THIS PAGE
TO A FRIEND
COMMITTEE FOR JUSTICE
1920 L Street, N.W., Suite 200
Washington, DC 20036FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: Wednesday, September 30, 2009
CONTACT: Curt Levey, (202) 270-7748,Gun Case Puts Focus on Sotomayor & Future Nominees
CFJ Executive Director Curt Levey on the Supreme Court’s decision today to review the
Chicago gun case:“With the Supreme Court now set to decide in McDonald v. Chicago whether the Second Amendment applies to state and local gun laws, the focus is on the Court’s newest Justice, Sonia Sotomayor, and on President Obama’s future picks for the Court.
“Gun owners were alarmed by Sotomayor’s nomination to the Court, because of her ‘extreme anti-gun philosophy’ and record on the Second Circuit, in the words of former NRA president Sandy Froman. At her Senate hearing this summer, Sotomayor defended that record by saying that her hands were tied by old Supreme Court precedent. Now that she’s on the High Court, her hands are no longer tied. She will have a lot of explaining to do if she decides in McDonald that the right to keep and bear arms is the only significant right in the Bill of Rights that doesn’t apply to the states. Such a decision would indicate that she was not serious when she promised the Senate that she would put the rule of law above ideology.
“Today’s announcement ensures that gun owners will continue to play a big role in Supreme Court confirmations, just as they did this summer. The Court’s 2008 decision in District of Columbia v. Heller, recognizing the Second Amendment as an individual right, moved the battle over gun rights from the legislatures to the courts. That set the stage for gun owners to enter the judicial wars. The decision to review McDonald puts the future of gun rights back squarely in the Supreme Court, reinforcing the conviction among gun owners that their fate is now in the hands of judges and that their continued involvement in the judicial confirmation process is vital.
“Whatever the Supreme Court’s decision in McDonald, it will further focus the Second Amendment community on the needs for constitutionalist judges. Heller was limited to federal gun laws and the District of Columbia, but most of the laws that worry gun owners are at the state and local level. If the McDonald decision recognizes an individual Second Amendment right at that level, the number of gun rights cases – and thus the importance of the judges issue to gun owners – will explode. Should the Supreme Court rule the other way in McDonald, the anger of gun owners will be a force to reckon with every time there’s a Supreme Court nomination.”
Curt Levey, after graduating Harvard Law School with honors and clerking for the U.S. Court of Appeals, Mr. Levey served as Director of Legal & Public Affairs at the Center for Individual Rights, where he worked on landmark Supreme Court cases involving affirmative action and federalism. Most recently, Mr. Levey headed the Title IX policy group at the U.S. Education Department's Office for Civil Rights. He also serves on the executive committee of the Federalist Society's civil rights practice group.
Mr. Levey's op-eds have appeared in leading national and legal publications. He has been a guest on more than one hundred radio and television programs, and he has spoken about the law to dozens of live audiences, including ones at the nation's top law schools.
Mr. Levey also has an M.S. and B.A. in computer science from Brown University. He worked in the field of artificial intelligence (AI) before attending law school and invented a new type of AI technology, for which he wrote a successful patent application.
NOTE: In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. section 107, any copyrighted material herein is distributed without profit or payment to those who have expressed prior interest in receiving this information for non-profit research and educational purposes only. For further information please refer to: http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml