BELLEVUE, WA – The Second Amendment Foundation has filed a reply brief in its federal challenge of New York State’s restrictive gun control law, telling the court there is no historical evidence supporting a ban on firearms in places of worship at the Founding, and as a result, the preliminary injunction granted by the District Court should stand.
The brief was filed with the U.S. Second Circuit Court of Appeals. The case is known as Hardaway, Jr. v. Nigrelli.
SAF is joined by the Firearms Policy Coalition and two private citizens, the Rev. Jimmie Hardaway, Jr., and Bishop Larry Boyd. They are represented by attorneys Nicolas J. Rotsko at Phillips Lytle in Buffalo, and by David H. Thompson, Peter A. Patterson, John D. Ohlendorf and John W. Tienken at Cooper & Kirk in Washington, D.C.
“After the Supreme Court struck down New York’s unconstitutional gun control law,” SAF founder and Executive Vice President Alan M. Gottlieb recalled, “the legislature replaced it with an even worse scheme which declares places of worship or religious gatherings as ‘sensitive places’ where carrying firearms for personal protection is prohibited. The state is trying to get around the high court’s Bruen ruling, and the Constitution at the same time, and we cannot allow this to stand.”
“In its zeal to maintain restrictive gun control policies over its citizens,” added SAF Executive Director Adam Kraut, “New York has once again adopted a law we believe is unconstitutional, and we’re confident the federal court will bring an end to this nonsense. It’s time for lawmakers in Albany to stop trying to outsmart the U.S. Supreme Court.”
In their brief, SAF and its fellow plaintiffs note, “all of the evidence before the Court demonstrates that governments in the Founding Era regulated the carrying of firearms in places of worship in exactly the opposite manner of the State’s Place of Worship Ban.”