The Supreme Court upheld the ATF’s regulations on what people call “ghost guns,” 7-2.The regulation “treats unfinished frames and receivers and DIY-gunmaking kids as fully functional firearms.”The decision overturned the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals ruling.Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito dissented.Justice Neil Gorsuch wrote the majority opinion. They held that the refulation “is not facially inconsistent with the GCA [Gun Control Act].”As Cam Edwards at Bearing Arms points out, the plaintiffs did not focus on the Second Amendment but the Administrative Procedure Act.The plaintiffs “filed what they described as a facial challenge under the Administrative Procedure Act, arguing that the GCA cannot be read to reach weapon parts kits or unfinished frames or receivers.”IMPORTANT: A facial challenge means the plaintiffs claim “that a statute is unconstitutional at all times and under all circumstances.”The Fifth Circuit vacated the rule, finding “that §921(a)(3)(A) categorically does not reach weapon parts kits regardless of completeness or ease of assembly, and that §921(a)(3)(B) reaches only finished frames and receivers.”The majority of SCOTUS ruled the following are not facially invalid:
This seems to leave an open door to more anti-gun policies to stand.These are parts. How can you treat parts of a gun as a fully functional weapon?(I’m about to board a plane. I will add more once I’m in the air!)Sorry about that!! The airplane’s wifi did not work. It put me back in the stone age!Edwards always does a great job breaking down anything gun related:
If unfinished frames and receivers can be treated as fully functional firearms because they can be converted into such, what’s stopping the Supreme Court (or lower courts) from adopting the arguments of anti-gunners that semi-automatic firearms should be treated like machine guns because they too can be converted to full-auto?
That result, the plaintiffs warn, could leave many Americans facing new and unforeseen criminal liability for possession of a “machinegun” simply because they own a “popular” and “commonly available” rifle. The plaintiffs’ fears are misplaced. The government represents that AR–15 receivers do not “qualify as the receiver of a machinegun.” Nor, the government emphasizes, has ATF ever “suggested otherwise.” Much the same can be said of our reasoning today. As we have stressed, a statute’s text and context are critical to determining whether (and to what extent) Congress used an artifact noun to reach unfinished objects. And, without doubt, the NFA and the GCA are different statutes passed at different times to address different problems using different language. Our analysis of the GCA thus does not begin to suggest that ATF possesses authority to regulate AR–15 receivers as machineguns under the NFA.
With all due respect to Gorsuch, he and his fellow justices have also stated that the Second Amendment isn’t a second-class right, but that hasn’t stopped lower court judges from treading all over our right to keep and bear arms. Similarly, today’s note of caution about treating semi-automatic firearms as “machineguns” may very well be disregarded by lower courts going forward. That’s one reason why SCOTUS needs to address semi-auto bans and declare them an affront to the Constitution and the Second Amendment.
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