Case 6:22-cv-06486-JLS Document 56 Filed 12/29/22 Page 26 of 36
firearms in place of worship or religious observation. Bruen, at 2135, 2138, 2150, 2156. See Dkt. 43, at 17. This Court has explained that the notion of a “tradition” is the opposite of one-offs, outliers, or novel enactments. “Tradition” requires “continuity.” See generally Bruen, 142 S.Ct. at 2135–56; Washington v. Glucksberg, 521 U.S. 702, 723 (1997); Tradition, The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (5th ed. 2011). These enactments are of unknown duration,[1] and the State has not met is burden to show endurance (of any sort) over time.[2]
Nor can the State demonstrate constitutionality of the houses of worship exclusion by identifying prohibitions on carrying firearms “in places where people gather in large crowds and confined places.” See Dkt. 43, at 18. Bruen squarely rejected this approach. See Bruen, 142 S.Ct. at 2134 (“[E]xpanding the category of ‘sensitive places’ simply to all places of public congregation that are not isolated from law enforcement defines the category of ‘sensitive places’ far too broadly”). In effect, such an approach would “exempt cities from the Second Amendment and would eviscerate the general right to publicly carry arms for self-defense.” Id.
As a result, the Court is left—as it was in Hardaway—with a handful of seemingly spasmodic enactments involving a small minority of jurisdictions governing a small minority of population. And they were passed nearly a century
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