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Incoming brief by federal legislators
DC had an Congressional amicus brief supporting it, signed by, I forget, 16 or 17 House members.
According to this article, there is a Heller brief incoming, supporting the individual right position, signed by 250 House members and 57 Senators. A majority of both Houses. And from that, necessarily bipartisan.
Hat tip to reader Jack Anderson.
UPDATE: the Washington Examiner reports that 68 House Demos, and 9 Demo Senators, are on the brief. Which means that the brief supporting Heller has four times as many Democratic signers as did the one supporting the District's gun law.
Comments
Yeeehaw!!!
Posted by: RKV at February 7, 2008 06:57 PM
Wonderful news! I had expected 100, hoped for 200...but this is tidings beyond all hope.
Posted by: Mike M. at February 7, 2008 07:17 PM
Very good news.
I hope the Congressional amicus brief squarely states that all those members of Congress support affirmance of the judgment of the D.C. Circuit below -- what the Solicitor General's amicus brief so signally failed to do.
Since the Congressional amici are filing in accordance with the Court's deadline for pro-respondent briefs, I assume that's so.
And that's big. Maybe I'm just in a good mood after finishing my read of the NRA's excellent brief an hour ago. But I'm becoming optimistic that the massive, combined support of both Congressional and state amici (the number of pro-Heller State AGs should likewise dwarf the pro-control AGs) will tend to marginalize the Solicitor General's brief.
The emerging storyline for SCOTUS (one that I think will be particularly persuasive to Anthony Kennedy) is that the Bush DOJ brief reflects the same old story from the Bush Administration: a bloated view of executive power (here, in the form of the BATFE).
Notice the passage in Heller's brief (Resp. Br. at 56) that cites Hamdi v. Rumsfeld (2004) (SCOTUS detainee case that Bush lost) for the proposition: "Exorbitant claims of authority to deny basic constitutional rights are not unknown. See Hamdi ..."
That's a shot at the SG's brief and the Bush DOJ. It is intended particularly for Justice Kennedy, who was in the majority in Hamdi. Although Heller's counsel puts his point in appropriate and dignified language, the subtext is, "Come on, what else would the Court expect from the authority-obsessed Bush Administration?"
Posted by: Mike O'Shea at February 7, 2008 07:39 PM
Very interested in who signed on to this brief.
Mark
Posted by: Mark at February 7, 2008 09:01 PM
Dollars to donuts, my congresscritter, the ripe honorable buttmunch Grijalva didn't sign it.
dc
Posted by: deadcenter at February 7, 2008 09:54 PM
The Washington Times in a story about this today is quoting some Congressman who signed onto the brief are all in favor of the Assault Weapons Ban....."Keep your friends close, keep your enemies closer."
Posted by: Rudy DiGiacinto at February 8, 2008 06:11 AM
Rudy:
First, your post above is unclear in its wording. How can a congressman be "all in favor?"
Anyway, that Congressman was Jon Tester from Montana. Please see:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/scotus_guns_congress
(This version CORRECTS by deleting that Tester backed assault weapons ban, which he did not.)
Posted by: Carl in Chicago at February 8, 2008 12:17 PM
Here is the direct quote: "Sen. Jon Tester, Montana Democrat, who also signed the brief, agreed that some restrictions are valid, citing their support for banning assault weapons."
Posted by: Rudy DiGiacinto at February 8, 2008 02:48 PM