Clarence Thomas has a gun fetish. The other Republican-appointed members of the 6-3 majority are on board with that in service of an arrogant, undemocratic crusade to dominate the elected branches of government.
To justify legalizing bump stocks, Clarence Thomas literally copied and pasted materials from an extremist pro-gun group whose violent rhetoric makes the NRA look moderate.
This is who has the Supreme Court's ear these days. -- Mark Joseph Stern
Yesterday, in a tortured ruling in Garland v. Cargill, Thomas took it upon himself to bone up on the mechanics of machine guns and bump stocks, overruling professional expertise at ATF and the Executive Branch, and the judgment of Congress. As Stern and Dahlia Lithwick note, Thomas relied on a gun group more radical than the NRA (which did not oppose the regulation that the 6-3 majority overruled). In addition to making us all less safe and secure, Thomas's decision also did violence to the plain text of Congressional legislation outlawing machine guns.
In dissent, Justice Sonia Sotomayer eviscerates his results-driven reasoning related to "a single function of the trigger" and Congress's clear intent, and observes that bump stocks convert semi-automatic rifles into machine guns.
Today, the Court puts bump stocks back in civilian hands. To do so, it casts aside Congress’s definition of “machinegun” and seizes upon one that is inconsistent with the ordinary meaning of the statutory text and unsupported by context or purpose. When I see a bird that walks like a duck, swims like a duck, and quacks like a duck, I call that bird a duck. A bump-stock-equipped semiautomatic rifle fires “automatically more than one shot, without manual reloading, by a single function of the trigger.” Because I, like Congress, call that a machinegun, I respectfully dissent.
Deadline White House presented a brief video of how a bump stock works for its viewers:
The bump stock demonstration begins at 11:31. Jamie Raskin's comments begin at 14.
Congressman Jamie Raskin commented on the decision:
The Supreme Court has been on a rampage with respect to the ability of states and localities to pass reasonable gun safety measures. And they turn the rhetoric of originalism on and off according to their ideological purposes. So nobody is saying that the flintlock musket is the only protected weapon because that's what existed in the 18th Century.
He adds that numerous gun safety measures (such as universal background checks) are highly popular, but are blocked by allies of the Republican Party. I'll add: And by this Republican-controlled court.
In previous posts I've commented on another 6-3 decision written by Thomas (New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen) that overturned a century old state law that no court had thought to overrule, and on the atrocious 5-4 decision that put the court on this path (District of Columbia v. Heller) written by Antonin Scalia before six Republican ideologues dominated the court. (Two Republicans joined two Democrats in dissent in that ruling; with Trump's nominations, courtesy of Leonard Leo, Republican justices have become far less likely to oppose the agenda of the Republican Party, so now we're at 6-3. Former Justice John Paul Stevens, who dissented from Heller wrote about guns and the Second Amendment in the Atlantic in 2019.)
I am heartsick about the decisions of the Roberts Court on guns and nearly talked-out about the corrupt SCOTUS Republican majority that's in place. In lieu of saying more, I'll offer some links:
"The Republican supermajority on the Supreme Court is on a tear in a war against democracy" includes comments on the Bruen decision, as does "Partisan and movement activists on the right are bound by a common war against democracy."
"Uncomfortable Americans are fearful and, increasingly, armed and dangerous" references a vicious cycle: more guns means more death.
"Guns, military assault rifles, mass shootings, and a terrorized population: a GOP success story" notes that mass shootings and mass deaths are the result of a concerted campaign and public policy decisions by Republicans; "Actions have consequences. Republicans own America’s glut of guns and of mass shootings" reaffirms this view via a cartoon.
These two posts step away from guns to make a more general point about this Republican dominated court: "Supreme Court’s supermajority overrules the facts and the law to benefit the GOP" and "Partisan and movement activists on the right are bound by a common war against democracy."
The Roberts Court is dominated by five Republican men who have been and continue to be, first and foremost, operatives of the Republican Party (while Justice Amy Coney Barrett mostly goes along for the ride). That, not a devotion to the Constitution or the rule of law, explains the direction and decisions of the court. Republicans have won the popular vote for president in one election since 1992, while Congressional Republicans in recent years have largely abandoned a positive agenda (with the exception of pursuing unpopular public policies, such as lowering taxes for the rich). The Congressional GOP is devoted not to legislative accomplishments, but to gridlock and performative gestures to rile up their base.
So too the Roberts Court. On and off the bench, Alito and Thomas (with their wives) serve as trolls, while the Republican majority seeks primarily to strip from the other two branches of government the public policy tools to enact constructive legislation that the Republican Party opposes. The Roberts Court's primary objective: to disable democratic (small-d and capital-D) public policy initiatives. The court is willing to overturn precedent, to run roughshod over the Fourteenth Amendment and other provisions of the Constitution whenever it pleases, and (as Raskin noted) to "turn the rhetoric of originalism on and off according to their ideological purposes."
This is an aggressive, expansive agenda, unbecoming a 'conservative' court. If this results in more Americans dying of gun violence, so be it.