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Massachusetts 2A group not mincing words on carry permit requirements

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Massachusetts has always found their way into the pages of Bearing Arms with regularity, but the last week has provided a cornucopia worthy of a Plymouth Thanksgiving of things to update people on. Yesterday I reported on the guidance document issued by Attorney General, and Democratic frontrunner for Governor, Maura Healey. In the document Healy conceded that Massachusetts’s “good reason” requirement for a permit to carry would no longer be enforced. The directive looked open and shut, but there were a couple of little details that were noticed, and the Gun Owners Action League (GOAL) is not having any of that. I noted yesterday:

Regardless of this weird semantical game, Massachusetts seems to be bending a knee to NYSRPA v. Bruen, as they should! The only concerning part of this mishmash is the references to whether or not someone is a “suitable” person. Is the Attorney General basically inferring that issuing authorities should just deem people “unsuitable” to workaround the decision?

GOAL, the state level NRA affiliate club, has zeroed in on this caveat with laser focus. Jim Wallace, the Executive Director, penned an eloquent fire and brimstone letter. The letter was sent to the Attorney General, Governor Charlie Baker, and Terrence Reidy, the Secretary to the Executive Office of Public Safety and Security. Wallace wasted no time in making his thoughts and the organization’s position known.

July 5, 2022

Attorney General Maura Healey
Commonwealth of Massachusetts
1 Ashburton Place, 20th Floor
Boston, MA 02108

RE: Restoration of Civil Rights Under Bruen

Dear Attorney General Healey,

On June 23, 2022 the United States Supreme Court issued a decision on the case New York State Rifle & Pistol Association, Inc., ET AL v. Bruen ET AL.. In that decision the highest court firmly ruled that the Second Amendment is indeed an individual civil right enumerated in the United States Constitution. The Court reiterated that Second Amendment “is not a second class right subject to an entirely different body of rules.” Further, any laws or regulations regarding the Second Amendment must meet the absolute highest standard of review.

We are aware of the joint “guidance” released by the Massachusetts Office of the Attorney General and the Executive office of Public Safety and Security. We are officially demanding that the so-called “guidance” be retracted and revised as it does not reflect the decision handed down by the Court!

First   It is very clear by reading the guidance that the Commonwealth believes that “suitability,” IE Chief’s Discretion, is Constitutional. This method in Massachusetts has been widely abused by licensing authorities to restrict or deny all manner of people based on arbitrary personal opinions. Doing away with this type of discriminatory prejudice is absolutely at the core of the Court’s decision. Following a clear and logical reading of Bruen, that could not be further from the truth.

Post Bruen, the only hurdle a citizen must overcome to obtain a license is to pass a standard criminal and mental health background check. Those checks must be standard for every citizen under the 14th Amendment (Equal protection) and can only apply to criminal convictions or mental health commitments that make the citizen a “prohibited person”.

Second   Whereas restricted licenses are now clearly unconstitutional, the guidance gave no mention of the fact that any restrictions on currently issued licenses can no longer be enforced. That all such licenses are now considered to have been issued for all lawful purposes.

Third     A key element of the Bruen decision was the ability to carry firearms in public places. The court made it exceedingly clear that carry/possession bans in public areas must meet the “historically sensitive areas” condition, such as schools, court houses, etc. As such, state and local law enforcement need to be advised that any state laws or local ordinances that ban the carrying/possession of firearms in public places that are not strictly historically sensitive areas can no longer be enforced.

Fourth  The guidance states that “Licensing authorities may continue to inquire about the reasons why the applicant wants a license…” This absolutely violates not only the clear legal opinion of the Court, but indeed the spirit of it as well. If the licensing authority is not allowed to use that information against the applicant, then why would it be constitutional to ask the questions?

Fifth    As the issuance of licenses can only be predicated on a standard prohibited person status, this means that all other hurdles/inquiries are now unconstitutional. These would include mandates and/or conditions, but not limited to, training requirements, letters of reference, names of reference, qualification tests, etc. It must be included in any official guidance that these mandates are now in violation of Bruen.

It is for these, and other clear reasons, that we are demanding the guidance be retracted and revised to meet the clear legal reading and the actual spirit of Bruen!

