A judge in Vermont needs to call the Judges in New Hampshire. Last month, Vermont tried to get a lawsuit challenging the States high-capacity magazine ban thrown out. They claimed the plaintiffs had no standing. Superior Court Judge Mary Miles Teachout set that record straight.
“Courts do not require law-abiding citizens to become criminals to earn the privilege to challenge the constitutionality of a statute,” she wrote. “Plaintiffs’ allegations are easily sufficient to show standing at this stage of litigation.”
In New Hampshire, a legal challenge to the State’s unconstitutional buffer zone law was rebuked by a judge who claimed plaintiffs did not have standing. But by Judge Mary Miles Teachout’s logic, they shouldn’t need it. Enforcement is not a prerequisite to a challenge of constitutionality.
Vermonters With Standing
The law bans the sale, possession, and transfer of new high-capacity gun magazines, but allows people to keep any they had before the law took effect. I’m curious about how the police are meant to know or care about the difference. This seems like a problem that invites arbitrary acts of force on citizens. The old ‘we can’t get you for that,’ but we can try to get you for this (or this, or this…).
But the lawsuit is not about such threats – where you would need standing. Plaintiffs believe the new law violates the Vermont Constitution.
And while neither side got the case tossed the judge did recognize that because of the nature of the ban there were plenty of individuals with standing in the case.
Teachout said that the plaintiffs’ claim that they were being prevented from purchasing devices that would be legal, if not for the law in question, gave them sufficient standing. Owners of gun shops and a shooting range are also plaintiffs in the case, and she said they had the same standing.
By that legal logic, every New Hampshire citizens right to free speech would entitle them to challenge the unconstitutional buffer zone law. Which it does, by the way.
And still, we are forced to wait for an act of enforcement that never comes because the abortion clinic managers, the Democrats, and the abortion lobbyists and their campaign money all know the moment that happens it gets overturned in court.
So, why have a law you can’t or won’t enforce?
Is the question of allowing repeal a matter of waiting on a change in the wind that isn’t coming?
SCOTUS has been a reliable defender of Free Speech rights. And there is no current scenario where the US Supreme Court upholds this sort of law such that Democrats in New Hampshire can instruct their abortion buddies to infringe on a citizens right to public assembly. But they still defend it. Ask them why?
Meanwhile, back in Vermont, there is not a lot of confidence that the legal process will win the day for gun-rights. Several states have imposed magazine bans successfully. And while a court in California just overturned their ban, there is no guarantee Vermonters come away with a victory at this level of the process.