How many gun cases would SCOTUS take in a year?

[Aim1]

Let's say that President Trump's nominee for the Supreme Court of the United States Neil Gorsuch is confirmed this week.

If he is there is a better chance of SCOTUS agreeing to hear 2nd Amendment cases. There are two that I think are the most pressing. One is carry outside the home with a justifiable need or not and the second is whether so called assault weapons and high capacity magazines are legal.


How many 2nd Amendment cases would SCOTUS most likely rule on in a year and what are the chances of these two cases being 2 of them?

 

[Jim Watson]

Zero.
Gun law is a hot potato and the justices would rather not mess with it.

 

[alsaqr]

"Zero.
Gun law is a hot potato and the justices would rather not mess with it."

Correct. After their rulings in Heller and McDonald; SCOTUS declined several other gun rulings from the federal appeals courts.

https://www.nytimes.com/2015/12/08/...lt-weapons-ban-of-highland-park-ill.html?_r=0

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/16/us/politics/supreme-court-declines-gun-law-case.html

https://patriotpost.us/articles/25433

 

[armoredman]

It takes four Justices to vote for cert. If Justice Gorsuch wants to get involved, he would start voting to hear them right away. Roberts, Thomas and Alito might go along, since I don't know who voted for cert for Heller or MacDonald. If so, we might get some of this hot buttons up to SCOTUS sooner than we might think. However, I am not a lawyer or "Constitutional scholar", so my opinion is worth exactly what you paid for it.

 

[Frank Ettin]

.....How many 2nd Amendment cases would SCOTUS most likely rule on in a year and what are the chances of these two cases being 2 of them?

There is no way to know, and anyone who claims to know is just guessing.

It takes four Justices to vote to hear a case. We almost never know why they decline a case. We only know if they decide to tell us, and that's rare.

SCOTUS receives about 10,000 petitions for certiorari a year. It will hear about 70 to 80 cases.

 

[GEM]

Frank is correct that we don't know what they would take. I would advise caution because I'm not so sure if they took one of those mentioned in the OP, that it would come out proRKBA. I would let sleeping tiger keep sleeping until you have more changes in the court that look positive. Remember with the 5/4 Scalia membership, they turned down an weapons ban case over the dissents of Thomas and Scalia. Scalia was probably more of a force than Gorsuch will be. The other guy that was talked about was a more vocal gun advocate. Get a couple like him and then try Scotus again.

I've thought that we probably will see no expansion of gun rights at the Federal level under Trump and Scotus. They have no fire in their belly for the issue. The best they offer is no new bans or laws.

 

[Aim1]

Frank is correct that we don't know what they would take. I would advise caution because I'm not so sure if they took one of those mentioned in the OP, that it would come out proRKBA. I would let sleeping tiger keep sleeping until you have more changes in the court that look positive. Remember with the 5/4 Scalia membership, they turned down an weapons ban case over the dissents of Thomas and Scalia. Scalia was probably more of a force than Gorsuch will be. The other guy that was talked about was a more vocal gun advocate. Get a couple like him and then try Scotus again.

I've thought that we probably will see no expansion of gun rights at the Federal level under Trump and Scotus. They have no fire in their belly for the issue. The best they offer is no new bans or laws.

If Gorush is confirmed it will leave the court with the same layout as when Scalia was on it. If Trump isn't able to nominate any other judges in his next 4 years and isn't re-elected and any conservative justices retire then the next president, most likely a Democrat could change the layout for the worse.


It might be time to strike now.

 

[Frank Ettin]

...It might be time to strike now.

Or not.

All of this is highly speculative, and these questions don't have answers.