With the 3rd Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals set to hear the case concerning New Jersey’s ban on so-called “assault weapons,” the Firearms Policy Coalition (FPC) recently filed its opening brief explaining why the ban is unconstitutional.
The appeal comes in the case Cheeseman v. Platkin. In late July, the District Court for the District of New Jersey ruled that the ban on AR-15-style rifles in the home was unconstitutional but left the rest of the restrictions in place. That ruling pleased neither the plaintiff nor the defendant and prompted both sides to file an appeal.
FPC President Brandon Combs said the entire law banning New Jersey residents from owning common firearms must be found unconstitutional.
“The weapons banned by New Jersey are common numerically, categorically, and jurisdictionally,” Combs said in an FPC press release. “But too many lower courts are ignoring binding Supreme Court precedent because they do not like what the Constitution means.”
In the brief, FPC argued that based on U.S. Supreme Court precedent, the case isn’t an overly complicated one, despite the lower court’s ruling.
“The principles established by Heller and confirmed by Bruen should make this a straightforward case,” the brief stated. “The paradigmatic semi-automatic firearm banned by New Jersey is the AR-15 platform rifle. Thirty years ago, the Supreme Court described the AR-15 as a ‘civilian,’ ‘commonplace,’ ‘generally available,’ and ‘traditionally … lawful’ firearm. It remains ‘commonly available,’ and according to the agency charged with administering the Nation’s firearms laws it is ‘one of the most popular firearms in the United States.’”
The New Jersey law classifies a wide variety of firearms as “assault weapons.” In addition to listing certain firearms by name, including the Colt AR-15, the law also treats any firearm that is “substantially identical” as an “assault weapon.”
The FPC brief argued that the law violates the plaintiffs’ Second Amendment right to bear arms and fails the historical test used in Heller and again in Bruen.
“As to history, the Supreme Court in Heller has already done the historical work for this case as well,” the brief stated. “In holding that the District of Columbia’s ban on handgun possession violated the Second Amendment, the Supreme Court in Heller performed a lengthy analysis of the historical restrictions on the scope of the right, and it adduced the following principle: while ‘dangerous and unusual weapons’ can be banned, arms that are ‘in common use for lawful purposes’ are per se protected and cannot be.
“That holding resolves this case, because whether the relevant group of arms is ‘semiautomatic firearms’ or ‘assault firearms,’ the fundamental fact is that New Jersey’s law bans a type of firearms that are in common use for lawful purposes.”
In the end, FPC’s Combs said his organization will continue to target unjust, unconstitutional gun laws wherever they are in effect—including New Jersey.
“The district court in this case was wrong to uphold the majority of New Jersey’s ban on constitutionally protected arms,” he said. “We will continue to fight forward and work to eliminate all of these laws throughout the United States.”
