NRA urges SCOTUS to hear challenge to lifetime ban on gun ownership by nonviolent felons

The National Rifle Association, joined by the Firearms Policy Coalition and Second Amendment Foundation, filed an amicus brief Oct. 1, urging the U.S. Supreme Court to hear a challenge to the federal lifetime prohibition on firearms possession by nonviolent felons.

A firearm regulation is unconstitutional under the Supreme Court’s Second Amendment test unless the government proves that it is consistent with America’s historical tradition of firearm regulation. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit, however, has never applied the Supreme Court’s test to the federal prohibition on firearm possession by felons and precludes any challenge to the law — regardless of the nature of the offense or how long ago it occurred.

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The amicus brief urges the Supreme Court to grant certiorari and reiterate that every firearm regulation must be subject to its test for Second Amendment challenges. It also provides an extensive historical analysis of firearm prohibitions from colonial America through the nineteenth century.

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The brief emphasizes that America’s historical tradition of firearm regulation allows for the disarmament of dangerous persons — disaffected persons who pose a threat to the government and persons with a proven proclivity for violence. But there is no historical tradition of disarming peaceable citizens. Rather, historically, peaceable citizens — including nonviolent felons — were expressly permitted and often required to keep and bear arms.

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