California’s Open-Carry Gun Ban Struck Down by Ninth Circuit

California lawmakers and governor Newsom were once again smacked down, this time by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, which found that the state’s open-carry ban violates the Second Amendment right to “keep and bear arms.”

This isn’t the first time California has received such a constitutional smack down.

“Judge Lee, joined by Judge VanDyke, write a concurring opinion ‘to highlight how California has apparently resorted to subterfuge to deny its citizens their Second Amendment rights,” the Firearms Policy Coalition reported. They offered up many highlights:

“The Ninth Circuit has ruled that California’s ban on open carry in counties with more than 200,000 people violates the Second Amendment.

The court says California’s Mulford Act is “tainted with racial animus.”

“Reliance on such racially odious laws in this case is both conceptually suspect and inconsistent with a proper application of Bruen.”

“In addition to legal arguments, California makes a series of policy arguments in support of its law… None of these policy points can overcome the text of the Second Amendment, the Supreme Court’s commands in Bruen, or the unbroken history and tradition of allowing open carry in this country.”

“Open carry is unquestionably part of our Nation’s history and tradition of ‘the right to keep and bear arms’… California’s ban on open carry in counties with a population greater than 200,000 is therefore inconsistent with the Second Amendment.”

Judge VanDyke noted that more than 30 states currently allow open carry in some form and highlighted that California itself once allowed residents to openly carry holstered firearms for self-defense without penalty, JDJournal.com reported. Open carry is part of a “longstanding tradition” protected by the Second Amendment.

The Firearms Policy Coalition continues:

“Most Californians would have no clue. But that appears to be the very point—California tries to hide the fact that citizens in those counties have a right to open carry their weapon under the law. Our constitutional rights, however, should not hinge on a Where’s Waldo quiz.”

“California routinely sues private companies for engaging in similar deceptive conduct… Our own state government must behave better than an unscrupulous telemarketer.”

The Globe reported in 2023 when California Governor Gavin Newsom proposed a Constitutional Amendment to the U.S. Constitution to restrict gun national rights. At the time, District Judge Roger Benitez also threw out California’s 32-year ban on assault weapons, while also clarifying the deliberate and incorrect use of the label “assault weapon.”

“The Second Amendment is about America’s freedom: the freedom to protect oneself, family, home, and homeland,” District Judge Roger Benitez wrote in 2021 for the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of California. “California’s assault weapon ban disrespects that freedom.”

In the case of the AR-15, “AR” stands for “Armalite Rifle,” named after the company that developed it.

Judge Benitez reiterated the meaning of the Second Amendment and swatted down other courts’ attempts to justify gun laws:

The Second Amendment “elevates above all other interests the right of law abiding, responsible citizens to use arms in defense of hearth and home.” Heller, 554 U.S., at 635. The Supreme Court clearly holds that the Second Amendment protects guns commonly owned by law-abiding citizens for lawful purposes. At the same time, “the Second Amendment confers an individual right to keep and bear arms . . . that ‘have some reasonable relationship to the preservation or efficiency of a well regulated militia.’” Id. at 622. And although the Supreme Court cautioned that the Second Amendment does not guarantee a right to keep and carry “any weapon whatsoever in any manner whatsoever and for whatever purpose,” Heller, 554 U.S., at 626, lower courts have often cited this proviso about extreme cases to justify gun laws in average contexts. There is no evidence that the Supreme Court intended that language to be a license to avoid its common sense holding in average contexts. Unfortunately, Heller’s acknowledgement of exceptions for gun laws at the extreme is in danger of swallowing Heller’s rule for the average case.”

The Globe remembers when Judge Roger Benitez warned Governor Newsom and the California Legislature several years ago to stop “nibbling around the edges of the Second Amendment.”

It appears the chickens are coming home to roost.