Alameda County defends restrictions on gun-shop locations

[alp227]

Source: San Francisco Chronicle

Alameda County supervisors have asked a federal appeals court to dismiss a challenge by gun groups to the county’s zoning restrictions on gun stores, arguing that the constitutional right to own firearms doesn’t include a right to sell them wherever you want.

The county’s 1998 ordinance prohibits new gun shops in unincorporated areas within 500 feet of a residential neighborhood, a school, a day care center, a liquor store or another gun shop. According to court filings, 17 other cities and counties in California restrict the locations of commercial gun dealers, including San Francisco — which has a 1,000-foot buffer zone — as well as Oakland and Contra Costa County.

In May, a panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals in San Francisco voted 2-1 to revive a lawsuit challenging the ordinance and said the county, to justify the zoning restrictions, must provide evidence that “gun stores act as a magnet for crime.”

Last week, the county urged the full appeals court to grant a rehearing before an 11-judge panel, and contended the previous ruling had overstated the scope of the Constitution’s Second Amendment.

Read more: http://www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/article/Alameda-County-defends-restrictions-on-gun-shop-8412064.php?t=af3f14cd5f1210a92f&cmpid=twitter-premium

[Igel]

1. Not only are some rights Constitutional, but as such they have other properties.

One is a property we're familiar with. Government can impose undue burden on their expression.

We love this with the Voting Rights Act. Apart from "disparate impact" there's also undue burden requirements. Even if the poll tests were equal in impact but harsh, they'd fail that test.

We saw it recently when the TX abortion clinic law was hit hard. One could argue that the requirements weren't unreasonable, and should stand. But they imposed an undue burden not on the right of women to get the abortion but on where the providers must be located. It so limited the right of people to acquire the services by limiting locations where the service could be provided that it couldn't stand.

Where to draw the line for "undue burden" can vary. But here intent also matters--if the purpose is safety, that's one thing. But if it's to limit gun access, that's another. And, yes, it is a conundrum on how to square that circle. Then again, we have the same circle with hate speech and protesting/freedom of assembly and had the same circle with religious use of drugs, so let's not say that this is a novel problem in principle.

[hack89]

2. If Texas can do it for abortion clinics then why not gun shops?

makes perfect sense to me.

[Taitertots]

3. Just don't start complaining when abortion is de facto illegal by restricting access

Because it's a policy you've made it clear that you view as valid.

[hack89]

4. I thought the sarcasm was obvious.

I am a gun owner and I am pro-choice. I think the zoning limits on gun shops are just as bad as the restrictions on abortion clinics.

[Lee-Lee]

5. Seems reasonable that if a right is restricted on claims that it causes crime there should be

facts shown that justify the action.

If they claim these restrictions are needed because gun stores are "magnets for crime" then they should be able to provide the court the evidence of that in the form of crime statistics.

It's the same as requiring states that demand doctors and facilities doing abortions meet certain restrictions to prove those restrictions are actually medically valid and not just put there to limit access with a bullshit medical reasoning.

I would bet that they won't be able to come up with any statistically valid data showing gun stores are "magnets for criminal activity", and if they can produce any data showing an increase related it would be no greater than, and likely less than the increase from bars and clubs, liquor stores, seedy hotels and other establishments- or even mass transit stops. And if they don't put the same restrictions on every other business that has an equal or great effect on crime then it's clearly discriminatory.