Transcription
Major breaking news. As the US Supreme Court decision in Wolford versus Lopez just keeps getting better and better and better for the Second Amendment, the more I analyze it in super geeky detail, and I'm happy to report that I've been Easter egg hunting, looking for Easter eggs in this opinion as to where the Supreme Court is going, and it's going to make you very happy. We're going to break down some very specific, detailed language here so that you can be the smartest person in the room. And if you're litigating these cases, you're going to be extra happy because what we're going to break down is going to totally help you win all of your cases, including cases involving suppressors, magazines, and yes indeed, the AR-15 fight. Okay, let's talk about it when we come right back.
Hey folks, I'm Mark Smith, host of the four box, proud American gun owner, constitutional attorney, member of the United States Supreme Court Bar, and I'm proud to send the top voice of the second in America. Thank you 2025 and 2026 gun news awards.
All right, folks. So, I've been reading more and more carefully the Wolford versus Lopez case, looking for every single scrap, every single inch that we can capture to advance the right to keep and bear arms. And wow, oh wow, have I found some great little Easter eggs that have been hidden in this opinion, hidden in plain sight by the US Supreme Court in the six to3 win for the Second Amendment in Wolford versus Lopez. And it's going to make you very happy. In fact, I'm just going to laser focus laser focus on just a paragraph or two and break it down so you can see exactly where the court is going and it's going to make you very happy.
Specifically, I want to look at page seven of this decision of Wilford versus Lopez. And we're going to read it to you, and then we're going to look at some specific language that has been used by the US Supreme Court, which is going to cover basically all modern American gun control laws and put them all at extreme risk, including some of the most popular anti-gun laws in America from the perspective of the anti-gun at least. That would be banning suppressors, banning magazines, banning AR-15s, that would be waiting periods, that would be all sorts of restrictions on the ability to acquire guns and indeed to make your own gun. All this stuff is going to be covered. And I think it's going to be very difficult moving forward for the anti-gun movement and the anti-gun states to win these cases.
But before we break it down in detail, let's just go back and I want to read for you carefully and slowly the relevant passages here. And then after we do that, we're going to break it down and I'm going to show you just how great this opinion is and why this has hugely advanced our right to keep and bear arms and the anti-gunners are absolutely justified in freaking out about it. So let's take a look at what the Supreme Court has to say in describing what constitutes the plain text of the Second Amendment, meaning the right of the people to keep their arms shall not be infringed and how to interpret that and look at the language. You're going to love it. Check it out.
The brewin analysis we held involves two steps. First, a court must determine whether the law before it clashes with the plain text of the Second Amendment's language. This inquiry entails three subsidiary questions. First, does the law apply to the people, which is to say all members of the political community? Second, listen carefully. Does it concern any form of arms, i.e. any weapon customarily used for offensive or defensive purposes? Third, does the law place any restrictions on either the keeping, possession, or the bearing, i.e. carrying of arms? If the challenge law falls within the plain text of the second amendment, it is presumptively unconstitutional, which means that it may violate the pre-existing right that the amendment codified. But because that right is not in every way cerminous with the amendment's literal language, further analysis may be needed. Specifically, the relevant government, federal, state, or local, may be able to show that his challenge law did not infringe the historical understanding of the codified right.
Okay, now, let's start breaking this down. Let's specifically look at the language of what constitutes an arms as articulated by the Supreme Court. But it's not just defining arms. It's actually expanding on the scope of what laws impact or concern arms. Check it out.
A court must determine whether the law the law before it clashes with the plain text of the Second Amendment's language. This inquiry entails answering quote, "Does the law does it does the law concern any form of arms?" Does it concern any form of arms, i.e. any weapon customarily used for offensive or defensive purposes? Okay, first of all, look at the word concern. If a law concerns any type of arm, then the plain text, the second amendment has been met, has been implicated, and the burden shifts to the government to show using history, the history of regulation of firearms, that the law is justified based on history. That's right. Concerns is a very broad concept. Let's think about this for a second. And by the way, it doesn't just say concerns arms. It literally says again, look at it. It concerns any form of arms. That is huge. That is so broad.
If a modern day gun control law concerns, which rem which means relates to or associates with or touches fingers with whatever. If it concerns any form of arms and any form of arms has multiple meanings. First of all, the word concerns is very broad. So if I say, "Hey, this concerns X, Y, and Z." It could be almost anything. That means, for example, if it concerns arms, a waiting period concerns arms, right? A background check concerns arms. A magazine, a magazine concerns arms. If you ban magazines, you're affecting a type of arm, right? You see that? So concerns is a very broad word that covers a lot of things. So, it's going to be very difficult for the anti-gun courts and the lower courts to argue the plain text of the Second Amendment has not been satisfied with the modern gun control law because every single gun control law concerns arms.
