New Challenge to New York's Stun Gun Bans

From the Complaint in Calce v. City of New York (S.D.N.Y.), just filed today:

This §1983 action challenges New York State and City laws that flatly prohibit private citizens from possessing or using stun guns and tasers. In Caetano v. Massachusetts, 577 U.S. ___, 136 S. Ct. 1027 (2016), the Supreme Court vacated a conviction under a Massachusetts law that—like the New York State and City laws at issue here—flatly prohibited the possession of stun guns. Since then, most courts have found that bans on stun guns and tasers violate the Second Amendment and are unconstitutional. See, e.g., People v. Webb, 131 N.E.3d 93, 98 (Ill. 2019); Ramirez v. Commonwealth, 94 N.E.3d 809, 818 (Mass. 2018). In Avitabile v. Beach, 368 F. Supp. 3d 404 (N.D.N.Y. 2019) the court found the State's ban on stun guns and tasers unconstitutional and enjoined the State Police from enforcing it, see id. at 421.

Notwithstanding this, the City of New York continues to enforce the State and City laws that prohibit the possession of stun guns and tasers. Among other things, the City and Commissioner Shea continue to train officers that stun guns and tasers are illegal under State and City law and to instruct them to bring charges against individuals found in possession of them. NYPD officers continue to arrest and/or summons individuals they find to be in possession of them. When the individual Plaintiffs—Nunzio Calce, Raymond Pezzoli and Shaya Greenfield—contacted their local NYPD precincts to inquire, NYPD officers [told] each of them that stun guns and tasers are illegal.

Cf. People v. Johnson (N.Y. City. Ct. 2019), which indeed refused to follow Avitabile, and allowed a stun gun prosecution to go forward. I think Avitabile is correct, and expect that this challenge will be successful as well; for an earlier article of mine on the subject, see Nonlethal Self-Defense, (Almost Entirely) Nonlethal Weapons, and the Rights to Keep and Bear Arms and Defend Life (Stan. L. Rev. 2009).

Note that the plaintiffs in this case include the Second Amendment Foundation and the Firearms Policy Coalition; I have often consulted for the Coalition, though I haven't worked on this Complaint, which was filed by New York lawyer David Jensen.

Comments

[Sidney r finkel]

Ah yes, I remember well how Jefferson, Madison, Monroe and Franklin argued strenously that the 2nd A provided that citizens should have unlimited access to stun guns and tasers.

Well I am certain the Originalists will come out in force in support of the NY ban. Oh wait a minute they always abandon that Constitutional authority when it is inconvenient.

[Á àß äẞç ãþÇđ âÞ¢Đæ ǎB€Ðëf ảhf]

Tell us how you feel about powered rotary printing presses, mimeographs, photocopy machines, and oh yes, the internet.

[Á àß äẞç ãþÇđ âÞ¢Đæ ǎB€Ðëf ảhf]

And don't forget to explain your reasoning behind your oddball definition of "arms" to be restricted to black powder single shot muzzle loaders.

[AmosArch]

Are you arguing for an 'everything not expressively approved is forbidden' type of legal regime?

At the very least its way easier to derive the right to less than lethal arms from the 2nd amendment than it is to derive the right to kill babies from where ever they hallucinated it was on the Constitution.

[Jason Cavanaugh]

So to be clear:

You believe that we have the right to use lethal force for self-defense, but not less-than-lethal?

:rolleyes:

[Stephen Lathrop]

Jason, let's think about that.

First, a taser is not a self-defense weapon. It is a weapon to enforce compliance, specifically to assist police officers in executing arrests. That means you cannot logically derive a general justification for use of tasers from the right of self-defense. So by what right do you justify overturning a law against them?

Second, there is a body of law which protects innocents from abuse by people wielding firearms. Is it clear that the same protections apply against persons wielding "less-lethal," tasers? If a civilian tasers someone who is committing a crime (say an unarmed teenage girl, committing shoplifting), but who is neither a threat to kill, nor threatening bodily harm, and that tasered person dies, is it clear that the victim has been murdered? Is there some lesser crime? No crime at all? Is she fair game?

