by William Kirk
Hello again everyone. Welcome to Washington Gun Law tv. I'm Washington Gun Law President William Kirk. Thanks for joining us. Hey, can you imagine if the minute you crossed the state line, you did not have the right to go to church, you did not have the right to speak freely. Government can kick in your door with no probable cause, with no warrant. You have to incriminate yourself and you're not entitled to an attorney. Sounds crazy, doesn't it? Of course, it is totally crazy. That's not how constitutional rights work. Oh, unless of course we're talking about your Second Amendment right of self-preservation because then the minute you cross a state line, depending on what state you're going into, you may go from living free like an American to live much more like a North Korean. Don't believe me. We're going to give you a couple of pretty crazy examples that have now resulted in a lawsuit that's got a huge hearing coming up before the Massachusetts State Supreme Court next week, and this case could, and I do mean this sincerely have massive, massive potential. So today, let's spend a few minutes, let's get familiarized with the case and let's talk about why this case might be Bruin's biggest impact yet.
Okay, America, we've talked about this case once before and we're going to talk about it again. It is the matter of Commonwealth v Donnell. It is a case that started at the trial court level in the state of Massachusetts. It is now before the Massachusetts State Supreme Court set for oral arguments on September 9th. It is also consolidated with another case of Commonwealth v Marquee. We will refer to the name case as Donnell, but there are two co-defendants to this case. Now understand that both of these cases involve pretty similar fact patterns. Mr. Donnell, as well as Mr. Marquee are lawful residents of the state of New Hampshire. Both of 'em have all the carry permits and privileges that the state of New Hampshire is willing to give them. In both instances, they crossed into the state of Massachusetts did nothing else except that they were actually possessing their everyday carry.
In both instances, they were then arrested and subsequently charged with and convicted of the crime of carrying a firearm into the state of Massachusetts without the state of Massachusetts permission. Now again, I want to be clear, there is nothing on Mr. Donnell or Mr. Marque's record that demonstrates they are anything other than lawful responsible gun owning Americans. The reason I said that this case, it really could be Bruin's biggest impact is because when you consider all of the policy considerations that states would use to try to justify why someone from New Hampshire should not be able to carry inside the state of Massachusetts, if you come up with all of the various horror stories and all the things that the gun grabbing left is really good at extrapolating, you realize that none of that matters under Bruin. None of it matters at all. As a matter of fact, we're going to spend a lot of time today on this amicus brief, which I think was incredibly well done, and this is done on behalf of the following party.
So you know who all is responsible for this memorandum, the California Rifle and Pistol Association, the Second Amendment Law Center, gun Owners of America, gun Owners of California Gun Owners Foundation, operation Blazing Sword and Pink Pistols, second Amendment Defense and Education Coalition, and the Federal Firearm Licensees of Illinois. All of you have weighed in on this very, very good amicus brief, which of course is authored by none under then one of our favorite California lawyers. That is Costas Morros. If you're not following Costas on Twitter, hey, there he is, right there. Get educated because he will do that. Listen, I said that this is really a very complicated equation that has a very simple solution and it does. It has a very simple solution because of how Bruin boiled it all down for us. And as the Amicus party correctly points out here, this case is simple.
There is no historical tradition of supporting a requirement that peaceable non-residents already permitted to carry in their home state submit to a burdensome process to obtain a Massachusetts license to carry if they wish to exercise their Second Amendment rights while visiting or passing through Massachusetts. And truthfully, if you look at the historical analogs that might actually be in play here, this is what else the Amicus Party correctly points out. On the contrary laws, his historically exempted travelers from such local restrictions, Americans of earlier eras knew that requiring citizens visiting another state to give up the right to bear arms was untenable. Well, and you see it still is untenable and in fact unconstitutional. Now we know that this Rahimi case, which yes, I have been very critical of, and maybe I'm overexaggerating the problem here, but I said that there is way too much sloppy language that can be used, especially for those who want to be intellectually dishonest to extrapolate language out there and say, well, obviously this law is constitutional.
And of course, of course the state of Massachusetts tried that here. The Amicus Party, however, does a very good job of bringing the court back to reality and actually pointing out that Rahimi probably actually helps our argument and hurts the state of Massachusetts. Rahimi poses several significant problems for the Commonwealth in that the Supreme Court one required historical analogs anchored in the founding era, two demanded a degree of fit. The Commonwealth cannot meet three demanded numerosity of laws that compare the underlying historical tradition and four justified disarmament only on the grounds of proven individualized dangerousness. All these leave the Commonwealth's argument in shambles and each is discussed in turn here. Now, I think one of the things that the Amicus Party does a really, really good job is this is great debate. Do we take a look at laws only from the founding era? Do we take a look at laws from the reconstruction era, both singular?
