Republicans challenge Sotomayor on gun issues

[ericire12]

http://www.thehawkeye.com/Story/Sotomayor-062509

Tribune Washington Bureau

WASHINGTON -- Senate Republicans vowed Wednesday to press Sonia Sotomayor on gun rights -- a politically divisive issue that they hope could potentially weaken Democratic support for the Supreme Court nominee.

While Republicans are a pronounced minority in both the House and Senate, they have used the gun issue to their advantage to divert the Democratic legislative agenda, forcing members from moderate and conservative states to take politically risky votes on gun provisions.

Sotomayor's judicial record appears to provide the GOP with another opportunity to bring the issue to light. Since the Supreme Court decided in a landmark case last year that restrictive gun laws in Washington, D.C. -- a federal entity -- infringed on a constitutionally protected right to own a handgun, the legal debate over guns has shifted to whether that ruling also affected handgun-control laws in individual states.

Earlier this year, Sotomayor was part of a three-judge panel on the 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals in New York that held the Second Amendment didn't apply to the states. At a press conference Wednesday, Jeff Sessions of Alabama, the ranking Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee, and other senators said they were concerned about the decision and pledged to grill Sotomayor about it at her confirmation hearings, which begin July 13.

The panel's reasoning, Sessions said, "would eviscerate the Second Amendment in many parts of the country."

Democrats and gun-control groups argue, however, that Sotomayor and the other members of the panel were simply following a restrained approach to the case by declining to rule on an issue the Supreme Court has yet to take up. Sotomayor "properly followed precedent," said Daniel Vise, a lawyer for the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence.

If confirmed, Sotomayor could end up hearing the very issue she considered in the 2nd Circuit case. The Supreme Court likely will consider the question as early as next term.

Sotomayor is the first nominee since the high court's gun-rights decision, and she is likely to be asked about her fidelity to that ruling in much the same manner that other nominees have been quizzed about respecting Roe v. Wade, the seminal abortion-rights case.

Gun rights "are now up for grabs in the court, so it brings a whole new constituency to this fight," said Curt Levey, executive director of the Committee for Justice, a conservative group. "This could become a tough vote for red-state Democrats because they don't want to be on the wrong side of the Second Amendment."

Gun control and the Second Amendment are lightning-rod issues that Democrats, now in full political control of Washington, would just as soon avoid altogether.

During his campaign, President Barack Obama tried to walk a centrist path on the question, saying he believes the Second Amendment confers an individual right to own a gun but also favoring certain restrictions on ownership. Democrats have made inroads in the South and West largely by downplaying the issue.

Seizing on that, Republicans during this session of Congress have brought up gun rights wherever possible.

Earlier this month, the House decided to abandon a Senate bill that would have granted the District of Columbia a voting member of Congress because Sen. John Ensign, R-Nev., succeeded in attaching an amendment that would have scaled back much of D.C.'s strict anti-gun laws.

The GOP criticism against Sotomayor centers on a three-judge ruling in January that upheld New York's law forbidding the use or possession of a popular gang weapon known as a nunchaku, saying, "it is settled law that the Second Amendment applies only to limitations the federal government seeks to impose on this right." That decision cited a Supreme Court ruling from 1886.

Sessions said Wednesday that the panel went out of its way to make its views on the Second Amendment clear, saying Sotomayor used language "that was not necessary to decide the case in front of her."

On June 2, the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals took the same tack in upholding a ban on handguns in Chicago. In April, however, the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco said that gun possession is a fundamental right under the Constitution.

Lawyers for the National Rifle Association have asked the Supreme Court to review the Chicago case. So far, however, the NRA, the most influential gun lobby in Washington, has stopped short of opposing Sotomayor.

"All options are on the table. We have serious concerns about her rulings, and we are working with senators to make sure the proper questions are asked and answered," said Andrew Arulanandam, a spokesman for the NRA.

[runstowin]

Questioning is irrelevant, she can answer any way she wants. The Rinos will vote for her, and she will rule any old way she wants, and the beat goes on.