SCOTUS Decision on Hawaii Carry Case will Tell Gun Owners All They Need to Know

by David Codrea, Ammoland, May 12, 2021

“This petition presents the same issue presented in New York State Rifle & Pistol Association,  Inc., v. Corlett … Like the New York statutory scheme at issue in NYSRPA, Hawaii maintains a statutory scheme that  denies permits to ordinary law-abiding persons who seek to carry a firearm (openly or concealed) outside the home for self-defense,” attorneys Alan Beck and Stephen Stamboulieh argue in a Petition for Writ of Certiorari filed Tuesday in the Supreme Court of the United States. “Indeed, unlike the New York scheme, where some permits actually have been issued, Hawaii’s scheme is a permitting system in name only, because the  statute has been used to deny all permit applications during the nine years this case has been in litigation.”

The case is Young v. Hawaii, an in-your-face denial of the right to bear arms covered extensively by AmmoLand Shooting Sports News. George Young, a native Hawaiian and Vietnam infantry veteran has been trying since 2007 to have his right to carry either openly or concealed recognized, having filed three federal lawsuits (this case is his third) over the state’s deliberately unused handgun carry law. In March, an 11-judge panel of the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals struck down an earlier ruling that Hawaii’s firearm restriction was unconstitutional, declaring “There is no right to carry arms openly in public; nor is any such right within the scope of the Second Amendment.”

“The Ninth Circuit’s opinion, which finds the Second Amendment right does not apply outside the home at all, contradicts the decisions of every federal circuit court in the country that has ruled on this issue,” attorney Beck told Courthouse News after the decision was handed down. “We will be seeking Supreme Court review in order to overturn the Ninth Circuit’s erroneous decision.”

Here is the petition: LINK

After procedural responses, we will see if SCOTUS takes on the case or denies it without a word in another act of deliberate indifference — the Roberts court has disappointed in the past. Questions about the Chief Justice have eroded confidence in the courts being a venue where recourse for gun owners is possible.

Add to that questions about the new judges added by Donald Trump, Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh, and Amy Coney Barrett. When are we going to see some of that pro-Second Amendment fidelity our national “gun advocacy” groups were promising us was just around the corner when they were exhorting us to loudly support their confirmations?

If SCOTUS either punts on or rules against George Young, gun owners will have their answers.

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