How does anything change if the suspicion was mistaken, and the suspected shoplifter was not in fact committing any crime? What happens if someone else did commit shoplifting, and the tasered person got tasered to death because of mistaken identity? Murder? Manslaughter? Assault with a deadly weapon? Nothing? What changes if the person using the taser is just a civilian bystander? An otherwise unarmed store security guard without a gun license? A cop?

Third, what happens during riots and rebellions, when rioters deploy tasers against police, perhaps police who are armed and defending the Capitol. Can an officer who sees a rioter holding a taser justifiably shoot that person? What about other kinds of crime situations? Let your imagination run wild. Are you clear in your mind about all the permutations of force and license which legalized tasers imply? Is the law clear about them?

More generally, you have a right to use a gun for self defense. What lawful civilian purpose does a taser serve that a gun does not serve better? Do you know of situations where you could lawfully taser someone, but not lawfully shoot them? Are there situations where police are trained that to save their lives against someone with a gun, they should not shoot their firearm, but always use the taser first?

How about ordinary crime? Is a mugger with a taser a less culpable criminal than a mugger with a gun? If the answer is, no, both modalities are deadly force, then is every police use of tasers to be treated by law as use of deadly force? Is that what happens now?

Why would anyone suppose that adding tasers to the civilian arms race is anything except a pointless invitation to more violence? Why do you want that?

[Armchair Lawyer]

"First, a taser is not a self-defense weapon. "

Really?

https://nypost.com/2021/02/27/self-defense-tasers-and-stun-guns-surge-in-popularity/

[Stephen Lathrop]

Armchair, I asked some questions. I didn't see anything in your linked article that answered them. You got any answers?

[WuzYoungOnceToo]

Armchair, I asked some questions. I didn’t see anything in your linked article that answered them.

Before that you asserted a (false) premise, which is what he was addressing. And most of your questions that followed that false premise were pretty ridiculous. For instance:

and that tasered person dies, is it clear that the victim has been murdered?

Did the person who used the taser have a reasonable expectation that it's use would likely result in the death of or serious injury to the shoplifter? And what the hell does that example have to do with self-defense...you know...what the poster you responded was talking about? And this one is just pants-on-head stupid:

What lawful civilian purpose does a taser serve that a gun does not serve better?

Gee, I don't know...maybe the same purpose that pepper spray might serve. For instance, a means of self-defensive force when/where a firearm is not a viable alternative (a location where they're prohibited, by a person who cannot legally carry one, etc).

You should have followed your own admonishment to "think" about this.

[Stephen Lathrop]

Go ahead, Wuz, answer all the questions. You will be able to tell how many there are by counting the question marks. If it is impossible to do it otherwise, feel free to insult me after each answer.

[WuzYoungOnceToo]

You do realize that the only one here stupid enough to be fooled by your tap-dancing is you...right?

[Stephen Lathrop]

Can't answer the questions, Wuz? Let's have some more insults!

[WuzYoungOnceToo]

LOL! I pointed out that your premise was bullshit and directly addressed not only two of your questions, but I did so in a way that demonstrated their stupidity and utter irrelevance (you still haven't told us what tasing a shoplifter has to do with self-defense)...and you think you're having a drop-the-microphone moment.

You really need therapy.

[Rossami]

Wuz overstepped with the insults (though in fairness you are doing your share to invite them). He is nevertheless correct that your questions, as asked, cannot be logically answered because you started with a false premise. If you'd care to try re-asking your questions without that false premise, maybe we can try to answer them.

[Stephen Lathrop]

Rossami, take a look again at my questions. Most of them do not depend in any way on the premise you call false. Wuz even complained about that, saying, "And what the hell does that example have to do with self-defense?"

And neither he, nor anyone else is trying to answer my questions. Just changing the subject, mostly. You want to impress me with an argument in favor of tasers, you have to have an argument in favor of tasers.

The best I have seen so far is pretty weak—basically that someone who wants to defend themselves might be reluctant to kill a would-be assailant. That gets asked apparently without notice of what it does to the necessary presumption that use of armed self-defense must be predicated on a reasonable fear of death or grave bodily harm. If that condition actually applies, who has the luxury of deciding on shooting not-to-kill? Conversely if you do choose to shoot not-to-kill, what does that do to a premise that you are about to be killed yourself, or maimed.

