JURIST - Paper Chase: Tenth Circuit finds no Second Amendment right to concealed weapons

[JURIST] The US Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit [official website] ruled [opinion, PDF] Friday that permits to carry concealed weapons are not protected by the Second Amendment [text]. The case involved a Washington state resident who filed a lawsuit against Denver and Colorado's Department of Public Safety [official website]. He was denied a concealed weapons permit since he was not a Colorado resident, and he claimed it violated his Second Amendment rights. A federal judge dismissed his case in 2011, and the appeals court decided that carrying concealed firearms is not protected by the Second Amendment or the Privileges and Immunities Clause, nor is the right of people to keep and bear arms infringed upon by laws prohibiting the carrying of concealed weapons. The judge reasoned:

Given that the concealed carrying of firearms has not been recognized as a right, and the fact that concealed carry was prohibited for resident and non-resident alike for much of our history, we cannot declare this activity sufficiently basic to the livelihood of the Nation.

A spokesperson for the Colorado Attorney General's Office welcomed the ruling [NYT report].

The Second Amendment and gun control [JURIST news archive] remain controversial issues in the US. Also Friday the US Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit [official website] refused to reconsider a case decided in December that struck down [JURIST reports] Illinois' ban on carrying concealed weapons. Last month New York Governor Andrew Cuomo [official website] signed legislation [JURIST report] intended to impose tighter restrictions on gun and ammunition sales by enacting the New York Secure Ammunition and Firearms Enforcement Act of 2013 (NY SAFE) [text PDF]. Also in January President Barack Obama [official website] signed 23 executive actions [JURIST report] and called on Congress to pass stricter gun-control laws. In November, the US Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit [official website] held that New York can continue to require [JURIST report] residents who seek to carry a concealed weapon to obtain a special license.