Transcription
Major, major win. A huge federal decision has just come out in Texas that actually appears to apply nationwide in favor of the Second Amendment. If you are a member of the Firearms Policy Coalition or the Second Amendment Foundation dealing with, ready for this, carrying guns into federal post offices. This is a huge deal, folks. A big win for the Second Amendment and frankly a loss for Pam Bondi and the Department of Justice. Uh, we'll break it all down when we come right back.
Hey folks, I'm Mark Smith, host of the Four Boxes of Don, proud American gun owner, constitutional attorney, member of the United States Supreme Court Bar, and proud to say the top voice of the Second Amendment in America. Thank you both 2025 and 2026 Gundy Awards.
All right, this is a fantastic bit of news, folks. This has been a big fight and it's turned out golden, turned out roses, whatever metaphor you want to use, in favor of the Second Amendment down there in the United States District Court for the Northern District of Texas in front of Judge Rita O'Connor. There was a huge fight over whether or not the Second Amendment, uh, prevented the government from barring American citizens from carrying guns as a general matter into post offices in the United States. And Judge Rita O'Connor, in a big decision, relying in part, as I recall, on the decision by Judge Katherine Meisels out of Florida, found that indeed there is no basis to ban, to ban, or no constitutional permission, if you will, to allow government to ban Americans from carrying guns in the post offices with only two very narrow exceptions, which we'll get to in a moment. But overall, there is no historical tradition of restricting the ability of Americans to carry their guns in public, which is, of course, what Bruen said. You have a right to bear arms in public, u.i.e., carry guns in public for the purposes of self-defense in a case of confrontation, and there is no basis for the federal government to say that post offices are somehow sensitive places that you can ban guns on that property.
Now, Judge Rita O'Connor went on, and this is the big fight, and this is the big win today. In addition to finding that it was unconstitutional for the federal government to ban guns in post offices with two narrow exceptions, we'll get to in a second. Pretty narrow exceptions. Um, there was also a fight as to who benefited from this ruling. Remember how I've explained to you at this channel, we don't just train you about substantive stuff. We don't just talk to you about the meaning of the Second Amendment and what did Joseph Story say? What did James Madison think? We don't just train you about the substance of the law, what is the law? We also spend a lot of time talking about the process by which cases move through the system. That's why we talk about on-bunk review. We talk about motions to dismiss, motions for summary judgment. We talk about standing and the like, because all these procedural things, if you mess them up, means that you do not get to win for your Second Amendment substantive rights.
Well, this is a big deal, folks, and illustrates my point. The fight, the big fight that we in the Second Amendment community just won hugely was this: Who benefits from the court's decision that says the federal government cannot ban firearms in post offices? Who benefits from that? Well, the Trump administration argued that the only people that could benefit from this were the specific plaintiffs that sued, and that the members of these organizations, um, were the only ones who conceivably could benefit. Well, guess what? The court rejected that argument in a big way. Judge Rita O'Connor said that the beneficiaries of this ruling, meaning those individuals who are able to carry guns in the post offices, consistent with this order, consistent with the law, are not just current members of the Second Amendment Foundation and current members of the Firearms Policy Coalition, but also, ready for this, drum roll please, also future members of these organizations.
This is a big deal, folks, because the court rejecting arguments by the Trump-Bondi Department of Justice said that under longstanding Supreme Court precedent, you continue to have what is known as associational standing, associational standing, sometimes referred to as the associational standing doctrine. And you're like, Mark, why do I need to learn about the associational standing doctrine for crying out loud? And the answer is because it is the difference between going to prison and not potentially. Because under the associational standing doctrine, it says that if you are a member of an organization that wins a case that benefits from, let's say, injunctive relief, i.e., an injunction, then you're protected by that injunction. So, for example, if you are a member of the Second Amendment Foundation today, if you're a member of the Firearms Policy Coalition today, at least as I read this order, you should check with those organizations specifically. Make sure I got this right. Right. You want to talk to them. If you're a member of these groups or you want to become a member, you got to talk to them directly and have them confirm what I'm saying. But I think I'm right. I think I'm right. But you should confirm it with the groups that are actually litigating these cases. If you worry about your personal situation, whether or not you personally can carry a gun into your post office or particular post office or the particular post office that are not covered by this order.
Okay, so with that disclaimer out, basically associational standing says this: If you are a member of an organization, if you're a member of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, the NAACP, or you're a member of the Second Amendment Foundation, you're a member of the NRA, you're a member of the Gun Owners of America, you're a member of the Firearms Policy Coalition, whatever it is you're a member of, if that organization that you're a member of sues in federal court and wins and gets an injunction on behalf of itself and its members, you're protected. You're covered by the injunction.
