The strategically placed ellipsis is just the start of the unethical misrepresentations in this brief. It's about to get interesting.
 
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BB62

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The strategically placed ellipsis is just the start of the unethical misrepresentations in this brief. It's about to get interesting.
Okay, that's the second time on this thread that the ellipsis (...) has been mentioned - so why not just quote the portion that you're referring to rather than simply mentioning it again??
 

StogieC

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Okay, that's the second time on this thread that the ellipsis (...) has been mentioned - so why not just quote the portion that you're referring to rather than simply mentioning it again??

Docket: http://jweb.flcourts.org/pls/docket/ds_docket?p_caseyear=2015&p_casenumber=650

Being involved in the case, I must decline to offer additional comment at this time. But I will point out where it was used.

The AG's Brief:
The Heller Court noted that the right is not absolute and is subject to certain long-standing limitations:

Like most rights, the right secured by the Second Amendment is not unlimited. From Blackstone through the 19th-century cases,commentators and courts routinely explained that the right was not a right to keep and carry any weapon whatsoever in any manner whatsoever and for whatever purpose. . . . Although we do not undertake an exhaustive historical analysis today of the full scope of the Second Amendment, nothing in our opinion should be taken to cast doubt on longstanding prohibitions on the possession of firearms by felons and the mentally ill, or laws forbidding the carrying of firearms in sensitive places such as schools and government buildings,or laws imposing conditions and qualifications on the commercial sale of arms.Id. at 626-27 (emphasis added).

What the Supreme Court ACTUALLY said:
Like most rights, the right secured by the Second Amendment is not unlimited. From Blackstone through the 19th-century cases, commentators and courts routinely explained that the right was not a right to keep and carry any weapon whatsoever in any manner whatsoever and for whatever purpose. See, e.g., Sheldon, in 5 Blume 346; Rawle 123; Pomeroy 152-153; Abbott 333. For example, the majority of the 19th-century courts to consider the question held that prohibitions on carrying concealed weapons were lawful under the Second Amendment or state analogues. See, e.g., State v. Chandler, 5 La. Ann., at 489-490; Nunn v. State, 1 Ga., at 251; see generally 2 Kent *340, n 2; The American Students' Blackstone 84, n 11 (G. Chase ed. 1884). Although we do not undertake an exhaustive historical analysis today of the full scope of the Second Amendment, nothing in our opinion should be taken to cast doubt on longstanding prohibitions on the possession of firearms by felons and the mentally ill, or laws forbidding the carrying of firearms in sensitive places such as schools and government buildings, or laws imposing conditions and qualifications on the commercial sale of arms.

District of Columbia v. Heller, 554 U.S. 570, 626-627 (U.S. 2008) (Emphasis added to show what the Attorney General tried to hide from the FL Supreme Court)

Note: State v. Chandler and Nunn v. State both ruled Open Carry bans unconstitutional.
 
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California Right To Carry

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Note: State v. Chandler and Nunn v. State both ruled Open Carry bans unconstitutional.

Heller also cited at 2818 "State v. Reid, 1 Ala. 612, 616-617 (1840) ("A statute which, under the pretence of regulating, amounts to a destruction of the right, or which requires arms to be so borne as to render them wholly useless for the purpose of defence, would be clearly unconstitutional")."

The court in Reid explained that Open Carry is the right and went so far as to consider a scenario where Open Carry was banned but concealed carry was permitted. The court in Reid held that would still result in the destruction of the right because it is only when arms are carried openly that they can be effectively used for self-defense.

The Reid decision closed by saying that it could not conceive of any circumstance in which a firearm should be carried concealed.

And neither has any concealed carry lawsuit to date.

Secret/Tactical advantage is not a constitutionally protected reason.
 

davidmcbeth

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Well, the court said MOST rights ... can be regulated. Well, which rights cannot be regulated then? And why not those?

These tyrants don't comprehend ... our rights do not derive from the gov't or will of the people....they are natural rights that existed before the invention of government. They are not subject to legislative, executive, or judicial review.
 

California Right To Carry

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Everytown for Gun Safety gets to file an Amicus brief.

Update by Charles Nichols, President of California Right To Carry – January 28, 2016 – Yesterday, the court granted the motion by the anti-gun group Everytown for Gun Safety to file an Amicus brief. On December 15, 2015 the same court denied the motion of Mississippi Carry Inc., to file an Amicus brief.

I post updates when they happen to the case here.
 
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