Legal experts: Supreme Court assault-rifle decision won’t mean much to Kansas

A U.S. Supreme Court decision to let stand an Illinois city’s ban on assault weapons won’t have any discernable effect on guns in Kansas, according to two constitutional law experts at Washburn University in Topeka.

Monday’s decision not to hear an appeal in the Illinois case is being described as a victory for gun control in some national media and “people will probably over-react” to the decision on both sides of the gun issue.

The High Court declined Monday to consider an appeal of a Seventh Circuit Court decision upholding the assualt weapons ban in the Chicago suburb of Highland Park. That city prohibits the possession of military-style semiautomatic weapons and magazines that can hold more than 10 rounds of ammunition.

The decision in favor of assault-weapon bans is only binding in the Seventh Circuit’s juridictional area of Illinois, Wisconsin and Indiana, said Jeffrey Jackson and William Rich, professors of constitutional law at Washburn Law School.

Kansas is in the Denver-based 10th Circuit and those judges could make a ruling opposite of what the Seventh Circuit appeals judges decided, Jackson said.

“If Kansas were to have an assault weapons ban, it (the Supreme Court decision) would still only be just a persuasive argument for any court that would have jurisdiction,” Jackson said.

The Seventh Circuit court ruled that the ban is a reasonable restriction to prevent or limit mass shootings.

Semi-automatic assault weapons were used in a San Bernardino County attack last week that killed 14 people, and in the 2012 massacres at an elementary school in Newton, Conn. and a movie theater in Aurora, Colo.

The circuit court also ruled the assault weapons ban doesn’t conflict with an earlier Supreme Court ruling that upheld the individual right to own weapons for personal protection, primarily because Highland Park’s citizens are still allowed to own numerous other types of firearms.

Kansas doesn’t have any sort of ban on private possession of semi-automatic assault weapons and the Kansas Legislature is overwhelmingly opposed to gun control.

This year, Kansas became one of only a handful of states with a law called “constitutional carry,” which allows anyone who can legally own a gun to carry it loaded and concealed in public without having a permit or training.

In addition, the Legislature has expressly prohibited cities from enacting local regulations of guns that are stricter than state firearms law.

“They can do that because municipalities are subdivisions of the state (government),” Jackson said.

Rich said it’s difficult to draw many conclusions from cases the Supreme Court declines to hear, But the indication in the Highland Park case would be that the justices are continuing to duck having to make a decision outlining the exact boundaries of the Second Amendment, the part of the Bill of Rights that speaks to the right to keep and bear arms, he said.

Justice Clarence Thomas filed a dissent in the case which was joined by Justice Antonin Scalia.

Rich said the significance of the dissent is it shows two justices do want a nationally binding ruling that would limit state and local governments’ authority to prohibiting weapons.

“Because the Second Amendment confers rights upon individual citizens — not state governments — it was doubly wrong for the Seventh Circuit to delegate to States and localities the power to decide which firearms people may possess,” the dissent said. “I would grant certiorari to prevent the Seventh Circuit from relegating the Second Amendment to a second-class right.”

But the 7-2 decision not to hear the case indicates Thomas and Scalia don’t have a firm majority for that position, Rich said.

This story was originally published December 7, 2015 at 4:35 PM with the headline "Legal experts: Supreme Court assault-rifle decision won’t mean much to Kansas."