Sincerely,

James L. Wallace
Executive Director, Gun Owners’ Action League

I can picture James “Big Jim” Wallace standing there like Galndolf, beard blowing in the hostile freedom squelching winds, staff in hand declaring “You shall not pass!”, as he demands a full retraction and revision to the guidance, to meet what the opinion in NYSRPA v. Bruen really means at the core.

Bravo GOAL and James Wallace! I don’t have any inside baseball, or know what’s going to come next, but I’m going to assume, as the Attorney General should, if Wallace’s missive goes ignored, a more firm wake up call will probably be delivered to the offending pinkos.

While I understand that the learning curve is going to be steep for many jurisdictions on this topic, that does not mean that I, or the constituents (mis)served in them, like it. The likes of the marxist states of Hawaii, New York, New Jersey, California, Maryland, Massachusetts, et.al. all need to come to terms with the “control” portion of so-called “gun control” laws. “Gun control” needs to be removed from their ideological fiber. No longer can these states control the people by infringing on their right to keep and bear arms. We’re looking at just the beginning of what infringements need to be scrapped going forward. Once the permitting processes are straightened out, hopefully we’ll see relief in the form of zero fees for such licensure, as well as dismantling every other infringement ripe for the picking. The dominos that’ll fall will make the progressives have a collective inadvertent defecation. The sooner they come to terms, the better.

We’ll be watching the progress of how our friends over at Gun Owners Action League make out, and of course update you with any new developments.

In the meantime, take a gander at the video that Wallace put out last week on GOAL’s youtube page letting the membership and public at large know they’re “on it” by clicking HERE or watch it in the embed below.

New Jersey governor signs (most of) his anti-gun wish list into law

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While it may have seemed too good to be true that the governmental bodies in New Jersey have not been standing in the way of honest law abiding citizens applying for their permits to carry, cold hard reality is coming in the way of more infringements from gun-hating Governor Phil Murphy. On July 5th, a day after the Murph spitefully noted on social media on Independence Day, that he was in fact going to take away liberties, he brought pen to paper surrounded by failed pillow salesman, or salesze, saleszi, saleszire (?), David Hogg, and some red shirted commie mommies.  As reported by the Association of New Jersey Rifle and Pistol Clubs (ANJRPC), the Murph signed into law quite a bit of his anti-gun agenda, which has been mostly stalled in the state legislature over the past year or so.

July 5, 2022.  Today, Gov. Murphy signed 7 bills from his infamous gun ban package into law.  All of the bills target the rights of law-abiding gun owners, and none of them provide for the severe punishment of gun criminals or impact mental health issues related to firearms ownership.  ANJRPC is analyzing the final versions of these measures in light of the recent Supreme Court Bruen ruling.

The 7 bills signed into law today are:

A-1302 – ammunition registration.
A-1765 – the “industry-killer bill.
A-4368 – microstamping
A-4370 – ban on gun ownership without training
S-1204 – registration double-standard for new residents
S-2846 – 10 years in jail for previously-legal kit guns
S-2905  – Bans .50 BMG firearms

This was close to the complete package of restrictions that tyrant Murphy wanted to come across his desk. Luckily a few other really awful bills did not make it past the finish line and we can hope that an immediate suit will force these laws into being stayed. Let us remember, in a post-Bruen world, it’s the responsibility of the government to prove they’re not infringing on rights, rather than us peasants proving that the tyrants are. This might be a very rude awakening for all the pinkos out there.

In that same vein, it’s hard to tell if these provisions will last, given the history, text, tradition test any offending law is going to have to face. At the time of the founding, would these things have been considered normal? Are these infringements. The answer to those questions are quite simple. Not normal to regulate the way the Murph wants to, and yes, these are infringements.

So subtlety stated, ANJRPC had that remark on the very same subject, noted again.

ANJRPC is analyzing the final versions of these measures in light of the recent Supreme Court Bruen ruling.

I had not checked in with ANJRPC’s leadership on that, but it seems pretty self-explanatory. That is, the hope is a brandy new bottle of litigation is about to be popped open, and fizz over on Murphy’s, “The Bill of Rights is above my paygrade”, hubris attitude.

