Expert taken aback as Supreme Court conservatives and liberals 'unite' for puzzling case
A legal expert was surprised on Tuesday after the Supreme Court seemed to be "united" in a puzzling case.
On Monday, the Supreme Court heard oral arguments in United States v. Hemani, which challenges a federal statute that bars people who admit to using illegal drugs from owning a gun. Earlier this year, the Fifth Circuit struck down the law, finding that it was being unconstitutionally applied to recreational drug users like Hemani, who had previously admitted to using marijuana regularly.
Dana Bazelon, fellow at the Quattrone Center at Penn Carey Law School, argued in a new article for Slate that the oral arguments were unique in that the ideologically divided court seemed to unite behind the Fifth Circuit's reasoning.
"While we don’t yet know how Hemani will be decided, members of both the conservative and liberal factions of the court seemed united against the broadness of the category that the law had created," Bazelon wrote. "Too many people could be prosecuted and disarmed for things that, the justices seemed to agree, just weren’t worth it."
She added that the case also poses a puzzling question to the court in the future because it leaves open the interpretation of when a recreational drug user becomes "too dangerous" to own a firearm.
"A majority of the justices seemed to agree that many unlawful drug users were simply too dangerous to be allowed to own guns," she wrote. "But leaving argument on Monday morning, it seemed equally clear that both the left and right wings of the court did not think all unlawful drug users, regardless of personal circumstance, forfeited their Second Amendment rights."
"This is certainly good news for Mr. Hemani, but left unclear the question of how other, more serious drug users may be disarmed," she added. "If the statute is struck down entirely for being overly broad, will Congress rewrite it?"