Firearms Owners Against Crime
Institute for Legal, Legislative and Educational Action
Institute for Legal, Legislative and Educational Action
New York Attorney General Letitia James is a big fan of gun laws. In particular, gun control laws, just so we’re clear. As attorney general, she’s willing to defend pretty much any bit of gun control the legislature concocts.
Yet in a brief defending the state’s new concealed carry regulatory scheme, James has opted to argue that overturning the law might inconvenience the state.
State Attorney General Letitia James predicted in a legal brief that New York could become mired in “regulatory chaos” if a federal court decision knocking out key sections of a new gun control law isn’t challenged.
James, responding to last week’s bombshell ruling by U.S. District Judge Glenn Suddaby, filed a motion aimed at keeping the Concealed Carry Improvement Act in effect.
The measure was hurried through the Legislature on July 1, with Gov. Kathy Hochul, a Democrat, maintaining it was crucial to impose new restrictions on pistol permits to avoid “Wild West” behavior by those possessing firearms.
The legal brief from the attorney general states: “The serious risk of irreparable harm to public safety and the possibility of regulatory chaos necessitates an immediate appeal.”
The problem here is that the state being inconvenienced–what she terms “regulatory chaos”–is one of those things that simply shouldn’t matter to the courts.
This is a matter of rights. In particular, the right to keep and bear arms.
In light of that, how much “chaos” it creates should be irrelevant. One could argue the same could be said if the state sought to regulate journalists, only that law or parts of if were overturned.
Even the public safety argument is specious because one could make that same argument about violating literally any other right, and yet we don’t permit any of that to get in the way of preserving those same rights.
And people like James wonder why we say they view the Second Amendment as a second-class right.
The truth is that gun laws like the New York measure don’t preserve public safety. They endanger it.
Law-abiding people are unable to carry their firearms lawfully in any meaningful way thanks to the current law–the laws James is trying to defend–while criminals simply don’t heed any law. As a result, the gun laws in question only impact the law-abiding themselves.
So when a criminal decides on his target, there’s a better chance that target isn’t able to defend themself.
How does that make anyone safer other than the criminals? Then again, she spent most of her time in office arguing in favor of cashless bail, which just turns jail cells into revolving doors. Sure, she’s changed her tune now, but only an idiot could be blind to what cashless bail would do in the long run with regard to public safety.
So, as a result, her defense of this gun law based on “regulatory chaos” and “public safety” ring hollow. She cares for neither. What she cares about is keeping law-abiding citizens defenseless so as to make a safer world for the bad guys.
She’ll only change her tune on that when she risks losing her political career.
https://bearingarms.com/tomknighton/2022/10/24/chaos-gun-law-n63565