SCOTUS dismisses NYC Second Amendment case as moot (and Justice Alito dismisses public safety claims with gun rights at issue)
The Supreme Court resolved a closely watched Second Amendment case this morning, in a manner that is sure to be disappointing to Second Amendment fans. The Court's two-page per curiam opinion in New York State Rifle and Pistol Association v. City of New York, No. 18–280 (S. Ct. Apr. 27, 2020) (available here), starts this way:
In the District Court, petitioners challenged a New York City rule regarding the transport of firearms. Petitioners claimed that the rule violated the Second Amendment. Petitioners sought declaratory and injunctive relief against enforcement of the rule insofar as the rule prevented their transport of firearms to a second home or shooting range outside of the city. The District Court and the Court of Appeals rejected petitioners’ claim. See 883 F. 3d 45 (CA2 2018). We granted certiorari. 586 U. S. ___ (2019). After we granted certiorari, the State of New York amended its firearm licensing statute, and the City amended the rule so that petitioners may now transport firearms to a second home or shooting range outside of the city, which is the precise relief that petitioners requested in the prayer for relief in their complaint. App. 48. Petitioners’ claim for declaratory and injunctive relief with respect to the City’s old rule is therefore moot.
Justice Kavanaugh issued a two-paragraph concurrence that concludes this way: "I share JUSTICE ALITO’s concern that some federal and state courts may not be properly applying Heller and McDonald. The Court should address that issue soon, perhaps in one of the several Second Amendment cases with petitions for certiorari now pending before the Court."
Justice Alito, joined entirely by Justice Gorsuch and mostly by Justice Thomas, authored a 31-page dissent. Justice Alito not only disputes the claim that the petitioners' claims are moot, but he also explains why he thinks it "is not a close question" on the merits "that the City ordinance violated the Second Amendment." Second Amendment fans will like a lot of what Justice Alito has to say, but I think criminal justice fans will want check out how Justice Alito is quick to dispute the claims made by NYPD Inspector Andrew Lunetta in an affidavit explaining why the NYC law was "necessary to address public safety concerns."
Justice Alito spend four pages explaining why he disputes and discounts and ultimately dismissed the public safety assertions of a 30-year veteran of the New York Police Department. He calls some of what the police official asserted "not relevant," and says that other statements "actually undermine the City’s public safety rationale." On another front, he states the NYPD Inspector is making a "strange argument" and call another claim "dubious on its face" and yet another "more than dubious." Justice Alito concludes his analysis with this sentence: "The City’s public safety arguments were weak on their face, were not substantiated in any way, and were accepted below with no serious probing."
Though I know that this is just wishful thinking, I sure hope Justice Alito's eagerness to question, dissect and dispute claims made by police — and prosecutors and others who make all sort of debatable claims what is "necessary to address public safety concerns" — will extend to cases involving assertions by individuals of claims under other Amendments like the Fourth and Fifth and Sixth and Eighth. But I fear only Second Amendment claims lead Justice Alito to question how government officials seek to leverage claims of what public safety makes necessary.
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