Alito Misleads Committee on U.S. Gun Laws, Says Brady Center

Alito Misleads Committee on U.S. Gun Laws, Says Brady Center

1/10/2006 4:49:00 PM


Contact: Peter Hamm of the Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence, 202-289-5792

WASHINGTON, Jan. 10 /U.S. Newswire/ -- In an exchange with Sen. Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.), Judge Samuel Alito, in defending his dissent in U.S. v. Rybar, 103 F.3d 273 (3rd Cir. 1996), mislead the Senate Judiciary Committee about the content and history of federal gun laws, according to Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence. In his Rybar opinion, Judge Alito wrote that the federal machine gun ban amounted to an unconstitutional exercise of Congressional power under the Commerce Clause.

-- Judge Alito wrongly suggested to the Committee that the machine gun ban is indistinguishable from the statute struck down in U.S. v. Lopez, 514 U.S. 549 (1995). The Gun-Free School Zones Act at issue in Lopez banned possession of guns in a particular place; i.e. at or near a school. The machine gun ban, by contrast, prohibits possession of fully automatic weapons in any location.

o Moreover, Judge Alito went far beyond the limited holding in Lopez, and indeed his view in Rybar has been repudiated by the Supreme Court. In June 2005, the Supreme Court issued its latest ruling on Congressional power under the Commerce Clause in Gonzales v. Raich, 125 S.Ct. 2195 (2005), rejecting the theory advanced in Judge Alito's Rybar dissent. Six Justices, including Justice Scalia, sustained the application of federal drug laws to intrastate medical marijuana use. Based on this ruling, the Supreme Court vacated a 2-1 ruling in the Ninth Circuit case of U.S. v. Stewart, 348 F.3d 1132 (9th Cir. 2003), that had declared the machine gun ban to be unconstitutional. In his exchange with Judge Alito, Senator Kyl cited the Stewart decision, without noting that it had been vacated by the Supreme Court. Judge Alito's conclusion that the machine gun ban violates the Commerce Clause has now been rejected by every circuit to consider the issue: the Second, Third, Fifth, Sixth, Seventh, Eighth, Ninth, Tenth and Eleventh Circuits.

-- Judge Alito also falsely suggested that the federal machine gun ban and Gun-Free School Zones Act were unique among federal firearms laws because they lack a "jurisdictional element," requiring that prosecutors show that a machine gun had traveled in interstate commerce.

http://releases.usnewswire.com/GetRelease.asp?id=59107

unanimous. It appears Alito was on the side of the dissenting liberal justices in Lopez.

See UNITED STATES v. LOPEZ, ___ U.S. ___ (1995)
QUOTE
REHNQUIST, C. J., delivered the opinion of the Court, in which O'CONNOR, SCALIA, KENNEDY, and THOMAS, JJ., joined. KENNEDY, J., filed a concurring opinion, in which O'CONNOR, J., joined. THOMAS, J., filed a concurring opinion. STEVENS, J., and SOUTER, J., filed dissenting opinions. BREYER, J., filed a dissenting opinion, in which STEVENS, SOUTER, and GINSBURG, JJ., joined. < UNITED STATES v. LOPEZ, ___ U.S. ___ (1995) , 1>
UNQUORE

Of course "Freedom" to the right wing gun nuts means trashing social security and medicare. Ballooning deficits that threaten our nation's financial health and a really stupid President fighting useless wars to distract from his failings.

Now sit back and watch the right wingers try to defend Alito's pro NRA comments:

own firearms". See http://www.democrats.org/pdfs/2004platform.pdf

Are you saying our platform is for "right wing gun nuts"?

And that's why the right wing gun nuts support him.

support RKBA.

Just because a person supports the right to keep and bear arms (RKBA) does not place that person in the right wing.

...The machine gun ban, by contrast, prohibits possession of fully automatic weapons in any location....

That is utter BS. There is no such ban.

Machine guns are regulated under the National Firearms Act of 1934. Commerce in them is tightly regulated. People who wish to buy them have to undergo a background check, notify their local chief law enforcement officer, and pay a $200 transfer tax. The "Firearms Owners Protection Act" of 1986 stopped the manufacture and importation of NEW machineguns for other than police and military use.

But there is no federal law that "prohibits possession of fully automatic weapons in any location". That is an outright lie. When it comes to information about guns laws and peoples' rights with respect to gun ownership, the Brady Center is every bit as bad as the NRA.