Buckeye Reporter

The U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Illinois has invalidated certain parts of the Protect Illinois Communities Act (PICA), which prohibited "assault weapons" and "large-capacity magazines." This decision came on November 8, in a case supported by the National Rifle Association, Barnett v. Raoul.

The court's decision was detailed in a 168-page opinion that applied the U.S. Supreme Court’s text-and-history test for Second Amendment challenges, as interpreted by the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals.

In its analysis, the court started with defining key terms based on previous Supreme Court statements that protect "common" arms under the Second Amendment but exclude "dangerous and unusual" arms. The court described a "dangerous" arm as one that is not reasonably controllable by a typical operator to neutralize specific threats. An "unusual" arm was defined as one employing atypical methods or agents such as caustic or poisonous substances. Conversely, a "common" arm was described as any bearable rifle, shotgun, or pistol capable of semiautomatic fire available to law-abiding citizens for self-defense unless deemed otherwise dangerous or unusual.

With these definitions, the court concluded that the banned items fall under common arms protected by the Second Amendment.

Further historical analysis emphasized the significance of bearing arms at America’s founding and considered traditional regulations on this right. The court found no historical precedent justifying PICA’s restrictions.

In its conclusion, the court criticized attempts to undermine individual rights and ruled that “the provisions of PICA criminalizing the knowing possession of specific semiautomatic rifles, shotguns, magazines, and attachments are unconstitutional under the Second Amendment to the United States Constitution as applied to states by the Fourteenth Amendment.”

A 30-day stay was issued to allow time for an appeal from the government.