So, here the big fight that's been going on is the scope of the relief. Who was going to benefit from this huge win for the Second Amendment against the federal government that was trying to enforce the ban on guns in post offices? Well, the judge today, and I'll link to this order if I, if I think I can link to this order, um, found that indeed all the members of the Firearms Policy Coalition, the Second Amendment Foundation, and future members are going to be covered and protected by this order once they're members. And if they join in the future, they will also be protected as long as this order continues in effect.
Here is specifically what Judge Rita O'Connor said in ruling for the Second Amendment rights claimants over the arguments by the federal government. They were basically saying that the scope of the relief should be much more narrow. Check it out. "Based on the foregoing, the court grants in part defendants' motion and clarifies its order and final judgment as follows: The permanent, the permanent injunction as set forth in the court's order ECF number 35 and the final judgment ECF number 36 applies to plaintiffs and, listen carefully folks, applies to plaintiffs and to all present and future members of Firearms Policy Coalition and Second Amendment Foundation." Amazing. That's amazing. It's correct, by the way. 100% correct.
And I want to step back and give you some context here. This doctrine of associational standing, that says that if you're a member of an organization and the organization sues in federal court and wins a case and gets injunctive relief for the organization and its members, it was always basic black letter law, bas going back many decades. Supreme Court precedent, very clear. In fact, even written about at the time of the founding in various contexts. Okay, very clear that if an association is suing on behalf of its members, if the association wins the case, its members benefit from the injunction. Even if the members themselves don't show up and appear in court because they are implicitly being represented by, they're implicitly in the case through an organization which presumably, this makes a lot of common sense, right? Think about it. Presumably, everyone that joins a particular organization has similar interests and common goals. So, if you join a Second Amendment organization, presumably the reason why you're joining a Second Amendment organization is you have an interest in the Second Amendment. You have an interest in guns. You have an interest in the freedom and the right to keep and bear arms, right? So, it makes sense if an organization representing members that have this common interest and desires and goals, right, and hopes, guess what? It makes sense that if the organization representing all those interested people win a case, that they as members should benefit from that court victory. And that is basically what Judge Rita O'Connor said. And this is not crazy in the least. This is long-standing American law. This is exactly what happened in the so-called Civil Rights era, where the, uh, African-American groups like the NAACP would bring these lawsuits in the South arguing over segregation and whatnot, and they, the NAACP would win its case, and the members of the NAACP would get the benefit of the desegregated school or or the bus station or whatever it happened to be in those cases, they benefited. So, really, all that's going on here is we in the Second Amendment community are taking those long-standing precedents that organizations like the NAACP used in the 1950s and 1960s, and we're taking all those bricks. We're taking all those precedents and we're applying it to vindicate the most fundamental civil right of them all, the most fundamental American liberty of them all, the right to keep and bear arms that actually finds itself in the text of the Bill of Rights.
And what I just said is basically articulated by Judge Rita O'Connor. Here's what he writes in his order today. "The doctrine of associational standing recognizes that the primary reason people join an organization is often to create an effective vehicle for vindicating interests that they share with others. And suits by associations on behalf of its members are different from class action lawsuits. In plaintiff's complaint, Firearms Policy Coalition and the Second Amendment Foundation clearly indicated that they were bringing suit on behalf of their members, stating, 'Firearms Policy Coalition brings this action on behalf of its members and SAF brings this action on behalf of its members.' In crafting its injunction, the court here is mindful of the government's previous argument that any injunctive relief should be tailored to the plaintiffs in this case. But the government did not argue, and the court did not interpret this to mean that only individual members of FPC and SAF who had membership at a certain date should be included in the court's injunction. Rather, the court interpreted this as arguing against a nationwide injunction, which the court did not issue."
And that's exactly right. The doctrine of associational standing has been around forever. And we'll, at the end of this video, I'll give you a brief distinction with the CASA case dealing with nationwide injunctions. Why I think the Trump administration is rightfully worried about some of these issues, not so much when it comes to the Second Amendment, but they're clearly fearful that some, you know, whackadoodle federal district court judge that hates Trump in Boston or Chicago or San Francisco is going to use anything they can to thwart the Trump agenda to do, among other things, kick out all the, uh, illegal immigrants that never should have come in in the first place. But I digress. When that said, the court specifically addresses here in ruling for the Second Amendment that it's not doing anything to violate the Supreme Court precedent of CASA, which dealt with nationwide injunctions. Here's what Judge O'Connor had to write about that. "In crafting this injunction, the court was mindful of the Supreme Court's ruling in CASA. But the court intended its injunction to enure to the benefit of those members of the association actually injured. This includes future members. Hear what I just said. This includes future members. Not including future members could cause FPC and Second Amendment Foundation's injunction relief, injunctive relief, to disappear due to attrition or death of their members, or impose a significant burden on the organizations to track which members qualify for injunctive relief and which do not. And as another court has explained, could result in continuous litigation and be a waste of digital resources, as well as the time and resources of the litigants."
