''United States v. Rybar'', 103

F.3d The ''Federal Reporter'' () is a case law reporter in the United States that is published by West Publishing and a part of the National Reporter System. It begins with cases decided in 1880; pre-1880 cases were later retroactively compiled by We ...

273 (3d Cir. 1996), is a case which was argued before the

Third Circuit Court of Appeals The United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit (in case citations, 3d Cir.) is a federal court with appellate jurisdiction over the district courts for the following districts: * District of Delaware * District of New Jersey * East ...

on September 13, 1995, and decided on December 30, 1996. The appeal addressed the constitutionality of a provision of the

Firearm Owners Protection Act The Firearm Owners' Protection Act (FOPA) of 1986 is a United States federal law that revised many provisions of the Gun Control Act of 1968. Federal firearms law reform Under the Gun Control Act of 1968, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and F ...

of 1986 under the Commerce Clause and the

Second Amendment to the United States Constitution The Second Amendment (Amendment II) to the United States Constitution protects the Right to keep and bear arms in the United States, right to keep and bear arms. It was ratified on December 15, 1791, along with nine other articles of the Un ...

The case

Raymond Rybar, Jr., a federally licensed firearms dealer, had conditionally pleaded guilty to two counts of possessing an illegal

machine gun A machine gun is a fully automatic, rifled autoloading firearm designed for sustained direct fire with rifle cartridges. Other automatic firearms such as automatic shotguns and automatic rifles (including assault rifles and battle rifles) a ...

under the

of 1986. He had possessed them at a

gun show In the United States, a gun show is an event where promoters generally rent large public venues and then rent tables for display areas for dealers of guns and related items, and charge admission for buyers. The majority of guns for sale at gun s ...

Monroeville, Pennsylvania Monroeville is a Home rule municipality (Pennsylvania), home rule municipality in Allegheny County, Pennsylvania. It is located about 10 miles east of Pittsburgh. Monroeville is a suburb with mixed residential and commercial developments. As ...

. The weapons in question were a ''Chinese

Type 54 The Type 54 () and its variants (Type 51, M20, TU-90 and Model 213 pistols) are Chinese copies of the Soviet type Tokarev TT-33. Type 54 pistols are also known colloquially as "Black Star" pistols (Traditional Chinese:黑星手槍, Simplified Ch ...

7.62-millimeter machine gun'' (see note below), and a U.S. Military M-3 .45 caliber

submachine gun A submachine gun (SMG) is a magazine-fed, automatic carbine designed to fire handgun cartridges. The term "submachine gun" was coined by John T. Thompson, the inventor of the Thompson submachine gun, to describe its design concept as an autom ...

. Rybar was charged with four felonies, but only convicted of two. The other two counts were for failing to purchase a tax stamp (this is not registration) for the machine guns under the National Firearms Act of 1934 for firearms that can not be classified under 18 U.S.C. § 922o. A federal district court had previously ruled in '' United States v. Rock Island Armory, Inc.'' that a conviction under 18 U.S.C. § 922o would violate the fundamental fairness found in the Fifth Amendment. Rybar argued that these convictions violated his Second Amendment rights as well as the commerce clause of the United States Constitution.

The decision

The Third Circuit Court upheld his convictions 2-1. Authoring a notable dissenting opinion was then-Judge

Samuel Alito Samuel Anthony Alito Jr. ( ; born April 1, 1950) is an American lawyer and jurist who serves as an associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States. He was nominated by President George W. Bush on October 31, 2005, and has served ...

. Alito argued that the law under which Rybar had been convicted should be vacated, because Congress, in its lawmaking, had not made sufficient findings regarding the impact on interstate commerce clause to fully justify the court deferring to Congressional judgement that the law was authorized by the Commerce Clause. Rather than actually ruling that the law was unconstitutional, Alito asserted simply that Congress had not sufficiently justified it, allowing that, had Congress made sufficient findings, he would defer to those findings.

References

External links

*{{caselaw source , case = ''United States v. Rybar'', 103 F.3d 273 (3d Cir. 1996) , courtlistener =https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/732313/united-states-v-raymond-rybar-jr/ , findlaw = https://caselaw.findlaw.com/us-3rd-circuit/1201319.html , justia =https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/appellate-courts/F3/103/273/518277/ , other_source1 = OpenJurist , other_url1 =https://openjurist.org/103/f3d/273 , other_source2 = Google Scholar , other_url2 =https://scholar.google.com/scholar_case?case=5836794757734912440 United States Commerce Clause case law United States Second Amendment case law United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit cases History of Allegheny County, Pennsylvania 1995 in United States case law 1996 in United States case law United States federal firearms case law

The case

The decision

See also

References

External links