Or is it your argument that when you are armed with a taser, you are not constrained by the usual standards which apply to defense with a firearm? If that is your argument, what different constraints apply to shooting people with tasers, if any?

[Jason Cavanaugh]

"The best I have seen so far is pretty weak—basically that someone who wants to defend themselves might be reluctant to kill a would-be assailant."

Maybe you should look into the psychological effects of taking a human life. Maybe you're just a psychopath who has no empathy or remorse. Most people are not like that, and will not simply go skipping down the street after having to kill someone. You demonstrate a callous indifference to the emotional consequences someone will have to deal with in that scenario that, frankly, pisses me right the fuck off. Who the hell are you to make that determination for anyone other than yourself?

"If that condition actually applies, who has the luxury of deciding on shooting not-to-kill?"

The person who is being attacked. Granted, in your world (unsupported by common sense or SCOTUS precedent), you want people to be forced into killing their attacker. That choice isn't yours to make, unless you are the one being attacked.

The decision to employ a taser instead of a firearm has no relevance whatsoever to whether or not the attacker was capable and intent upon inflicting grave bodily harm.

Your arguments are wildly illogical.

[Commenter_XY]

lathrop, I thought Rossami articulated the issue well. Your original premise - a taser is not a self-defense weapon - is completely erroneous. Therefore, the questions you posed afterward have no meaning.

I would say this to you. Hypothetically, if I knew in advance that a stun-gun would be 99% successful in self-defense, I would choose that non-lethal means over a handgun. Sadly, reality is not that way; we do not know in advance. That personal view is informed by my religious tradition.

[Stephen Lathrop]

Maybe you should look into the psychological effects of taking a human life. Maybe you’re just a psychopath who has no empathy or remorse. Most people are not like that, and will not simply go skipping down the street after having to kill someone. You demonstrate a callous indifference to the emotional consequences someone will have to deal with in that scenario that, frankly, pisses me right the fuck off. Who the hell are you to make that determination for anyone other than yourself?

Jason Cavanaugh, keep thinking like that. If you do, you may someday arrive at moral clarity.

The fact is that our various states' standards for determining when it is legal to shoot and kill a would-be assailant are impractical, and a moral outrage in themselves. In American life today, when someone puts you in reasonable fear of death or grave bodily harm, the chance that he will also go on to kill you or maim you is small. Far more often than people are murdered or maimed, criminals and others—including would-be self-defenders who are mistaken or reckless—put people in fear of injury or death. But compared to the frequency of such incidents, actual injuries and deaths are rare.

You defend a personal power to take such a threatening person's life on no better evidence than an intuition. It is a panic-driven intuition quite likely—a supposition for which the law makes generous allowance on behalf of gun wielders. You are not only willing to do that, and approve that, but insist the law should protect you for doing it.

If you are like many of the other pro-gun commenters here, you take it a step farther, and suppose that your power to kill is a right, and that your exercise of that right would be a social service and a public protection. And on the basis of unquestioned premises such as those, you attack me as a possible psychopath.

That is taking things pretty far from any justifiable claim to moral legitimacy. It leaves me skeptical that morality has much to do with your accusations leveled at me.

I have for decades lived a quiet life in peaceful suburbia, with nary a threat to my survival from anyone. It has not always been that way. During my young manhood I went places and did things which from time to time caused others to threaten me, to assault me, to brandish guns or other weapons at me. I have been shot at, by an assailant who missed me with two shots as I fled. He turned out to be a paranoid schizophrenic, convinced I was an agent of the FBI and the CIA, and the Devil as well.

I have had guns leveled at me by police and civilians, men and women alike. I have been threatened with vicious dogs, and a length of heavy chain. In none of those instances had I done anything aggressive, or anything which justified in the slightest the threats against me. Those experiences were simply products of a disorderly culture I found myself in. I was not extraordinary in that respect, it was commonplace. One time, I was warned away from a path I was following by a burst of fully automatic fire into the ground in front of me.