What is it? And I think that the Amicus Party does a really good job to saying, Hey, listen, there's no problem looking at reconstruction era laws so long as they also have a tie into founding era laws because then that demonstrates that we as a society have actually accepted those sorts of restrictions. Now, when it comes back to the Rahimi case, because as you know, state governments, federal governments, anyone who's proposing or promoting civilian disarmament, they're going to beat that thing like a drum all day, all night. This is how the Amicus Party also dealt with it. Contrary to Rahimi's reliance on founding era laws, the Commonwealth has not presented a single law from the founding era requiring residents of other states to obtain permissions from the state or local government before carrying a firearm. Thus, this case is not a matter of disagreement over degree of similarity of analogs.
The Commonwealth has not presented even vaguely similar laws about the carry rights of members of the political community. And of course, the state of Massachusetts tries all the usual prospects. We used to disarm the Catholics and the Native Americans and the enslaved and the British loyalists and all of that. But again, as the amicus party points out, that's a little bit apples to oranges here in the following. Even assuming laws treating Native Americans or loyalists as less than citizens were still good law. Mr. Donnell and Mr. Marquee have no such special status, actual or analogous, excluding themselves from the general citizenry entitled to full constitutional protection. And so again, in keeping with this theme that, hey, listen, they may want to make this out to be a very complicated equation. And even if the court believes it to be a complicated equation, it is still a very simple solution because it all comes down to history.
And as the Amicus party points out, Massachusetts proposed analogs do not come close to the degree of fit necessary to justify Section 10 A as the historical laws presented pertained only to concealed carry and often contained exceptions for travelers. Yeah, you see the problem here for the state of Massachusetts, it's not just the lack of historical analogs, it's that the history you did cite actually supports Donne's position as the amicus party correctly points out in its zeal to flood this court with synchronistic and dissimilar historical laws, the Commonwealth made an error that further imperils its arguments. Many of the laws it cites expressly exempted travelers even from concealed carry restrictions. Yes, that's correct. In fact, in many earlier laws, there was always exceptions placed for people who were traveling to or through that state. So as the Amicus Party, again correctly points out, these traveler exceptions to concealed carry restrictions were common in the 19th century, revealing that to the extent any tradition existed regarding carry by non-residents, it was a tradition that gave more leeway to visitors from other states like Mr.
Donnell or Mr. Marquee. And the reason that we say that this case could absolutely have the biggest impact of any post Bruin decision is, is that we all talk on this channel and you guys all go around the internet trying to figure this out, conceal carry reciprocity, and some states are incredibly good about it, and some states are actually horrible. And in fact, we have three states, and actually now it's down to two that absolutely positively do not provide any legal method for an out-of-state resident to carry a firearm inside that state. Now, this sounds like a really complicated problem, but the solution, as I mentioned, is really quite easy. And as the Amicus party points out, constitutional rights do not end at state borders. A New Hampshire resident visiting Massachusetts is at liberty to speak freely, worship as he wishes, travel inhibited and much more, all without undergoing a time consuming permit process.
His right to bear arms is no exception because the Second Amendment is not a second class right subject to an entirely different body of rules than the other Bill of rights guarantees. Okay? Now remember, the trial court actually found this law to be unconstitutional. So Donnell and Marquee are going to be asking the Massachusetts State Supreme Court to uphold the lower ruling. The state of Massachusetts is asking the State Supreme Court to reverse the ruling. The case is set for September 9th, so this is not the last video we're going to do about it, but this case, like I said, has the potential to start an avalanche of significant changes in this could ultimately turn out to be one of the biggest post Bruin impacts we ever see to our inalienable rights. We'll go ahead and link up the amicus brief down below so that you guys can geek out on it for yourself.
All of the groups who actually supported and contributed to that amicus brief. We'll put links for them down below in the description box so you could show them a little bit of love if you want to do that. If you've got any questions about this or anything else related to what's left of our second amendment rights, all of Washington gun law's contact information is down there in the description box. Maybe you got an idea for video we should be doing around here. If you do, go ahead and click on that link. Let us know what it is because it's probably a better idea than we come up with ourselves. Maybe you just want to be part of our monthly newsletter. The ability to do that is all down there in the description box. And then finally, and most importantly, let's everyone remember that part of being a lawful and responsible gun owner, like we talk about all the time here, is to know what the law is in every situation, how it applies to you in any instance that you may find yourself. Until next time, thanks for watching and stay safe.
Credit: William Kirk Washington Gun Law