In 2016, California voters passed Proposition 63, in which a limit was placed upon the number of bullets a firearm could legally hold. This law came in response to numerous mass shootings, during which assailants were able to fire as many as thirty rounds before needing to reload.
Just days ago, US District Judge Roger Benitez decided that it was asking too much to limit the capacity of gun magazines. He ruled that a particular section of Prop 63, which limited this number to ten rounds, was unconstitutional.
Benitez released an 86-page decision containing arguments which included thwarted home invasions and fiery rhetoric stating the Second Amendment to have been written by “colonists who cherished individual freedom more than the subservient security of a British ruler.”
The ruling has created a deep fissure among respondents. The NRA and gun advocates across the US have rallied behind the judgment as “one of the strongest judicial statements in favor of the Second Amendment to date.”
On the other hand, proponents of gun control were horrified, not just by the decision (which they had anticipated) but also by the justifications for it. Quoted in an article from The Sacramento Bee, Ari Freilich of the Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence stated sharply that “this opinion is not normal.”
He went on to say that “The judge does at times suggest that military style weaponry may be the most protected by the Second Amendment…He was citing the ability to make war against the government, which is something I think is absurd and dangerous.”
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