Many anti-Second Amendment groups cite the licensing of drivers and registration of cars to justify backing similar procedures for guns, but there is one big difference: A driver’s license is recognized in all 50 states, but the same is not true for concealed-carry permits, but that could change as early as this Supreme Court term.
While a majority of states either have “constitutional carry” or universally recognize permits from other states, ten states reject permits issued by some or all other states, leading to a series of lawsuits, including one that could be heard by the Supreme Court. The Daily Caller News Foundation asked attorneys and organizations representing plaintiffs about lawsuits seeking to force the recognition of out-of-state permits. These lawsuits have mostly focused on allegations that refusing to recognize out-of-state permits violates the Second Amendment.
“In the Eighth Circuit’s view, an individual’s Second Amendment rights are confined to the borders of the state of where he holds a firearm permit,” Liberty Justice Center argued in its Aug. 24 petition to the high court. “No matter how many times an ordinary law-abiding citizen proves his worth through a state’s firearm licensing process, another state can force him to do it again before he can exercise his ‘constitutional right to bear arms in public for self-defense.’”
Gun Owners of America (GOA) and the group’s Oregon state director, Cynthia Ladd, sued the city of Salem, Oregon, and Marion County, Oregon, Sheriff Nick Hunter Friday in the United States District Court for the District of Oregon on Sept. 11, demanding that the state’s b