I have been on the scene of two shootings, one of them deadly, but never so close I saw the shots fired. I did see the aftermath. I have two friends who were shot. The good friend of a close acquaintance was murdered in front of her, by strangers, for no reason at all, as they walked along a city street.

I have nothing against guns used properly. I have owned a bunch of guns, which I used to hunt game. I have more experience even than most hunters carrying a gun with the intention to use it to kill, because I lived for years in a place where the various hunting seasons stretched about 5 months of the year, and I loved to hunt.

But during all that time, and in all those occasionally threatening circumstances, I resisted going armed in public. I resisted because I fully believed what I mentioned above—that even under apparently deadly threat, my life was actually in little danger. I reckoned that in most instances, to produce a gun to defend myself would escalate my danger, and the danger to others, instead of reduce it. I had enough experience with actual gun use to discount nearly to zero any assurance that I would be better off in a shoot out than by relying on sober restrained judgment to de-escalate a crisis. And I was keenly aware that almost all of the people who threatened me (all of the non-criminals), including those with guns, had done so mistakenly. I wanted no part of killing such a person on my conscience.

I suggest you are not in a good comparative position to lecture me about morality, empathy, or remorse. I am guessing, perhaps incorrectly, I admit, that you do not have much real-world experience with actually deadly gun use. I base that guess on experience with others I know who have had histories similar to mine. They do not talk like you do.

[Stephen Lathrop]

Commenter_XY, the questions I posed afterward have exactly the meanings they would have had if I had not voiced the premise. Can you answer those questions, or are you like the others here who want to evade them? I value your commentary enough that I would especially like to see any answers you would give.

You do at least get credit for forthright admission that you do not suppose a taser is an adequate weapon for self-defense—however much you paradoxically insist it is a defensive weapon. I presume you do not actually contest my assertion that the taser was designed as a weapon to force compliance with police as they made arrests, and not for their defense. You would not assert, would you, that police are trained that when under deadly threat they should go for the taser instead of the gun?

[WuzYoungOnceToo]

And neither he, nor anyone else is trying to answer my questions.

Except that I did directly address 2 of them...which is 2 more than were warranted...you lying sack of crap.

[WuzYoungOnceToo]

That gets asked apparently without notice of what it does to the necessary presumption that use of armed self-defense must be predicated on a reasonable fear of death or grave bodily harm. If that condition actually applies, who has the luxury of deciding on shooting not-to-kill?

I'll address this one, but only for the benefit of other readers...because you already know the question is bullshit since you've had this explained to you ad nauseum here for many years now.

First off, "shoot-to-kill" is an inaccurate term when used to describe the legally justifiable use of deadly force via a firearm. What is justified is "shoot-to-end-the-threat". That doing so also comes with a high risk of lethality for the attacker is just an unavoidable consequence of employing the single most effective and practical means of quickly and decisively stopping such a threat. Once the threat is ended (as perceivable by a reasonable person) the law in pretty much all U.S. jurisdictions requires that a defender cease employing deadly force. Indeed, there are several well-known cases of defenders now doing prison time because they chose to administer a coup de gras anchoring shot after their attacker had already been incapacitated by what would otherwise have been a perfectly legal self-defense use of deadly force. Were "shoot-to-kill" the standard then that would not be the case.

That some might be adverse...for whatever reason...to accepting the elevated (relative to use of less-lethal means) risk of killing their attacker and choose to carry something like a taser (or pepper spray, or whatever) instead of a firearm, and are willing to accept the lesser effectiveness of those tools then that has absolutely in no way makes their use in a self-defense situation less justified. Your argument is akin to saying that since the justification for use of deadly force is reasonable fear of imminent death or great bodily harm, one would not be justified in fighting back using one's hands and/or feet because one opted to not arm oneself with a firearm. Hopefully even you can recognize how profoundly dumb that is.

[WuzYoungOnceToo]

That some might be adverse...

Er, "averse".

[Chris Baker]

Stephen,
There are many reasons that a less-than-lethal arm may be the device of choice of someone interested in self-defense. We have seen this many times in domestic relationships where the victim doesn't particularly want to shoot or kill their opposing party and have to explain to their child why mommy or daddy shot and killed their other parent.

