BELLEVUE, WA – The Second Amendment Foundation filed further arguments in its motion for a preliminary injunction to go along with the temporary restraining order granted by the court against the State of New York’s enforcement of a “place of worship” firearms ban, telling the federal court “the State’s Place of Worship Ban remains unconstitutional.”
“With Plaintiffs suffering ongoing, irreparable harm and the public interest being squarely in favor of upholding constitutional rights, a preliminary injunction is warranted,” SAF said in its reply to issues raised by the defendants in their effort to have the issue rejected. The Reply in Support of Their Motion for a Preliminary Injunction” was filed with the U.S. District Court for the Western District of New York. The case is known as Jimmie Hardaway, Jr. et.al. v. Steven A. Nigrelli, et.al.
In the 12-page document, SAF notes, “The State has not identified any tradition of a complete ban on firearms in places of worship.” Indeed, as stated a few lines later, “The tradition at the Founding included imposing a duty to carry in church because of a society beset by violence.”
“New York is making arguments that fail to provide any real justification for the ban,” said SAF founder and Executive Vice President Alan M. Gottlieb. “It boils down to the state simply wanting the ban just to prevent law-abiding citizens from carrying firearms for personal protection in as many places as possible.
“For more than a century,” he continued, “New York was able to maintain an unconstitutional prohibition on the exercise of Second Amendment rights by honest citizens. Even after the Supreme Court struck down that restriction, the state has been scrambling to continue keeping its citizens disarmed by any means necessary. New York’s new gun control law essentially allows the state to thumb its nose at the high court, and this has to stop.”
The SAF brief, submitted by attorneys Nicolas J. Rotsko at Phillips Lytle LLP in Buffalo, NY, and David H. Thompson, Peter A. Patterson and John W. Tienken at Cooper & Kirk, PLLC in Washington, D.C., acknowledges there were some limitations on carrying arms during the Founding era at “polling places, legislative assemblies and courts.” However, “There is no similar Founding-era precedent for banning guns in churches,” the brief says.