WASHINGTON, DC – Guns are back at the Supreme Court, as the justices announced on Friday they will decide on free speech rights for the National Rifle Association (NRA) and whether the federal government can ban bump stocks, which are a firearm accessory, by calling them machineguns.
People usually think of the Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms when the think of the NRA, but the provision of the Constitution in the NRA’s case this time is actually about the First Amendment, not the Second.
The NRA is represented by one of the country’s foremost First Amendment scholars, Prof. Eugene Volokh, as well as attorneys who have been representing the NRA for years in the lower courts. The NRA’s petition explains that the head of New York’s Department of Financial Services is using “pressure tactics—including backchannel threats, ominous guidance letters, and…
