New York: NRA Brief Defends Equal Rights for Part-Time Residents
On January 26, former U.S. Solicitor General Paul Clement filed the opening brief in an NRA-supported challenge to New York state licensing authorities who refuse to issue handgun permits to part-time residents.
Alfred Osterweil is a retired lawyer who has moved to Louisiana but keeps a summer home in New York. During the part of the year when Mr. Osterweil lives in New York, the state’s policy infringes his right to possess a handgun in the home for self-defense. In the Heller and McDonald cases, the Supreme Court protected that right for Washington, D.C. and Chicago residents, respectively, and as the brief puts it:
The fundamental right of self-defense is no less acute because one has more than one home, or spends less than twelve months per year in one’s home. To be sure, those likely to cause a confrontation or illegally enter a home will be neither impressed nor deterred by the part-time nature of a person’s occupancy.
The case, Osterweil v. Bartlett, is pending in the Second Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals. Additional briefs will be filed over the next few months.
(NY Court has ruled in the past that an out of state resident can not get a handgun license. NY law only allows an out of state resident who works or has a business in NY to have a license.)