Also, there are religious reasons that are present for some where they are authorized to defend themselves, but not kill people. Mix this with those individuals who are just generally opposed to killing others and you have a good mix of folks who these are great choices for.

People carry pepper spray for self-defense. I'd argue that a taser is far more effective than that.

[Brett Bellmore]

"Why would anyone suppose that adding tasers to the civilian arms race is anything except a pointless invitation to more violence?"

Because some people are reluctant to defend themselves when it carries a high risk of their attacker dying, obviously.

[Stephen Lathrop]

Brett, anyone with a gun is at risk of being killed by an assailant with a taser, who can take the gun after the taser incapacitates the gun carrier. On that basis, if an armed person sees a taser pointed at him, is he justified in shooting to kill? Why not?

[Brett Bellmore]

The only reason I'm not calling that stupid, is that it isn't coherent enough to rise to that level.

You are, I must assume deliberately, eliding the difference between the aggressor and defender.

A defender with a taser may be reasonably presumed to intend to stop at incapacitation, because they ARE the defender, they're somebody who was forced into the fight, they didn't attack.

An aggressor with a taser benefits from no such presumption, because if they didn't mean you ill, they had the option of simply not attacking in the first place. It may reasonably be presumed that, once they have incapacitated you, they will continue tasing you until you have a heart attack, or switch weapons.

[Stephen Lathrop]

So Brett, assume a Capitol insurrectionist in a mob trying to force entry past a police barricade, holding a taser in hand and pointing it at a police officer directly in front of him. Can the officer shoot him dead? If not, why not? (I predict you will respond with beside-the-point blather about shooting in a crowd, or something. Please just face the question.)

Also? You are gratuitous in assigning roles of guilt and innocence among participants in an armed confrontation. It reminds me of the rhetorical advantage which gun advocates attempt to seize with their endlessly repeated, "lawful gun carrier," refrain. Nothing works better to get you where you want to go in an argument than assuming your critics are criminals and you are blameless. To bystanders who have not chosen a side, it is a more complicated picture.

[Brett Bellmore]

I'd require that the officer say something like, "Stop, or I'll shoot!", but, yes, an officer of the law legally barring entry to a place is perfectly entitled to shoot you if you point a taser at them.

I distinguish between the aggressor and the defender. Don't you?

[WuzYoungOnceToo]

assume a Capitol insurrectionist in a mob trying to force entry past a police barricade, holding a taser in hand and pointing it at a police officer directly in front of him. Can the officer shoot him dead? If not, why not.

Well, given that we already know that they can shoot someone dead who isn't holding...let alone pointing...any sort of weapon that seems like an extra stupid question, even for you.

[The original jack burton]

For the past eight years I have had a webstore specializing in non-lethal self defense items such as tasers, stun guns, and pepper spray. I also have a store front in Gary Indiana with the same merchandise. I also do booths in gun shows, flea markets, and other venues across northern Indiana. Don't want to seem like a spammer but you can find me by googling myhightechsecurity.

I have sold these tools over the net and in person to thousands of people interested in their safety and self defense. It is fair and legitimate to say that I know a bit about these products, the people who buy them, and how they are used.

In the immortal words of Vincent Gambini, "Everything Stephen says is bullsh!t."

[Stephen Lathrop]

Jack Burton. Mostly I asked questions, which commenters here are mostly running from. Are you suggesting that asking questions is, "bullshit?" Wuz seems to think that, so maybe you do too.

If you think you can provide answers, based on your personal knowledge, why don't you line up the questions in my original comment, and answer them one after the other. I am not saying they are unanswerable, just that I don't have those answers. I do see potential for a lot of mutually-contradictory answers, given the premises imposed by the usually applicable laws of self-defense.

I was hoping for a discussion to show whether those contradictions could be resolved. Can you show how making tasers legally available for use by everyone could somehow fit into the existing legal framework which constrains armed self-defense? I don't think it gets the job done to accept the off-the-cuff presumption that if deadly arms are justified as a matter of right, then less-deadly arms must also be included automatically. Some of my questions were intended to illuminate problems I see with that presumption. What are your answers?

