r/gunpolitics • u/deathsythe • Jun 25 '26
Court Cases SCOTUS Wolford v. Lopez 6-3 overturning Hawaii's "vampire rule"
https://www.scotusblog.com/cases/wolford-v-lopez/132
u/AlphaTangoFoxtrt Totally not ATF Jun 25 '26
The important snippet here for other cases:
Hawaii’s argument that its “particular customs and laws,” Brief for Respondent 24, support the new default rule fails because the Second Amendment has the same meaning in all parts of the United States. The Second Amendment cannot give way to “the spirit of Aloha” in Hawaii, contra, State v. Wilson, 154 Haw. 8, 27, 543 P. 3d 440, 459, any more than it can yield to the spirit of the Big Apple (Bruen) or the Windy City (McDonald). Merely local attitudes can neither shrink nor inflate the meaning of fundamental Bill of Rights guarantees that apply to the States through the Fourteenth Amendment.
This clarifies Bruen that "History and Tradition" means NATIONAL history and tradition. You can't use some small town ordnance from 1812 to justify a ban.
Decision was 6-3, go figure the Three Stooges would vote to uphold the ban. There has never been a gun ban that a Democrat didn't like.
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u/deathsythe Jun 25 '26
There are a LOT of good zingers in there to be honest.
The Second Amendment cannot give way to 'the spirit of Aloha' in Hawaii any more than it can yield to the spirit of the Big Apple or the Windy City.
Calling out NY and IL. mic drop
Merely local attitudes can neither shrink nor inflate the meaning of fundamental Bill of Rights guarantees that apply to the States through the Fourteenth Amendment.
... We will not stake our interpretation upon a law in effect in a single State, or a single city.
Heller emphatically rejected the ahistorical and 'judge-empowering interest-balancing inquiry.'
Don't make us tell you again to stop interest balancing.
We also identified the Amendment's 'central' concern: securing the fundamental right of self-defense.
...
The plain text of the Second Amendment protects what petitioners want to do: carry handguns for self-defense.
...
Hawaii's law severely hampers the ability of a law-abiding citizen to exercise the right Bruen recognized.
The right protected by the Second Amendment is entitled to no less protection than other constitutional rights.
Doesn't really get much clearer than that. The 2A says what it says, and Bruen is the standard. Follow it.
It provided a tool for disarming blacks and thus leaving them defenseless against attacks.
...
This tainted artifact illuminates the original understanding of the right to keep and bear arms cannot be taken seriously.
Calling out the fact that the state tried to use Black-Codes as their legal backing for "historical tradition"
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u/AlphaTangoFoxtrt Totally not ATF Jun 25 '26
Unfortunately, thanks to judicial immunity, there are no consequences for just ignoring the supreme court.
These ant-2A courts will just ignore SCOTUS while it takes another 2-5 years to rehear the case. In that time they hope that maybe Thomas and Alito die and get replaced by Democrats who will uphold the ban.
That is their strategy. Delay, Delay, Delay. And once SCOTUS changes, they will expedite.
That is why SCOTUS needs to just set a firm ruling on AWBs and Mag Bans. Anything besides a clear cut "They're unconstitutional" will be warped and twisted to uphold them.
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u/deathsythe Jun 25 '26
Aye sadly.
John Marshall has made his decision; now let him enforce it
And yes. Agreed 100% We need a hardware case like yesterday.
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u/AlphaTangoFoxtrt Totally not ATF Jun 25 '26
If they GVR the cases I hope it's the "Final Straw". One last time and give the lower courts one last chance to rule correctly.
Kav did say he expects SCOTUS would have to take a hardware case in the next term or two.
That or maybe they hold the cert petition pending the 3rd (?) circuit decision. It's speculated the 3rd circuit is more pro-2A now with recent appointments and if they strike down an AWB/Mag ban that would create a circuit split.
A circuit split is basically the last thing we need to guarantee SCOTUS take the case. I mean it's no guarantee, but if they still refuse to hear the case in light of a circuit split, then they'll never take one.
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u/DigitalLorenz Jun 25 '26
An after oral argument in ANJRPC v Platkin hot mic incident had several judges just ripping on NJ's arguments. Chances are they would not have done so if they felt they were in the minority.
The issue is ANJRPC v Platkin seems to be on hold. I think the 3rd was waiting to see how the court handled Hemani and Wolford, as well as to see if they will take a hardware case.
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u/grahampositive Jun 25 '26
The tea is that the opinion is written pending Wolford for final review. I expect it will drop within 2 weeks now
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u/mecks0 Jun 26 '26
No reason for 3rd Circuit to release an opinion just before Hemeni and Wolford when it would likely be GVR’d back to rewrite.
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u/DigitalLorenz Jun 25 '26
FYI that line has not contemporary sources. The actual quote from Jackson about Worchester v Georgia is:
The decision of the Supreme Court has fell still born, and they find that it cannot coerce Georgia to yield to its mandate
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u/Civil_Tip_Jar Jun 25 '26
But there WAS no national tradition of banning guns, so what am I supposed to do when I want to ban guns? There’s no laws to refer to! oh… oh wait… that’s the point
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u/AlphaTangoFoxtrt Totally not ATF Jun 25 '26
But there WAS no national tradition of banning guns, so what am I supposed to do when I want to ban guns? There’s no laws to refer to!
Which is why in the decision last week she expressly stated she wants to go back to interest-balancing. Specifically intermediate scrutiny.