We’re also playing in the big leagues now. The question I want answered on an academic level is “are these civil rights violations?” Between you and I, hell yeah they are. But would they be considered so in the eyes of the law?

Last week when I wrote every single member of the New Jersey legislature, I did mention that none of these bills should survive scrutiny under NYSRPA v. Bruen. I used simple terms, ideas, and words like “unconstitutional” and “think”.  From my correspondence to the viper pit:

If you have not familiarized yourself with the opinion, you should. In short, laws that would be considered constitutional or not have to meet the following test: Would this be considered an infringement on someone’s right to keep and bear arms at the time of the founding? That’s a simplified version of some of what you’re going to have to know about this case. Now is not the time to be voting on a package of bills that will create more litigation, but rather a time to learn about your limitations on what bills can or cannot be consisted constitutional.

The opinion can be found here: https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/21pdf/20-843_7j80.pdf

As a lawmaker, voting for any of these bills would be in direct violation of NYSRPA v. Bruen, the Second Amendment, and the Heller decision. You’ll be knowingly going against Supreme Court orders. Should any of these bills become law, they will be challenged, and the probability of them being overturned is quite high. Regardless of what you feel, or think, or know, about guns, firearms, gun stuff, etc. does not matter anymore. What matters is if you’re going to knowingly vote against established precedent less than a week after orders were delivered? Are you going to waste tax payer’s money by having the state tied up in litigation over any of these bills?

You can go on back and read the entire message I sent them in full, but you get the idea. They were put on notice. Someone did tell them, very publicly and individually, that these bills are things they aught to think about before voting on, because it’s likely they’ll be deemed a violation of our rights.

As more information on these laws comes out, as well as any litigation announcements, we’ll be sure to pass that along. In the mean time, the Garden State’s Independence Day celebration is clearly over, but we do have NYSRPA to blanket us, and keep us a warm.

NJ lawmakers ready Wednesday vote on new 2A infringements

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New Jersey has been in the spotlight a lot. Let’s face it, the Garden State is no friend to the Second Amendment. Just the other day Cam wrote about Governor Phil Murphy’s proposals to thwart the NYSRPA opinion. The other week I alerted readers about some bills that were in committee. Well, New Jersey is at it again with what seems to be a massive package of anti-civil liberty bills, all due to be voted on Wednesday June 29th, tomorrow. From the Association of New Jersey Rifle and Pistol Clubs, we have the following notice:

WEDNESDAY: ENTIRE LEGISLATURE TO VOTE ON GOV. MURPHY’S GUN BAN BILL PACKAGE

Please Tell Every Lawmaker to Oppose This Attack on the Second Amendment

On Wednesday, June 29, 2022. both the full Senate and the full Assembly are scheduled to take a final vote on Gov. Murphy’s misguided gun ban package, which targets only the rights of honest gun owners instead of targeting actual gun criminals. Whatever passes both houses will go to the governor’s desk for signature.

PLEASE IMMEDIATELY CLICK HERE TO CONTACT EVERY LEGISLATOR AND TELL THEM THE FOLLOWING:

PLEASE OPPOSE GOV. MURPHY’S MISGUIDED GUN BAN PACKAGE, WHICH DOES NOTHING TO MAKE ANYONE SAFER, PUNISH GUN CRIMINALS, OR ADDRESS MENTAL HEALTH ISSUES RELATED TO GUN OWNERSHIP. INSTEAD OF ATTACKING GUN RIGHTS OF THE LAW-ABIDING, PLEASE SOLVE ACTUAL PROBLEMS RELATED TO CRIME AND MENTAL HEALTH.

For in-depth analysis of the full roster of bills originally in Gov. Murphy’s gun ban package, click here and here.

I took a look at a rundown of what the lawmakers are poised to be voting on, and it’s quite a package. Instead of relaying every line item here, they were included in my correspondence to the lawmakers, which I invite you to read below. I took a bit of a different approach in addressing the lawmakers this time. I added a little splash of NYSRPA for them to ponder:

Attention NJ Lawmaker:

I’m writing concerning the upcoming vote tomorrow on Governor Phil Murphy’s anti-civil rights package of bills. The bills that Murphy is championing will do nothing to stop or mitigate criminal activity, or violence committed with a firearm. Rather than going after the criminals, these measures will only affect the law abiding citizen.

