A federal appeals court heard oral arguments on Thursday in a case concerning the constitutionality of the federal ban keeping medical marijuana patients from purchasing or possessing firearms.
A three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit listened and asked questions as attorneys for Florida medical cannabis patients and the Justice Department argued their sides of the case, which have been fleshed out in multiple briefings over the course of more than a year.
Will Hall, who is representing the plaintiffs, said in his opening remarks that there are two main considerations at hand that demonstrate the unconstitutionality of the federal ban. Multiple courts outside of the Eleventh Circuit have already determined that the prohibition is unconstitutional.
Hall’s first argument was that, regardless of the legality of cannabis use, precedent holds that simply committing a crime on its own does not inherently exclude people from their Second Amendment rights. The second is that the Supreme Court has created a new threshold for gun restrictions that renders them unconstitutional if there is not a historical analogue consistent with the amendment’s original 1791 ratification. Banning people who use medical cannabis is inconsistent with that historical context, Hall contended.
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