When Oregon voters passed Measure 114, there was always going to be a legal battle over it. The law went way too far for there not to be, and it turned the state into one of the most anti-gun areas of the nation overnight.
They're not California yet, but it isn't due to a lack of trying.
While the battle was always going to happen, the questions from the state Supreme Court include some...well, frankly, ridiculous ideas about the Founding Fathers and what they would have tolerated regarding the "consequences" of certain weapons being legal:
[Attorney Tony L.] Aiello argued that there should be no restrictions on “hand-carried personal defense weapons,” as opposed to other defense systems such as aircraft carriers or Apache helicopters.
Justice Christopher L. Garrett asked if Aiello would argue that automatic weapons are protected under the state constitution as well because they are carried by hand.
“Certainly,” Aiello said.
Should the justices also consider what the founders may have thought about the consequences of the right to bear arms at the time the constitution was adopted, Duncan questioned.
If they were OK with the consequences from weapons that existed at the time of the state’s founding era, “why should we assume that they’re OK with a much greater type of consequence now?” she asked.
Aiello said the justices need to consider the founders’ intent, not the consequences of modern technology.
Now, Aiello isn't wrong here. The consequences of modern technology are irrelevant when it comes to the Second Amendment, but I think he missed an important point here—what was legal at the time of the Second Amendment's ratification.
Despite former President Joe Biden's pronouncements to the contrary, you could most definitely own a cannon during the time of the nation's founding and well afterward. Artillery was the most destructive thing anyone could own, and there were no restrictions on their ownership. In fact, those same cannons are still perfectly legal today; they're outdated enough that no one would use them offensively today.
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Plus, the Constitution gives Congress the power to issue letters of marque. That means privateers, ladies and gentlemen, and since privateers aren't the Navy, our Founding Fathers literally believed people could own warships.
An 18th-century privateer vessel had the capability of laying waste to entire towns along the coasts or other navigable waterways. The consequences of misuse were well beyond what anyone could do with an AR-15, and the Founding Fathers did nothing to prevent that. They might not give someone inclined to do such a thing a letter of marque, but they could outfit their own warship if they so desired. They just couldn't do anything with it lawfully.
If you're going to talk about the consequences of any kind of firearm as if that should matter, it's imperative to remember what the Founding Fathers actually thought was perfectly acceptable in order to get the necessary context.
I feel Aiello may have missed a golden opportunity to bring that up—if he were even aware of this fact.
The truth is that even if I mounted an M2 Browning on the top of my SUV and shot at everyone who cut me off in traffic, the kind of firepower private citizens could bring to a fight was much more significant when it comes to so-called consequences.