[Jason Cavanaugh]

"I don’t think it gets the job done to accept the off-the-cuff presumption that if deadly arms are justified as a matter of right, then less-deadly arms must also be included automatically."

Thankfully it is not only 'off-the-cuff,' but supported by logic and SCOTUS precedent.

Maybe you should read Caetano v. Massachusetts, 577 U.S. ___, 136 S. Ct. 1027 (2016) as referenced in Professor Volokh's post.

[The original jack burton]

Stephen sez: Mostly I asked questions, which commenters here are mostly running from.

Jack replies: Steph, you are in the position of a flat earther demanding that others answer his questions about the geographical makeup of the earth. It's not going to get you far.

But,, in your favor, you are consistent. We nailed you ten years ago on Volokh for being stupidly anti-self defense, and here you are a decade later making the same, silly arguments.

[Jason Cavanaugh]

"First, a taser is not a self-defense weapon."

False. To prove otherwise, you'll have to provide evidence which overrules a SCOTUS decision on the matter.

Your second paragraph is nothing short of absurdity. Stun guns and tasers should have the same general criteria for use as lethal weapons.

Third paragraph is more absurdity. This is not a game of 20 varieties of "what if."

"What lawful civilian purpose does a taser serve that a gun does not serve better?"

How about ceasing someone's risk of violence against your person without having to actually KILL someone? I'm quite certain that you've never even considered the mental health ramifications of having to shoot someone and put them down, but I assure you that it isn't just a piece of happiness and sunshine for most rational human beings. How about not having any collateral damage from over-penetration? How about not having hearing damage from having to discharge your firearm inside of a household hallway or bedroom?

Your arguments, as evidenced by your closing remarks, don't come from a legal standpoint, or a moral one, but rather one from which you are clearly antagonistic to the basic right itself.

"...civilian arms race." JFC.

Maybe before making a casual connection between the ownership of firearms and violence, you should look at the rates of gun ownership in the US over the last 40 years and compare that to the rate of violent crime in our country.

News flash: It won't support your correlation.

[Stephen Lathrop]

Instead of dismissing my questions, Cavanaugh, try answering them.

[Jason Cavanaugh]

I did answer some of your questions. Instead of ignoring the words I write, maybe try reading them.

I'm sorry that you based your entire argument on a false premise. I'm equally sorry that when presented with rational responses to your Chicken Little scenario, that you chose to pretend you've been ignored.

Are you clearly arguing against SCOTUS precedent? Yep.

Are you wrongly pretending that there aren't numerous reasons one might want to use a taser or stun gun to protect themselves instead of using lethal force? Yep.

Are you clearly hostile to the 2A? Yep.

Are you wrongly implying a correlation between civilian firearm ownership and rates of violent crime? Yep.

Are you pretending that we've ignored your response because your position is untenable? Absolutely.

[Stephen Lathrop]

Cavanaugh, I am arguing against SCOTUS precedent. So what? Happens here every day.

Did you notice that, ". . . we've ignored your response because your position is untenable," is neither an argument, nor anything I said?

You make the same mistake as several others by asserting that you can disagree with my premise, and thus dismiss all the questions. Mostly, the questions do not depend on the premise. If you can't answer the questions, what convinces you I have a weak argument? If you think the SCOTUS precedent is so great, why not just quote it for answers to my questions.

[Brett Bellmore]

You're arguing against Supreme court precedent and everybody who actually knows anything about the topic.

[WuzYoungOnceToo]

You make the same mistake as several others by asserting that you can disagree with my premise, and thus dismiss all the questions.

Your questions have not all been dismissed. Some have been directly quoted and addressed, including by me. Stop lying about it.

Mostly, the questions do not depend on the premise.

And they're also mostly irrelevant to the subject at hand. You've been asked what your shoplifting scenarios have to do with self-defense (the subject), but you've repeatedly ignored that...something you keep hypocritically and dishonestly accusing others of doing to you.

[WuzYoungOnceToo]

Instead of ignoring the words I write...

To be fair, that's all he's got.

[KevinP]

Sidney r finkel, did you write your comment with a quill pen?