Exactly right. So, let's just step back and think about this from a common sense point of view. So today, in the year of our Lord 2026, the Firearms Policy Coalition has members. The Second Amendment Foundation has members. They've just won this huge case. They've got this injunctive relief. Let's play out a hypothetical where it does not cover future members that join these organizations tomorrow or next month or next year. Let's play that out hypothetically. Okay. At some point, as time waits for no man, all the members of FPC and all the members of the Second Amendment Foundation will die out or they'll quit or whatever, at which point the lawsuit would have to be brought again on behalf of new members seeking the same relief. Or in a more basic way, if you limited this injunction to members as of today, well, let's say you go out, you're not a member of the FPC, you're not a member of the Second Amendment Foundation, and like three months from now, you join, you would have to, if you limited, if the court limited the protection of this injunction to current members, then a member that joined the organizations like six months from now, would have to go out and bring another lawsuit and waste the court's time and waste the resources of the organization. So to avoid that judicial inefficiency, the court here correctly, and this is consistent with long-standing law. This is not new law. He's just applying old Supreme Court precedent. The court went on and said that's why the court said it applies also to future members that join these groups in the future, tomorrow, next month, next year. Otherwise, it'd be totally inefficient and silly and would just give rise to ongoing continuous litigation, which is in no one's interest because you never get finality and you waste a lot of time and money.
Okay, there's just two additional points I want you to know about. First of all, now again, there are exceptions to this. If you're going to a post office, I think on a military base, I think if you're going to a post office like in the basement of Congress or or some other place attached to a federal building where there's other federal functions, I don't think that that applies there. Again, if you want to be a member of these organizations, if you want to follow the law, if you want to get this right, you need to reach out to the Second Amendment Foundation, to the Firearms Policy Coalition, and find out exactly what you should do and find out exactly what you should not do, because they're going to be advised presumably by attorneys who can in turn advise the members. So, don't take anything I'm saying here as legal advice. You never should do that. You should check with your own lawyers. And in this case, I would check with these organizations immediately to find out the full scope of what you can do and what you can't do. Although I think I'm generally right here, you should always double check with them because they're going to have the best information, give you the best advice and the best guidance. So, you can't take my word for it. I'm just giving you the big picture.
Now, with that said, I want to introduce something that you need to be aware of. And this is, I don't know the answer to. And again, the organizations might know the answer to that. And that's this: When you're the beneficiary of an injunction involving a potential crime, you got to be sensitive to this issue. So, let's say you're a member of the organization and you go into a post office. And can the government arrest you? I think the answer is possibly yes. And what do I mean by that? There's two ways to interpret these kind of preemption injunctions. One is, is it a preemptive injunction? One is, is it an affirmative defense to an indictment? So what do I mean by that? So if you walk into a post office and they say you have a gun in a post office, they could say, "Okay, are you?" And you say, "Look, I'm a member of these organizations." Then that is viewed as preempting the charge, then you'd be able to do this. You get, you'd be able to avoid the arrest presumably. But the, some post offices or police or law enforcement might take the position that, well, you're in the post office with a gun. I'm going to arrest you, and then you get to go to court and as an affirmative defense to the charge of carrying a gun in a post office, you get to demonstrate that you are a member at the time you were in the post office with the gun of FPC or SAF, and then you get off at that point. So, I don't know how if this is going to work as like, um, if you're confronted with the police, if this will be like viewed as a preemption to an arrest, or will this be viewed as like an affirmative defense to a post-arrest situation. I just don't know. And again, this is why I'm urging you all, if you're a member of these groups, you want to be a member of these groups, to reach out to them and get guidance from them, because they should be able to walk you through this stuff in detail. I can flag the issues. I can talk about the big picture, but the specific particular legal advice or advice that you may need, you should get from the horse's mouth and not from a YouTube video.
The last thing is, I think the federal government has appealed this. So, you know, we'll see what happens. There's going to be a lot going on here. This goes all the way to the Supreme Court. But for the moment, very exciting news, very good news. Congratulations to Firearms Policy Coalition and to the Second Amendment Foundation and to all of its members. And again, if you're interested in benefiting from this injunction, I strongly urge you to reach out to these organizations and get guidance as to what to do and what not to do, 'cause we certainly don't want anyone getting into trouble with the law anywhere in this great country. And, uh, you always got to be careful because there's a lot of bad actors out there that want nothing more than to arrest law-abiding American gun owners that support Donald Trump, if you know what I'm saying. I think you get the point.
All right, folks. Hope you enjoyed today's video. Make sure you follow me on X. Don't forget to subscribe with YouTube and Rumble. I'll talk to you real soon here in Four Boxes of D. >> Orders up. Table 2A.