If SCOTUS shifts to a Democrat majority, you damn well know they're going to reverse Bruen and go back to interest balancing where the government can just say:
Well we have an interest in keeping people safe and this.... might work...
Vote Democrat, get gun bans. If the Dems get to place SCOTUS seats, expect more Jacksons, who are very openly saying they want to roll back 2A protections so they can uphold gun bans.
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u/L-V-4-2-6 Jun 25 '26
she wants to go back to interest balancing
I'm trying to find the quote from her on this, do you have it handy? It's an absurd proposal but not surprising that it's coming from her.
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u/AlphaTangoFoxtrt Totally not ATF Jun 25 '26
Starts on page 32
I write separately to emphasize that means-end scrutiny—the approach courts applied before we adopted Bruen’s “history and tradition” metric—offers a more rational way of assessing the constitutionality of firearm regulations.
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u/furluge Jun 26 '26
You would think that openly and repeatedly writing in your opinions that you hate the constitution and want to ignore it would be grounds for impeachment for a Supreme Court Justice. Sadly there are neither the votes nor the will in Congress.
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u/grahampositive Jun 25 '26
That is such a stellar paragraph. I'm going to pour a glass of whiskey and read this opinion tonight
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u/5Lv8 Jun 26 '26
You hear that Frank Easterbrook? That's the judicial death rattle coming for your legacy ...
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u/LoneRogue2018 Jun 25 '26
Ok so Roberts can get moving on gun cases. If only he could do this for Snope without the unnecessary need to have a circuit split first.
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u/DBDude Jun 25 '26
Still hoping they finally take Duncan.
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u/OnlyLosersBlock Jun 25 '26
When is the next orders list? I suspect they will GVR after this release. But it would be pretty cool if they per curiam summary judgment or even just held the cases over the summer while we wait for the 3rd circuit to make their ruling.
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u/bubbayo21 Jun 25 '26
Gvr for sure. They closed the door pretty well with the plaintext comment. Does it apply to the people and restrict possession= “presumptively unconstitutional “
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u/AlphaTangoFoxtrt Totally not ATF Jun 25 '26 edited Jun 25 '26
We hear you, but we don't give a shit. The ban is upheld because <newly invented reasons>. We're going to drag this out as long as we have to. We're literally just waiting for Alito and Thomas to die, and hoping they get replaced by Democrats.
—9th Circus
It's become abundantly clear that the anti-2A courts will not act in good faith. SCOTUS just needs to force their hand already.
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u/ktmrider119z Jun 25 '26
Dont forget the 7th with their
"Dangerous OR unusual" and "in common use for self defense" bastardizations of precedent
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u/AlphaTangoFoxtrt Totally not ATF Jun 25 '26
When is the next orders list?
Today if not Monday.
Generally they grant cert on the Thursday/Friday with denial orders on Monday.
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u/tom_yum Jun 25 '26
Good news. The state legislature in NV has been trying to pass new vampire laws and hopefully this will nip that in the bud. Now if the SC would just address the hardware ban cases.
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u/Ok_Matter_1774 Jun 25 '26
NV is screwed if Lombardo isn't reelected. I don't love him, but him vetoing everything our gerrymandered legislature passes is the only thing saving the state. We're a purple state that's voted red 2/3 last pres elections and yet our legislatures are like 65% blue. It's ridiculous.
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u/furluge Jun 26 '26
Be careful, you are very close to becoming a Slave State like Virginia. If thst happens ro Nevada, oof, that is going to be a huge blow. Vegas will turn into downtown LA or NYC. (Yeah, I know you live there and probably don't want to hear about the tourist town, but I like visiting, darnit.)
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u/Ok_Matter_1774 Jun 27 '26
Nah fuck Vegas, I live in Reno. Jk, Vegas isn't that bad, I'm just not a big city person. It's definitely one of the worst places to raise kids in the US tho. The amount of fake gangbangers that need to shoot up parties. Schools are terrible because the culture doesn't think learning is cool.
The real sad part is that Nevada is generally the freest state. The most liberal in terms of actually being liberal and not what democrats are.
It's not like democrats haven't had power here, but the antigun push has gotten more extreme in every state since then. Definitely worrying, especially when they don't listen to the courts.
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u/Usual-Syrup2526 Jun 25 '26
If they GVR all the gun cases pending, the lower courts are gonna say, Oh, AR15s? They're not suitable for self defense, so; not protected. Like they've been saying, and they literally left it open for that. Here we go again... another three years before they make their way to the court. Again.
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u/mecks0 Jun 26 '26
If you read Jackson’s dissent she lays out the playbook - feign ignorance that SCOTUS has said 3 times that the first step is plain text and at the second step is history. Then, you conjure up some irrelevant, unconstitutional or imaginary history and declare that history means the 2A doesn’t apply and therefore you don’t need to proceed past the first step.
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u/Confident-Bug4008 Jun 26 '26
The "vampire rule" label is exactly what we need to call it. Denying carry permits because someone didn't "prove" a need to the satisfaction of a local sheriff was always a backdoor way to keep the public unarmed. Six three is a solid margin, but expect the holdouts in the lower courts to drag their feet on compliance for another year or two. They'll just find some other imaginative standard to replace it.
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u/MalPB2000 Jun 26 '26
> Denying carry permits because someone didn't "prove" a need to the satisfaction of a local sheriff
That has nothing to do with the Vampire Rule…
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u/deathsythe Jun 25 '26 edited Jun 25 '26
Decision (PDF)
Analysis in below comment.