[Sidney r finkel]

Wow, talk about missing the point. I have to assume that was deliberate on the part of the many responders because they had no rational rebuttal to the point.

The point was this. Originalists believe in a narrow definition of the Constitution, until they don't. They don't when a narrow interpretation would produce a result that they do not like. So, Originalists are basically opportunists, taking a theory when it produces the outcome they desire, abandoning it when it does not not.

They are of course free to adopt a 'results basis' philosophy of the law, but not free to claim that they are consistent, and fail to understand the fallacy of their logic, or lack thereof.

[The original jack burton]

Errrr.... YOU are the one taking a "narrow interpretation" of the arms word. Yet, you have not tried to justify that, eh. Wonder why.

[Jason Cavanaugh]

Ah. The ol' "I've been thoroughly embarrassed by my peers so I'll pretend they all missed my point" strategy.

Tell me, did SCOTUS accept your arguments? Has anyone ever accepted the argument that the Constitution only protects contemporaneous technology?

Seems that you're the only one without any kind of rebuttal.

[Krayt]

And thank god they didn't or government would be IR scanning inside your house without a warrant.

And using drug sniffing dogs outside your front door.

We have terrible battles for freedom underway right now. "Eye in the sky" drones taking high res photis every second of a city, so police can follow cars from, and back in time, from a crime scene. Oh, and who is meeting with an opposing politician.

Cameras everywhere. Cameras pointed onto property.

Good luck convincing Hollywood, one of the Democrats' primary donors, they have no right to distribute films because it's not from a clanking "The Mangler" printing press.

[WuzYoungOnceToo]

Wow, talk about missing the point.

Yes, you certainly did miss it.

Tell us...does the text of 2A refer to a specific weapon (for example, "muskets"), or does it use a far more general word indicating a very broad category like, oh...I don't know...."arms"?

[Kazinski]

Well, I don't have much use for non-lethal arms myself, if I need to shoot someone, then they probably need to stay shot. However not everyone feels that way, do you really want to tell people if they feel they need to carry a weapon for protection, it's a handgun or nothing?

[Stephen Lathrop]

Kazinski, for my take on that, see my 6:08 reply to Cavanaugh's charge that I am a moral monster. The TLDR is that it is not so simple, and that I generally oppose the notion that folks ought to be arming themselves against vague happenstance, or even possible happenstance.

I don't think anyone should be carrying a weapon merely because they, "feel," they need it. I believe that doing that puts them in more danger than leaving the weapon behind. Shoot outs have uncertain outcomes. Of course, increased public danger created by feckless gun carriers is undeniable.

As I said, for more explanation, read my 6:08.

[WuzYoungOnceToo]

Cavanaugh’s charge that I am a moral monster

There was no such charge made by him, you lying sack of crap.

I generally oppose the notion that folks ought to be arming themselves against vague happenstance

There were over 1.3 million violent crimes committed in the U.S. in 2020. You're calling that "vague happenstance"?

I don’t think anyone should be carrying a weapon merely because they, “feel,” they need it.

I don't either, given that there is plenty of rational fact-based justification for doing so in many (perhaps even most) cases.

I believe that doing that puts them in more danger than leaving the weapon behind.

A belief based on nothing but feelings.

Shoot outs have uncertain outcomes.

So does getting out of bed in the morning. And the overwhelming vast majority of self-defense uses of firearms don't involve "shoot outs" anyway, so...what the hell is your point?

Of course, increased public danger created by feckless gun carriers is undeniable.

You really are a disingenuous asshole.

[santamonica811]

Small typo:
"...NYPD officers to each of them that stun guns and tasers are illegal...."

I assume it's supposed to be, "...officers TOLD each of them..."

[Eugene Volokh]

Good point, I think that's right -- modified the post accordingly.

[santamonica811]

Or, I guess it also could have been "...officers [said] to each of them that..."

[BadLib]

That caught my eye also. It's in the linked PDF so the typo appears to be in the original.

This, boys and girls, is why you have someone else proofread documents before filing them.

[Krayt]

True. However I eould prefer eithrr an edit button, or at leadt s preview button to makenc94rections when posting here.