Manhattan Federal Court Judge John Koeltl [above] has ruled that The Big Apple’s $340 gun permit fee—payable every three years for the “right” to keep a gun in your home—does not violate islanders’ right to keep and bear arms. “There is no evidence that the fee has deterred or is likely to deter any individual from exercising his or her Second Amendment right.” According to the nydailynews.com, Judge Koeltl’s ruling relied on the fact that courts have approved significantly higher fees for other city permits, citing a ruling that permitted a $3,000 adult business license fee. ‘Cause exercising a constitutional right to armed self-defense is the same as opening a porn palace (which pays extra taxes because . . . ?) And the gun permit fee costs the same as New York City’s voter registration permit fee. Oh wait . . . At least someone’s happy about the ruling . . .
“Corporation Counsel Michael Cardozo said the decision ‘upholds our ability to conduct meaningful checks into applicants’ qualifications—which requires far more time, expense and hassle (for the applicant) than the ten-second FBI background check that gun stores use to screen customers, and helps keep as many people as possible from obtaining firearms as possible.”
Just kidding. I made that up, up to the bit with the triple dashes. Obviously.
actually, this could be a good thing. . . . on appeal, it impacts a wider area rather than just the area subject to the district court jurisdiction. Now this can be compared to a poll tax, which itself is illegal,. Ezell v Chicago lost at district court level as well . . . . the unfortunate part is it now costs more to continue the litigation
Hmm, a $340 poll tax … what a good idea! We can keep the riff-raff from voting! Hey, let’s make it $3400! There is no reason anyone should complain about a reasonable fee to do something minor, like, say, exercising one or two of their civil rights. In fact, let’s have a $34,000 “free speech fee”. That will let us shut down those smelly Occupy Whatever types.
Alternate Headline:
“Highly paid federal judge with apartment on Central Park West sees no problem with small NYC licensing fee applied to the peasants.”
s/Alternate/Actual/
Nice regex
Not surprising. I believe the courts have held this up to be true. I am just surprised the fees are not more. I find this just as stupid because you know they are not really doing much more than a computer records check at the end of the day. In CT, the PD talks to your neighbor and calls your place of business and does some background check for about $75 and then the state PD costs you another $75 for simply taking a picture. My favorite is in MA, if you are out of state they require you to go through the same BS in state residents go through, but then charge you $100/yr and you are required to file and renew in person near Boston.
Honestly, I am surprised the anti-gun states have not just taxed away guns.
Honestly, I’m surprised that decent people haven’t just fled the anti-gun states and left them to become even more crime ridden cesspools than they already are. Vote with your wallet and your feet and when they’re Mayor of a city of nothing but ex-cons and no tax revenue, they’ll change their tune.
+1 because staying put is a vote of confidence. Take your skills and earning power elsewhere. Only 40000 people in NYC pay the majority of collected income taxes, It would be nice to see 10% leave for other places.
And a poll tax is unconstitutional? Maybe we need a “Gun Rights Act” along the lines of the Voting Rights Act.
Careful what you wish for. Most legislation takes away as much as it gives. FOPA closed the NFA registry civilian full auto purchases. What would a gun rights act do except trample on our supposedly inalienable rights.
It’s pricey to get it in the first place in CT, but once you have it it’s just $50 every 5 years to renew. Annoying, but not insane.
The argument was the the $340 fee was extreme as the rest of the state is around $100 or there abouts.
I am not a lawyer, and I don’t pretend to play one on TV, but it seems that this judge just gave a good reason to carry without paying the fee. “The fee was too expensive for me, and I have the right to keep and bear arms.”
Granted that person would be arrested and charged with a felony, but thats besides the point…
As an attorney and spokesman for the legal industry, I’d just like to remind you that lawyers have their kids’ college tuition to pay, grand homes to maintain and whoa, have you seen the price of a new Jaguar lately?
So on behalf of all of us, I say go ahead and break any law you want. We lawyers can use the money that we’ll drain from your kids’ college fund. So what if you have to sell your house — you’re not going to be living there anyway. The best part is that the expense of visiting you once a year in Attica, Green Haven or Sing Sing is tax deductable.
Ralph I hope die a very painful death. Ass clown
If you look at the linked Daily News article you will see that this $340 fee every three years is for the privilege of keeping a firearm in your HOME, and not one of the mythical carry permits that only connected people can get in NYC.
Silly me. Text amended. Thanks.
This case will provide great grist for the mill of Alan Gura and Co. What a tool Koeltl is. If we play our cards right, we could end up having the States paying the citizens to apply for a permit.
