The Supreme Court declined on July 2 to take up several Second Amendment-based challenges to gun laws, including a lawsuit about an Illinois law that prohibits so-called assault weapons such as the AR-15 rifle.
The ruling means that the Illinois law will remain on the books.
Justice Clarence Thomas filed a statement saying he would have granted the petition for certiorari, or review, in the Illinois case known as Harrel v. Raoul. No other justices dissented. At least four of the nine justices must vote to grant a petition for it to advance.
The law in Illinois made it a felony-level offense to have “assault weapons,” including AR-15s.
Quoting from a previous court ruling, Justice Thomas noted that the AR-15 “is the most popular semi-automatic rifle” in the United States and is “in common use today.”
The petitioners in the case applied for a preliminary injunction to halt enforcement of the law, taking the position that it violated their right to “keep and bear Arms” under the Second Amendment.
But the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit refused to block the law, finding that “the AR-15 … is not protected by the Second Amendment.”
In other words, the Seventh Circuit determined that “the rifle selected by millions of Americans for self-defense and other lawful purposes does not even fall within the scope of the Arms referred to by the Second Amendment,” the justice wrote.
He added that the Supreme Court held in District of Columbia v. Heller (2008) that the Second Amendment covers “all instruments that constitute bearable arms, even those that were not in existence at the time of the founding.”
And the court said the amendment fails to protect “those weapons not typically possessed by law-abiding citizens for lawful purposes,” such as “dangerous and unusual weapons.”
“But, this minimal guidance is far from a comprehensive framework for evaluating restrictions on types of weapons, and it leaves open essential questions such as what makes a weapon ‘bearable,’ ‘dangerous,’ or ‘unusual,’” he wrote.
Although the court “is rightly wary of taking cases” that are still before lower courts, Justice Thomas wrote he hoped the nation’s highest court “will consider the important issues presented by these petitions after the cases reach final judgment.”
The Supreme Court has “never squarely addressed what types of weapons are ‘Arms’ protected by the Second Amendment,” the justice wrote.
