NRA fantasies shouldn’t shape our courts
Should the Constitution be amended to vest the power to approve Supreme Court nominees in a Washington lobbyist? While that sounds absurd, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said just last month that he “can’t imagine” Republicans confirming a nominee opposed by the NRA, even after the election.
Not only has the Senate taken the unprecedented step of refusing to hold hearings for nominee Merrick Garland, senators are also blatantly outsourcing their constitutional duties to a lobbying group. There is nothing wrong with lobbyists such as the NRA voicing their opinion about judicial nominees. That’s part of their role in a democracy. Yet the Constitution declares that the Senate, not lobbyists, shall advise and consent on judges and justices.
McConnell’s statement is especially disturbing because of the NRA’s long record of misleading rhetoric designed to inflame voters. In 2008, the NRA said Sen. Barack Obama had a “10-point plan” to take away Americans’ guns. While President Obama has endorsed universal background checks and limits on the sale of military-style rifles, he has never proposed a law to confiscate guns.
As a supporter of the individual right to keep and bear arms, I look to the NRA to help me understand the weaknesses of proposed laws. These days, however, the NRA seems to prefer misrepresentations and scare tactics.
The NRA says Garland is “bad on guns” and “would vote to overturn” the landmark D.C. v. Heller, a 2008 decision that held the Sec- ond Amendment guaranteed an individual right to bear arms. Garland, however, has never written or spoken publicly about his views of the Second Amendment or the Heller case.
The NRA bases its “analysis” on two cases. One of them was
Heller before the Supreme Court decided it. After a panel of judges held that Washington’s ban on handguns was unconstitutional, Garland was one of several judges voting to have the whole court weigh in. His vote tells us he wanted to have a say in the decision, not how he’d rule. Indeed, Judge Raymond Randolph, a conservative Bush appointee, sided with Garland’s position.
The NRA says Garland supports the creation of a national registry of firearms owners because of his vote in a case involving an NRA challenge to a Justice Department audit of the background check system. But Garland’s court ruled against the NRA — as did the Supreme Court.
Just last month, the Supreme Court gave new reason to hope that, no matter who fills the vacant seat, Heller will not be overturned. In a decision joined by all four liberal justices, the court overturned a Massachusetts ruling upholding a ban on stun guns.
What are Garland’s views of the Second Amendment? The truth is no one knows. That’s why the Senate should do its job and hold confirmation hearings — just as it has for more than a dozen other election-year nominees to the Supreme Court.