Some of the proposed bills are as follows:

BANNING .50 BMG FIREARMS (A-4366)
BANNING GUNS WITHOUT USELESS “MICROSTAMPING” TECHNOLOGY THAT DOESN’T EVEN EXIST (A-4368)
BANNING GUN OWNERSHIP UNLESS YOU’VE HAD TRAINING (A-4370)
BANNING POSSESSION OF DEFENSIVE BALLISTIC SHIELDS FOR PERSONAL PROTECTION (A-4369)
10 YEARS IN JAIL FOR ITEMS LEGALLY ACQUIRED (A-4367)
KILLING 2A RIGHTS INSIDE THE HOME (A-2215)
BANNING GUN OWNERSHIP UNTIL AGE 21 (A-509 / S-504)
AMMUNITION AND LONG GUN REGISTRATION (A-1302)
FIREARMS INDUSTRY-KILLER BILL (A-1765 / S-1893)
FIREARMS REGISTRATION DOUBLE-STANDARD (NEW VS. EXISTING RESIDENTS) (A-1179 / S-1204)

I’m not going to give you a line by line breakdown of each of these proposals. Instead, I’m going to remind you that the Supreme Court of The United States just released a very important decision last week on NYSRPA v. Bruen. If you have not familiarized yourself with the opinion, you should. In short, laws that would be considered constitutional or not have to meet the following test: Would this be considered an infringement on someone’s right to keep and bear arms at the time of the founding? That’s a simplified version of some of what you’re going to have to know about this case. Now is not the time to be voting on a package of bills that will create more litigation, but rather a time to learn about your limitations on what bills can or cannot be consisted constitutional.

The opinion can be found here: https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/21pdf/20-843_7j80.pdf

As a lawmaker, voting for any of these bills would be in direct violation of NYSRPA v. Bruen, the Second Amendment, and the Heller decision. You’ll be knowingly going against Supreme Court orders. Should any of these bills become law, they will be challenged, and the probability of them being overturned is quite high. Regardless of what you feel, or think, or know, about guns, firearms, gun stuff, etc. does not matter anymore. What matters is if you’re going to knowingly vote against established precedent less than a week after orders were delivered? Are you going to waste tax payer’s money by having the state tied up in litigation over any of these bills?

Lawmakers in New Jersey have long ignored both the Constitution, the Heller decision, and the voices of the citizens of New Jersey…Now is the time to pay attention to what the entire country has been told about how YOU/WE/Et.al. are supposed to treat the Second Amendment.

Instead, may I recommend passing bills that overturn the magazine ban, restrictions on semi-automatic rifles, hollow-point bullet restrictions, and pretty much every so-called gun control measure on the books in New Jersey. Why? Because they’re going to be challenged and that means money out of everyone’s pockets…regardless of what you may or may not “feel” about the measure.

In closing, please vote against all of these measures. Don’t be Governor Phil Murphy’s puppet and do his bidding so he has a case to make when running for the White House. You have been duly notified that these provisions would be considered unconstitutional under judicial review, and come reelection time, your voting record will be pulled and people will be told if you’ve wasted tax payer’s dollars as well as voted against the law of the land.

Some guidance for you to lean on:

“The constitutional right to bear arms in public for self-defense is not “a second-class right, subject to an entirely different body of rules than the other Bill of Rights guarantees.” McDonald, 561 U. S., at 780 (plurality opinion).

And “A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.” The Second Amendment

Warmest Regards,
John Petrolino
www.thepenpatriot.com

Now is the time to write to New Jersey’s lawmakers and tell them to oppose every anti-freedom, so-called “gun control” bill that’s been introduced. Not a resident of New Jersey? No problem. I’m sure the lawmakers would love to hear from you too! We’re all in this together and what happens in New Jersey, does not stay in New Jersey!

In the wake of NYSRPA, non-residents are also going to be able to apply for their concealed carry permit in the Garden State without having to provide a “justifiable need”, the provision of law that made the jurisdiction “may-issue”. Just last week, Murphy’s lap dog Attorney General did issue guidance saying that “justifiable need” is no longer a requirement to meet when applying for a permit. With that, I welcome everyone in the United States to apply for a NJ Carry Permit. The current guidance from New Jersey State Police on applying for a CCW can be found HERE.

