State High Court to Review Assault Gun Ban

The California Supreme Court unanimously decided Wednesday to review the constitutionality of the state’s 1989 assault weapons ban.

The decision was welcomed by gun control advocates and state Atty. Gen. Dan Lungren, who want the justices to overturn a lower court ruling that struck down a key provision of the ban.

That ruling, by a state Court of Appeal in Sacramento, expressed strong reservations about the constitutionality of the law. The ruling flatly rejected a provision that gave the attorney general, with a judge’s consent, the ability to add new semiautomatic weapons to a list of 75 banned firearms.

The provision was intended to prevent manufacturers from skirting the law by producing copycat military-style weapons with large firing capacities. But the appeals court said the provision violated the separation of powers by giving judges legislative authority.

The appellate court also asked a trial court to examine the constitutionality of the list of banned weapons. The Court of Appeal, sharply critical of the list, complained that it treated owners of banned weapons differently from those who own nearly identical copycat weapons.

Luis Tolley, Western director of the Center to Prevent Handgun Violence, praised Wednesday’s decision.

“The threat that has been hanging over us--that Uzis and AK-47s would have been legal again--has now been lifted,” Tolley said when he learned that the Supreme Court had granted review of the ban.

Tolley, whose group joined with law enforcement organizations to ask for the court’s review, said the Sacramento ruling probably would have “completely eliminated the ban on assault weapons that we have had here for nine years.”

He complained that the appeals court ruling was “full of the strongest pro-gun diatribe we have ever read.”

The Supreme Court’s acceptance of the case wipes from the books the appeals court ruling. The state high court could affirm it, modify it or reject it entirely. A decision may take about a year.

Don Kates, a lawyer who represents gun owners against the law, said he was not concerned about the court’s decision to examine the Court of Appeal ruling. “This is obviously a matter of great importance, which is the kind of thing they feel is more or less incumbent upon them to address,” he said.

The state high court has accepted other cases involving individual assault weapons. If the court found the law unconstitutional, the other cases would become moot, Kates said.

Steve Helsley, the state liaison of the National Rifle Assn., said the ban is so legally weak that it is bound to be overturned by the Supreme Court. “I am assuming that the decision to grant review means we are just another step closer toward repealing existing law,” he said.

The Legislature has been considering a bill that would ban semiautomatic assault weapons by their characteristics instead of by brand name. That bill is expected to be rewritten to accommodate concerns by Gov. Pete Wilson, who has objected to some of its provisions.

But Tolley said the original law is still needed because “manufacturers might try to make copies that sneak through the cracks of a generic definition.”

Lungren has taken no formal position on the bill but has criticized some of its contents.

State lawmakers decided to ban assault weapons after a gunman in 1989 fired a semiautomatic weapon into a Stockton schoolyard, killing six people and injuring 30 others.