But it gets even better because it's not just concerning arms. What the language there says concerns any form of arms. Hear what I just said? Concerns any form of arms. It doesn't say in in Wilford versus Lopez concerns arms. It says concerns any form of arms. And I think what that means is several things. You see, a form of arm means I think one of two things. A form of arm refers to types of arm. So for example, a firearm is a type of arm. A stun gun is a type of arm. A knife is a type of arm. A nunchucks is a type of arms. You see what I'm saying? So where the Supreme Court in this language says that if a modern-day arms control law concerns which means relates to IN ANY RESPECT VERY broad it concerns any form of arms. It means any modern day law that concerns anything that can be used as an arm, not just firearms. And we know that arms as in the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed does not just include firearms because in 2016 the US Supreme Court said that stun guns are protected arms under the second amendment and stun guns are obviously not firearms. So we know that when the Supreme Court in Wilford says that any law that concerns any form of arms at a minimum includes things other than firearms that can also be used as arms which would include again knives for example and stun guns among other things.
Beyond that, the any form of arms mean any law that concerns any form of arms. Not my language, not your language, the Supreme Court's language. It concerns any form of arms means any type of arm with any kind of feature. Because remember, the way the anti-gunners do it is they don't just say, "We're going to ban all semi-automatic rifles." They say, "We're going to ban all semi-automatic rifles that have a protruding pistol grip, that have a uh, you know, a muzzle brake, that have the ability to attach to to uh to insert a detachable magazine into it, right? That it could be it has a flash suppressor, it has the ability to attach a suppressor, whatever it is, they define it with these features. So, what this means is the Supreme Court says that no matter what arm we're talking about, whether it's a semi-automatic rifle with a red dot, whether it's a semi-automatic rifle with a suppressor, whether it's a semi-automatic rifle with a magazine, whether it's a semi-automatic rifle with a pistol grip, it doesn't matter because the Supreme Court just said in Wolford that the Second Amendment applies to quote any form of arms. If there's a modern- day law that concerns any form of arms, which means any type of arms as well as any features associated with an arm.
So, let's take two clear examples of this. Suppressors and magazines. Keep in mind that a law that concerns a form of arms is different than saying a law regulates an arm. Do you hear what I just said? that laws that concern a type or a form of arms is different than saying that a law regulates an arm because you can regulate components and accessories. And even if those components or accessories are not in of themselves arms, they concern arms because these kinds of accessories uh affect the capability and the functionality of the arms themselves. So you hear what I just said. This is very important if you're arguing for example suppressors of magazines. The Supreme Court said that a modern day gun control law if it concerns any form of arms covers arms and suppressors and magazines. Because if a law regulates a component of a firearm or regulates an accessory of a firearm, even though even if those components and or accessories are not in and of themselves arms, by regulating that component or that accessory, you are having you have a law that concerns the form of an arm. because a magazine and or a suppressor or a red dot, a scope, whatever, those items affect the capabilities of the firearms. And by the way, all this is entirely consistent with what Bruins said that an arm includes any instrument, any instrument that facilitates armed self-defense. So, this language here is missionritical to saving the Second Amendment, and the Supreme Court just did it with this.
But it gets even better because it goes on to say that any restriction any restriction that impacts the keeping meaning the possession of or the carrying which means to bear to bear to carry means the plaint is implicated and the burnish system the government to try to justify it and as you know it's very difficult for the government to win when the burn system the government to use history because in 1791 when the second amendment was adopted there are very few gun control laws outside of laws that say don't misuse a gun like don't use a gun to commit rape or robbery and laws also says you can't touch a gun if you're physically violent dangerous, meaning you're a psychopath or you're a murderer.
So, with that said, let's take a look at this other critical language that is very good for us. Basically saying that any restriction that concerns guns meets the plain text of the Second Amendment. And now the burden is on the government to show that it's somehow constitutional. No longer the burden will lie with the Second Amendment rights claimments, which is how all these anti-gun courts are using to knock out Second Amendment claims. Again, here's what this specific language from the Wolfford case has to say about the text of the Second Amendment. Check it out.
