Supreme Court Upholds Concealed Carry Regulation
Recently, the Illinois Supreme Court upheld the law that governs the issuance of Concealed Carry Licenses (“CCL”) and Firearm Owners Identification Cards (“FOID”), saying that these regulations did not violate the Second Amendment rights of its citizens. The challenge came from Tyshon Thompson who was convicted of aggravated unlawful use of a weapon charge after police discovered a loaded handgun inside the glove compartment, who had a valid FOID card but not a CCL. Thompson argued that the statute governing the issuance a CCL is unconstitutional given the US Supreme Court’s decision in Bruen, which we have previously covered that has opened numerous challenges to existing gun regulations across the federal and state levels. Noting that such a challenge, “which is the most difficult type of constitutional challenge” to prevail on, the court characterized his challenge as essentially arguing for open carriage in Illinois. Noting that the statute he was convicted under is covered by the requirements for legal concealed carrying, and that open carry is illegal in Illinois regardless of what license an individual has. Nonetheless, in upholding the regulation the court relied on the language of Bruen which “described New York’s firearm licensing regulations as a ‘may issue’ regime that granted the government discretion to deny licenses based on a perceived lack of need or suitability” whereas in that decision, the Supreme Court, “accurately identified Illinois’s Concealed Carry Act as a ‘shall issue’ licensing statute.” Essentially the Supreme Court had taken issue with the New York requirement that a citizen needed to prove they were under more threat than the general public and that even then the regulators were not required to grant a license to an applicant, giving them too much discretion. In contrast, Illinois law and others that are “shall issue” are permissible because so long as an applicant meets certain criteria grounded in law, the authorities do not have discretion to deny an applicant from receiving their CCL. Given that Judge Kavanaugh reinforced the majority in a concurring opinion that explicitly stated, “the Court’s decision does not prohibit States from imposing licensing requirements for carrying a handgun for self-defense” it is unlikely that such a broad challenge to the statutes at question will receive much traction at the federal level, although court challenges will likely remain.
Department of Justice Files Brief Supporting Overturn of Illinois Gun Ban
Earlier this month, the Department of Justice filed an amicus brief in support of the plaintiffs in the federal case, Barnett v. Raoul, that is seeking to have an Illinois “assault weapons” ban overturned on Second Amendment grounds. The brief celebrates the ruling in Bruen and its reinforcement of Second Amendment rights, but says that, “Regrettably, not every State got the message. Just a few months after Bruen, Illinois outlawed some of the most commonly used rifles and magazines in America via a so-called “assault weapons” ban.” Looking at an earlier injunction that was struck down by federal courts, Bevis v. City of Naperville, which covered the municipal ban on assault weapons and high capacity magazines and kept the ban in place for the time being, the paper cited Justice Kavanaugh who believes that, “in the next Term or two” the Supreme Court will likely review such bans at the Supreme Court for their constitutionality. The brief singles out some firearms such as AR-15s as being effectively targeted by the ban, but that many of the firearms at issue should fall under the protection of the definition of “arms” that are covered under a Second Amendment analysis, owing in part to how ubiquitous said firearms are in our society generally. Although the DOJ coming out on one side of the debate is not dispositive in how judge’s may rule in the case at hand, it certainly is a signal of where the federal government will come down on these issues and for the likelihood of expanded gun rights in the near future.