$340 is more than a week’s gross pay if you have a minimum wage job ($7.25 x 40 = $290) So in effect they are disenfranchising the poor at a minimum (that’s assuming that we don’t consider $340 an enfringement, which I can’t agree with). So the poor could start a class action suit to…….. oh yeah, they’re poor and only grossing $290 a week so they can’t afford lawyers. So an activist pro gun law firm in NYC could donate their time…… oh yeah, this is New York City, probably aren’t any pro gun law firms there…..
Bontai: “So in effect they are disenfranchising the poor at a minimum.” The Mayor asks, “OK, so what’s your point?”
An American (that I once knew and who had spent many years living in 3rd world developing countries) told me that it is only a matter of time before the common person here becomes so angry at how they are unjustly treated by the elites that eventually the same political violence abroad begins happening in America.
Eventually?
It’s not much different that the attempted ban on ‘saturday night special’ firearms. They declared that to not be fair, basically because of financial segregation. Only the rich could afford a gun, essentially dearming the poor…or maybe just deterring individuals from acquiring them illegally.
If anything it should be made easier to obtain a gun, after relevant background checks of course. If it becomes so expensive to maintain the possession of your gun, then people will buy them illegally instead. It is to the general poppulation’s benefit that people be registered firearm owners.
The real problem with these fees to me is that they are not justifiable. What is the money being used for? All the anecdotal stories and evidence I’ve seen shows that they do not do anything different than the NICS check (10 sec background check mentioned, really like 5-20 min based on call volume). This is regardless of the scenario in which a background check is performed; gun purchase or permit application. They also supposedly destroy any fingerprints taken in respect of the 4th amendment, they’re only used for purposes of the background check.
Its actually a lot more than $340. You have to take a day off to go down to 1pp the first time then spend another day down there after you purchase the firearm for inspection. So even if you make around say 75k a year which is not a lot of money in NYC you just lost another $550-600 for taking 2 days off. Thats if it goes smooth and you don’t have to go back there for some bs or possibly denied all together none of that money is refundable. I would like to know how many people the judge asked to see if that was a lot of money for them. It seems like he made a decision on behalf of himself and not the people this is meant for.
As I recall, the stated intent of the $200 Tax Stamp on NFA firearms was to prevent people from legally owning certain types of firearms. It didn’t deter Al Capone with his millions in illicit funds , but it sure did prevent a shopkeeper in 1920s Chicago from getting his own “Chicago Typewriter”. It seems New York is determined to maintain the tradition.
Can any of you lawyers opine on why the case below doesn’t figure into these decisions?
“A state may not impose a charge for the enjoyment of a right granted by the federal constitution… The power to impose a license tax on the exercise of these freedoms is indeed as potent as the power of censorship which this Court has repeatedly struck down… a person cannot be compelled ‘to purchase, through a license fee or a license tax, the privilege freely granted by the constitution.’ —MURDOCK V. PENNSYLVANIA 319 US 105 (1942)”
Not a lawyer, but its b/c the states/cities call them “processing fees” necessary to process the paperwork, and the judges all seem to go, “ok”
Doesn’t apply, because they got together in the Mayor’s office and concluded that that’s not a right city people would actually enjoy. Since they won’t enjoy it, taxing it is fine. Lighten up. They’re very busy trying to decide whether to ban salt outright, or just tax it highly. They call this a ‘regression analysis’ in the Mayor’s office. The more regressive, the better. “If they all had left-over money, they wouldn’t clean our bathrooms, would they?”
Stay tuned! The definition of “Tax” is going to be important this election season.
Remember this NYC “fee” follows the same set of rules that make the subway system “public” when they need money and “private” when they make a profit or want to look in your bag.
New York City is the land of $20 martinis, shoebox-sized apartments that rent for $2000 a month and $12 cigarette packs. In that context, $340 for a permit is cheap.
Besides, except for the disenfranchised masses who live there, who really gives a damn about New York City? It’s my old home town and I sure don’t give a flying f^ck what goes on in Bloomberg’s paradise.
That price sounds about correct. NY will do anything to prevent it’s citizens from owning and possessing firearms. And to hell with the constitution, and the second amendment.
Whatever, it’s New York. A metropolis where the rich and powerful rule. It’s in their best interests to make it so only the people they employ can be armed.
All we can do is set up a fund to help gun loving people move the hell away from NY.
Vote with your feet. Leave. Secede from Soviet City State. Don’t do business there. Don’t send a penny there for any reason. Boycott it. Get the picture?