Does the law place any that would be any restrictions on either the keeping, i.e. possession, or the bearing, i.e. carrying of arms? You see that? Any restrictions, folks? Any restrictions. So, when the indie gun laws say, "No, no, that's not a big deal. It's just a three-day waiting period. It's not a real restriction." or they say, "Yeah, it's not a big deal. Cost you 10 bucks." No. The Supreme Court literally said any restrictions on possessing guns, any restrictions on carrying guns falls within the plain text of shall not be infringed. The right of the people to keep your arms shall not be infringed. And the burden then shifts to the government to show there's some sort of historical justification for the modernity gun control law, which of course is very difficult for them to do. And by the way, when it says any restrictions on the ability to possess or carry guns, that would clearly encompass any restrictions on the ability to acquire the guns because you can't you can't keep and bear arms if you can't acquire them. You can't make your own guns. You can't buy the guns. So these are clearly the case that the Supreme Court is making it crystal clear that all these modernity gun control laws are implicating the plain text of the Second Amendment and the government is going to have to justify them using history. a lot of these laws and a lot of these laws are just made up hoie from the 20th century, the 21st century, as you know.
And and last but not least, remember as I've always explained to you, never forget this critical argument. If you're dealing with a ban on a kind of feature associated with a gun, if you're dealing with a ban on a suppressor, you're dealing with a ban on a magazine, you're dealing with a ban on a flash suppressor, doesn't matter. That is not just a ban on an alleged accessory. It is a ban on a form of firearm. It is a ban on an entire category of firearm. Just pause and think about this hard for a second, but it's very straightforward when you get it. Ready? If I ban magazines that hold more than 10 rounds, what have I done? I have banned an entire category of firearms. Every firearm that is capable of firing more than 10 rounds without having to be manually reloaded has been banned. That is a categorical ban of an entire category of firearms. The same sort of thing that was struck down in Heler, which banned a category of firearms, handguns in DC when the Supreme Court decided DC versus Heler in 2008. So too, if I banned suppressors, what have I done? I've not just banned suppressors. What I've also done is I've banned an entire category of firearms, firearms capable of firing suppressed rounds. Right? That is what I have done.
And when you look at this language here that says that any modern day gun, any modern- day law that concerns any form of arms, right? And he goes on to say that any law that places restrictions on your ability to have the gun or to carry the gun, you know, every modern gun control law in America is going to be implicated by the plain text of the Second Amendment moving forward. And that means the burden is going to be on the government and that is going to be very difficult for them to satisfy. And that is very good because again, if you look at the Second Circuit out of New York, if you look at the Ninth Circuit out of San Francisco, they're a little fuzzy on this. If you look at the seventh circuit out of Chicago, if you look at the fourth circuit out of uh Maryland and Virginia, they all play these game games. They basically elevate historical issues. They smuggle historical regulations into the plain text of the Second Amendment and then they turn to the Second Amendment rights claimants, either a criminal defendant of certain Second Amendment rights or a plaintiff suing uh a gun rights organization suing in court over the meaning of a gun control law and whether that violates the Second Amendment. whatever in that second amendment rights claimment says the anti-gun courts always smuggle history into the plain text and say you're the rights claimant you have to show all this stuff like for example that the guns are in common use for lawful purposes or specifically what they say is you have to show that these guns are often used for self-defense and the Supreme Court just destroyed all of that right here and right now and that is extremely good for us and by the way as a side note I am confident that the US court of appeals for the third circuit in the Cheeseman and the association of New Jersey Rifle and Pistol Clubs is picking up on all of this right here and right now. And uh I'm guessing you're going to see a lot of the analysis that I'm articulating on this channel is probably going to appear in I assume I'm guessing the majority opinion that's going to knock out all those New Jersey gun control laws.
But again, the history of the future has yet to be written. So anyway, folks, I hope you enjoyed this great surprise and these surprises. We keep finding these Easter eggs site to Taylor Swift, I guess, uh in this opinion of Wolford versus Lopez. And there will be more to come. But this is all very good stuff. Very protective of our right to keep arms. And we should be very happy uh that the current Supreme Court is finally stepping up and doing the right thing. And they did a great thing in brewing and they continue to go down the path. I just wish they would take more cases. But every litigator on every subject in America wants them to take more cases, but they only take 70 years. So they have to pick and choose the Second Amendment cases. But fingers crossed and candles lit. They're going to take a lot more and we're going to win a lot more at the Supreme Court.
All right, folks. There you have it. I hope you enjoyed today's episode. Make sure you follow me on Xerbox. Don't forget to subscribe both to YouTube and Rumble and I'll talk to you again real soon here at the fourboxes.com. >> Orders up. Table 2 A.