AMGOA Staff
Pennsylvania


Posts: 1,427

New Jersey's ban on large-capacity gun magazines has survived another legal challenge.

A three judge panel of the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on Tuesday dismissed an appeal by gun-rights activists who said the state's 10-round magazine cap ran afoul of the Second, Fifth, and 14th amendments.

The 3-1 ruling is a victory for New Jersey, which has some of the strictest gun control laws in the nation, despite an increasingly conservative federal court system that gun control advocates feared would roll back restrictions. The lone dissent on the decision was from a judge appointed by President Donald Trump.

The 2018 law had previously passed muster with another three judge panel of the Circuit Court as well as the District Court for New Jersey.

The state defended the law, which exempted active military and police officers as well as retired police officers, by arguing that it could safe lives by forcing a mass shooter to pause to reload.

The Association of New Jersey Rifle and Pistol Clubs sued the state immediately after the law was passed. Federal judges concluded that the law does not violate the Second Amendment because it does not prohibit possession of firearms or "effectively disarm individuals or substantially affect their ability to defend themselves." Judges also noted that the law does not limit the number of magazines that a person can own.

The judges also said that the law does not violate the Fifth Amendment's takings clause because the law allowed owners of the large-capacity magazines to modify them, transfer them to a person who could legally own them, surrender them to police or register a magazine that could not be modified.

https://wpgtalkradio.com/nj-gun-control-measure-upheld-again-by-federal-judges/