The assaults on the Second Amendment are going to continue and it’s up to us to make our voices heard. At any and every opportunity we have, we should be letting the law makers know that they’re running afoul when they pass more laws that limit our Second Amendment right.

The legislators of the State of New Jersey can be reached HERE. Please be polite, and gently let them know how you feel. You can also contact Governor Phil Murphy’s office HERE and the Governor loves tweets directed to him at @GovMurphy and @PhilMurphy

2A activists take aim at California gun control laws

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A “Second Amendment reckoning” is coming for California’s gun-hating politicians, according to activist and attorney Chuck Michel, who heads up the California Rifle & Pistol Association and, along with fellow attorney and 2A scholar Stephen Halbrook, is one of the founders of the Second Amendment Law Center. Michel joins Bearing Arms’ Cam & Co today to talk about the immediate impact that last Thursday’s decision in NYSPRA v. Bruen will have on the right to carry in California, as well as the top legal priorities for challenging some of the hundreds of gun control laws that are on the books in the Golden State.

As we wrote about Monday morning, California Attorney General Rob Bonta is now encouraging licensing authorities in the state to strictly enforce the state’s “good moral character” clause for carry licenses, citing broad language used by the Riverside County Sheriff’s Office that allows the sheriff to “include consideration of honesty, trustworthiness, diligence, reliability, respect for the law, integrity, candor, discretion, observance of fiduciary duty, respect for the rights of others, absence of hatred and racism, fiscal stability, profession-specific criteria such as pledging to honor the constitution and uphold the law, and the absence of criminal conviction” to determine whether or not someone has the character necessary to exercise their constitutional right to bear arms in self-defense.

Michel says he and his team are already in contact with the Riverside County sheriff to talk about changing or even removing this language, but he adds that he fully expects several of the most restrictive counties in the state to follow suit, and CRPA is prepared to challenge the constitutionality of the clause itself if need be.

Beyond the additional litigation on the right to carry, however, Michel says that the Supreme Court’s decision is bad news for several draconian gun laws in the state.

Michel said the standard will affect three prominent California laws. Legal challenges to the state’s limits on assault weapons, its requirement for background checks for buying ammunition and its ban on online ammunition sales are pending before a federal appellate court.

“All of these laws should be struck down under this new Supreme Court standard,” he said.

The Supreme Court also is considering whether to take up California’s law banning ammunition magazines that hold more than 10 bullets, as well as a similar law in New Jersey. He expects the court may consider those laws under the new standard.

Michel told me today that he actually expects the Court to accept the magazine ban case currently pending in conference, but will likely remand the case back down to the lower courts for review under the “text, history, and tradition” test laid out by Justice Thomas in the Bruen decision. There are also several other challenges that are currently pending in the Ninth Circuit, including Rhode v. Bonta, which is the lawsuit taking on the state’s mandate for background checks on all ammo sales, as well as a ban on online or out-of-state ammunition purchases.

“The CRPA and my law firm are working together. We’re already getting ready to challenge a couple of the ‘sensitive places’ laws in California, we’re gearing up to fight the ‘moral character’ challenge. CRPA is calling it the ‘Second Amendment Reckoning Campaign’, and that’s what this is,” Michel declared.

“California gun owners have had pointless, punishing, bureaucratic red-tape, excessive gun control laws basically shoved down our throats. They haven’t saved one life, but they’ve made a helluva lot of good people into accidental criminals because these laws are now so byzantine and complicated that my book [on California gun control laws] is now 600 pages long.”

Hopefully the next edition of Michel’s book will be a little shorter, but in order for that to happen gun owners have to stay engaged and active, and most importantly, support the groups like CRPA that will be taking the fight to Gov. Gavin Newsom and the other anti-civil rights politicians intent on ignoring and infringing on our right to keep and bear arms.

Be sure to check out the entire conversation with Chuck Michel in the video window above, and stay tuned for the gun control lobby’s next steps in California, which could come as early as tomorrow when lawmakers are set to begin revising the existing concealed carry statute to include a host of new restrictions that were not explicitly outlawed by SCOTUS.