Saturday, June 14, 2008

Wow: Brady Organization Head Admits Defeat on 2nd Amendment Perceptions

According to the President of the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence:

We've lost the battle on what the Second Amendment means.  Seventy-five percent of the public thinks it's an individual right. Why are we arguing a theory anymore? We are concerned about what we can do practically.

Full story from ABC News here.  Hat tip: Eugene Volokh at The Volokh Conspiracy.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

On a totally unrelated note (the individual right reading of the 2nd amendment makes sense to me both textually and otherwise), what do you think the motivation behind this is, Brian?

http://www.legis.state.wv.us/Bill_Text_HTML/2008_SESSIONS/RS/BILLS/HB4120%20ENG%20SUB.htm

Brian said...

Alex:

I was puzzled by the motivations behind the new statute as well: some of the sponsors (Shook, Miley, and probably others) are as deeply committed to furthering the interests of plaintiff's lawyers as one can get. However, after a little digging I did manage to find an explanation, per the head of the trial lawyer's interest group as quoted in the WV Record. (http://www.wvrecord.com/news/209542-bill-would-prohibit-specific-damage-demands-in-personal-injury-wrongful-death-cases). Among other things, she talked about the $54 million demand in the D.C. pants case and the more local $10 million faulty cheeseburger demand against McDonald's, saying the new law "eliminates some of the anecdotal cases that corporate special interests like to cite when they try to claim that our court system is broken."

So basically it seems the trial lawyers supported it for the same reason their interest group changed its name a while back: enhancing the reputation of plaintiff's attorneys. Still, since all lawyers take a reputation hit when publicity-seeking attorneys make completely outrageous money demands in complaints I'm glad the bill got passed, even if some of its key supporters weren't perhaps only thinking of the general good.

Anonymous said...

Thanks, Brian. That makes sense.

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