7th Circuit Says Gun Registration is OK. Guns at Obama protests:

[tombogan03884]

http://volokh.com/archives/archive_2009_08_16-2009_08_22.shtml#1250794427

Last week, the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals decided a case involving
   the Cicero, Illinois, gun registration ordinance. Full coverage of the
   decision is available in an [1]article for CBS News, by Declan
   McCullagh. (And be sure to check out Declan's new [2]Taking Liberties
   weblog.) The decision is written by Supreme Court short-list Judge
   Diane Wood.
   The Wood opinion first cites circuit precedent, accurately, for the
   fact that the Second Amendment is not incorporated in the Seventh
   Circuit. The decision goes on, however, to declare that the Second
   Amendment would not be violated even if it did apply. That portion of
   the decision has very little reasoning; it simply says that Cicero
   (unlike D.C., in Heller) does not ban guns. Ergo, the Cicero
   registration law is constitutional.
   The Wood opinion quotes some language from Heller, which provided a
   non-exhaustive list of presumptively constitutional gun control laws.
   Yet this list, to the extent that it is relevant, cuts against the
   Cicero ordinance. Included in the Heller list are: "laws imposing
   conditions and qualifications on the commercial sale of arms." This
   would suggest that the gun registration system created by the federal
   Gun Control Act of 1968 would probably be upheld. The gun is
   registered at the time of sale, and the registration paperwork (the
   federal 4473 forms) must be retained by the dealer. The forms are
   available to law enforcement, without need for a warrant, in the
   course of bona fide criminal investigations. The 1968 GCA was a
   compromise; it created registration (which was the primary objective
   of gun control advocates at the time) but had the registration records
   maintained in decentralized locations (at the dealers) rather than
   consolidated by the federal government (since Second Amendment
   advocates worried that centralized registration might one day be
   abused in order to implement gun confiscation, [3]as it had been under
   Nazis).
   Cicero's ordinance, however, goes far beyond registration of
   "commercial sale," and requires that anyone who simply possesses a gun
   must re-register it every two years. Accordingly, the Cicero ordinance
   is not within the scope of Heller's presumptively constitutional laws.
   The Wood court, if it wanted to provide dicta about the
   constitutionality of registration, should have provided some legal
   analysis, rather than merely asserting that the Cicero ordinance was
   constitutional. (The CBS article explains some other features of the
   Cicero law; the ban on laser scopes strikes me as almost certainly
   unconstitutional, and the ban on slingshots seems dubious.)
   A second issue in the news has been the fact that when President Obama
   spoke at the Phoenix Convention Center recently, several protestors on
   the sidewalk outside the center carried firearms openly, as is lawful
   in Arizona. I've been the Phoenix Convention Center, which is immense.
   There is no possibility that a person with a gun outside the Center
   could pose the slightest threat to a person speaking in one of the
   rooms inside the Center. The White House, commendably, said that the
   President had no objection to the protesters. However, I think that
   the protesters probably hurt, rather than helped, the Second Amendment
   cause. This [4]article in the Christian Science Monitor quotes me to
   that effect. I did an iVoices.org podcast on the topic, to which I
   will provide a link when it is uploaded.
   Finally, shame on MSNBC for dishonestly injecting racism into the
   controversy, and claiming that the gun carrying may have had "racial
   overtones." Actually, as Newsbusters has [5]pointed out, the black
   rifle was being carried by a black man.

References

   1. http://www.cbsnews.com/blogs/2009/08/19/taking_liberties/entry5253857.shtml?tag=contentMain;contentBody
   2. http://www.cbsnews.com/blogs/2009/08/19/taking_liberties/entry5250967.shtml
   3. http://www.stephenhalbrook.com/law_review_articles/Halbrook_macro_final_3_29.pdf
   4. http://www.csmonitor.com/2009/0819/p02s01-ussc.html
   5. http://newsbusters.org/blogs/kyle-drennen/2009/08/18/msnbc-no-mention-black-gun-owner-among-racist-protesters

[Hazcat]

Ya want ta give us short attention span types the 'cliff notes'?  

[tombogan03884]

Those ARE the Cliff notes 

[fightingquaker13]

Here are the Cliff notes of the Cliff notes Haz. The Heller case, like all pioneering cases, was broadly worded. This leads to a massive amount of litigation. Federal judges say WTF and punt. Its then up to the appeals courts to figure out the details. That's what we are seeing. The good news is that the question is no longer whether you have a right to a gun, but rather what constitues reasonable regulations. Apparently bi-annual registration, a ban on laser sights and assault sling shots qualifies. This is only binding in the 7th circuit. Another court might disagree. This is when it hits SCOTUS. This wil take years to sort out. Just like abortion, antis will try new restrictions hoping some will stand up. Until the Court sets a clear rule, the dance will continue. The million dollar question is whether the 2A is binding on the states. Stay tuned.
FQ13

[Hazcat]

Registration should NOT be legal!

[Sponsor]

[tombogan03884]

Registration should NOT be legal!

Registration has been a fact since the GCA 68, the only catch is that the records are not centralized, they are kept by various dealers and are available to LE with out a warrant .

[fightingquaker13]

Registration should NOT be legal!

Agreed, but understand that your guns already are registered with the 443. Unless you got them by inheiritance or a private sale there is a record, its just a question of how many hoops the cops have jump through to get it. Personally, I believe that if you think the instant background check records really are destroyed without a "back up" being stored you're a sucker. I don't care what the law says, I think ATF has "destroy those records" right below "wash the cat" on their to do list.
FQ13

[Timothy]

This is not without precedent.  They have been doing this in MA for years.  Every gun I own is registered with the Firearms Bureau in Boston.  It's either that or I am a felon.....do people have them without being registered? 

Don't know, don't care, wouldn't bother me, shouldn't bother me, none of my business........nobody's business but the person who is Federally within his or her rights....

[fullautovalmet76]

The million dollar question is whether the 2A is binding on the states. Stay tuned.
FQ13

In your opinion, would SCOTUS have to find 2A as "fundamental right" first before affirming that it is incorporated to the states? If they ruled it was not a fundamental right, then it would not be subject to strict scrutiny, which would mean that it probably would not be incorporated to the states.

I'm just a layman, so any analysis of this scenario is appreciated....

[blackwolfe]

Just a note on the 4473 forms.  Some of them are centralized.  It is my understanding that when a dealer goes out of business the records are turned over to ATF.  I have heard, but don't recall where for verification, that ATF had truck trailers full of forms and records from out of business dealers.  Supposedly during the Klinton years many of these records wher being computerized in searchble databases.  The rational given to be able to legaly do this was that the records were not current dealers records and were not restricted from being centralized.  This was possible one of the reasons in the push to reduce the number of dealers.