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The
Hill
Holder
v. Brownback? DOJ and Kan.
on collision course on guns
By Ben Goad
05/04/13
The
Obama administration is on a
collision course with the state of Kansas over a new law that claims to
nullify
federal gun controls.
Attorney
General Eric Holder has
threatened litigation against Kansas over the law in what could the
opening
salvo of a blockbuster legal battle with national ramifications.
“This
is definitely a case that
could make it to the Supreme Court,” Kansas Secretary of State Kris
Kobach said
Friday afternoon. “There is nothing symbolic about this law.”
Kobach,
a former constitutional law
professor, helped craft the statute, which bars the federal government
from
regulating guns and ammunition manufactured and stored within Kansas
state
lines.
Scores
of bills in at least 28
states have sought to provide similar exemptions. But the Kansas
measure goes
further than some, in that it would make felons of federal authorities
who seek
to enforce any federal “act, law, treaty, order, rule or regulation” in
violation of the state law.
And
unlike many of the gun bills
that have stalled or fizzled in state legislatures around the country,
the
Kansas statute was actually enacted late last week
One
day after the legislation known
as S.B. 102 became law, U.S. Attorney Gen. Eric Holder sent a sharply
worded
missive to Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback calling the law unconstitutional.
“The
United States will take all
appropriate action, including litigation if necessary, to prevent the
State of
Kansas from interfering with the activities of federal officials
enforcing the
law,” Holder wrote to Brownback.
The
Obama administration has made
gun control a high-profile priority in the months since the shooting
spree that
left 20 children and six adults dead inside a Newtown, Conn.,
elementary
school. But the effort has been far from successful.
In
January, Obama announced nearly
two-dozen executive actions designed to reduce gun violence. But the
president’s authority is limited, and legislation to advance the White
House’s
big-ticket goals — including an assault weapons ban and universal
background
checks — has suffered bitter defeats in Congress…
Read
the rest of the article at The
Hill
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