A simple test about what the US Constitution says, as per the current SCOTUS rulings?
I mean, you can’t swear to uphold and defend something you don’t understand, right?
Toni Preckwinkle, president of Illinois’s Cook County Board, which includes Chicago, has proposed new taxes of $25 on each gun sold and a nickel for each bullet sold. According to the Wall Street Journal, the bullet levy would amount to a 200% tax on .22 caliber ammunition.
Preckwinkle’s message to the NRA? “You’re welcome to sue,†she said. “We’ve looked at this and we believe we can survive any challenge.†She must not have looked very carefully at the issue, or she never would have proposed the tax in the first place.The Supreme Court has recognized that the Second Amendment guarantees an individual right “to keep and bear arms,†which cannot be denied by the state. That means government cannot banish guns directly — nor can it do so indirectly by taxing guns out of existence.
It would save a whole lot of time if, when filing paperwork with the elections office, they could easily determine if a person had their head up their ass before they somehow convinced a majority of voting people to give them law-making capabilities.
Of course, then only non-wackoloon Libertarian candidates would ever be allowed to run for office.
Still not exactly seeing a downside to this one.
Actually, she’s right. It’s already been done with “machine guns”, the real ones. There is no reason the .gov can’t put a tax on guns and ammo. While I think a law abiding citizen should be able to own anything up to and including a Ma Duece, the fact exists that one group of guns is already taxed to restrict ownership to a select few. I really think we might lose this one.
The “non-whackaloon libertarian candidates” aren’t exactly falling all over each other to file for office, sir.
A $25 tax on a gun costing several hundred to thousands of dollars isn’t going to get challenged.
A tax or even an outright ban on the sale bullets may not be unconstitutional because they’re not “arms” (and can at least in theory be home made).
And of course with governments scrambling to “cut budgets” by taxing citizens more (thus increasing government income, making the deficit appear smaller temporarilly, hopefully until after the next elections), there’ll be little opposition from the street on another “tax for the rich” (after all, everyone knows just rich people play with guns).
The government cannot put an outrageous tax upon ink in order to stifle the free speech of a newspaper. Nor should a government put an onnerous tax upon ammunition in order to stifle the right of a citizen to keep and bear firearms.
WildBill, your forgetting about the “common use” clause in Heller. Full autos were expressly mentioned due to their limited availability.
Oh noes!@!!1, RD, what would our government do if it were short a few politicians?!?
JTW, it is impossible to “bear” arms without ammunition. Also in Heller. See dfwmtx’s comment.
Btw guys, I wasn’t actually being serious with this. Think of it as a sort of a pixelated “wouldn’t it be nice” moment.
Apparently they’ve dropped the bullet portion.
Of course they did! Rahmn figured out he didn’t want to have to write another humongous check to Alan Gura and Associates.