Source: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-caDC-10-05062/USCOURTS-caDC-10-05062-0/pdf.json

Nature of Suit Code: 440
Nature of Suit: Other Civil Rights
Cause of Action: 

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United States Court of Appeals

FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA CIRCUIT

Argued November 15, 2010 Decided April 15, 2011

No. 10-5062

STEPHEN DEARTH AND SECOND AMENDMENT FOUNDATION,

INC.,

APPELLANTS

v.

ERIC H. HOLDER, JR.,

APPELLEE

Appeal from the United States District Court

for the District of Columbia

(No. 1:09-cv-00587)

Alan Gura argued the cause for appellants. With him on 

the briefs were Thomas M. Huff and Candice N. Hance.

Anisha S. Dasgupta, Attorney, U.S. Department of 

Justice, argued the cause for appellee. With her on the brief 

were Ronald C. Machen, Jr., U.S. Attorney, and Mark B. 

Stern and Michael S. Raab, Attorneys. R. Craig Lawrence, 

Assistant U.S. Attorney, entered an appearance.

Before: GINSBURG, HENDERSON and KAVANAUGH, 

Circuit Judges.

USCA Case #10-5062 Document #1303429 Filed: 04/15/2011 Page 1 of 8
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Opinion for the Court filed by Circuit Judge GINSBURG.

GINSBURG, Circuit Judge: Plaintiffs Stephen Dearth and 

the Second Amendment Foundation, Inc. (SAF), seeking

declaratory and injunctive relief, claim that portions of 18 

U.S.C. § 922 and related regulations are unconstitutional 

because they prevent Dearth from purchasing a firearm. The 

district court dismissed the suit for lack of standing. Because 

we conclude Dearth does have standing, we reverse the 

judgment of the district court and remand the case to the 

district court for further proceedings.

I. Background

The plaintiffs challenge 18 U.S.C. §§ 922(a)(9) and 

(b)(3) and implementing regulations promulgated by the 

Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF), 

which together make it impossible for a person who lives 

outside the United States lawfully to purchase a firearm in the 

United States. Section 922(a)(9) makes it unlawful for “any 

person ... who does not reside in any State to receive any 

firearms unless such receipt is for lawful sporting purposes.” 

Accord 27 C.F.R. § 478.29a. Section 922(b)(3) prohibits the 

sale or delivery of a firearm by a licensed dealer to “any 

person who the licensee knows or has reasonable cause to 

believe does not reside in ... the State in which the licensee’s 

place of business is located,” except this prohibition does “not 

apply to the loan or rental of a firearm ... for temporary use 

for lawful sporting purposes.”*

 * Section 922(b)(3) contains another exception not relevant here.

 In order to ensure 

compliance, the ATF requires the seller to obtain from the

purchaser a completed form (Form 4473) listing certain 

personal information. See 27 C.F.R. §§ 478.124(a), (c)(1). 

USCA Case #10-5062 Document #1303429 Filed: 04/15/2011 Page 2 of 8
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Question 13 on Form 4473 asks for the purchaser’s state of 

residence. See id. § 478.124(c)(1).*

Dearth is an American citizen who resides in Canada and 

no longer maintains a residence in the United States. In 2006 

and again in 2007 Dearth attempted to purchase a firearm in 

the United States. On both occasions, he “could not provide a 

response to Question 13” on account of his residing in 

Canada; therefore “the transaction was terminated.” Compl. 

¶¶ 22–23. Dearth alleges he still intends, if he may do so 

lawfully, to purchase firearms in the United States for the 

purposes of sporting and self-defense, and to store those 

firearms with his relatives in Ohio.

Dearth and the SAF, a non-profit organization that 

promotes the Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms, 

filed the present action in the district court, which

subsequently granted the Government’s motion to dismiss for 

lack of standing. It held the merchants’ refusals to sell 

firearms to Dearth did not support his standing to sue under 

the Declaratory Judgment Act, 28 U.S.C. §§ 2201, 2202. 

Hodgkins v. Holder, 677 F. Supp. 2d 202, 204 (2010). Nor, 

according to the district court, did Dearth have “preenforcement” standing on the ground that the Government 

had “personally threatened” him with prosecution. Id. at 204–

05 (quoting Seegars v. Gonzalez, 396 F.3d 1248, 1251 (D.C. 

Cir. 2005)). The district court also rejected the SAF’s claim 

to organizational and representational standing. Id. at 206.

 * Form 4473 can be viewed at 

http://www.atf.gov/forms/download/atf-f-4473.pdf. According to 

27 C.F.R. § 478.11, “An individual resides in a State if he or she is 

present in a State with the intention of making a home in that 

State.”

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II. Analysis

In considering de novo whether Dearth has standing, we 

assume the factual “allegations of the complaint relevant to 

standing are true.” Young Am.’s Found. v. Gates, 573 F.3d 

797, 799 (D.C. Cir. 2009). Dearth’s burden is to show he 

suffers an “injury in fact” that is both “concrete and 

particularized” and either “actual or imminent.” Lujan v. 

Defenders of Wildlife, 504 U.S. 555, 560 (1992) (internal 

quotation marks and citations omitted). That injury must be 

both “fairly ... trace[able] to the challenged action of the 

defendant” and redressable by the court. Id. at 560–61 

(internal quotation marks and citation omitted). The 

Government disputes only whether Dearth has suffered a 

cognizable injury, as the requirements of traceability and 

redressability are clearly met.

In a case of this sort, where the plaintiffs seek declaratory 

and injunctive relief, past injuries alone are insufficient to 

establish standing. Rather, Dearth must show he is suffering 

an ongoing injury or faces an immediate threat of injury. See 

Los Angeles v. Lyons, 461 U.S. 95, 105 (1983); O’Shea v. 

Littleton, 414 U.S. 488, 495–96 (1974). Dearth argues he 

suffers continuing, adverse effects sufficient to support

standing because the Government denied and continues to 

deny him the ability to purchase a firearm; he notes we held a 

similar injury sufficient for standing in Parker v. District of 

Columbia, 478 F.3d 370, 376 (2007), aff’d sub nom. District 

of Columbia v. Heller, 554 U.S. 570 (2008). More 

specifically, he argues the Government denied him the ability 

to buy a firearm by requiring, via Question 13 on Form 4473, 

that he reside in a state as a condition of making such a 

purchase.

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We agree with Dearth that the Government has denied 

him the ability to purchase a firearm and he thereby suffers an 

ongoing injury. Dearth’s injury is indeed like that of the 

plaintiff in Parker, who had standing to challenge the District 

of Columbia’s ban on handguns because he had been “denied 

a registration certificate to own a handgun.” 478 F.3d at 376. 

As we there stated, “a license or permit denial pursuant to a 

state or federal administrative scheme” that can “trench upon 

constitutionally protected interests” gives rise to “an Article 

III injury”; “the formal process of application and denial, 

however routine,” suffices to show a cognizable injury. Id.

The Government nonetheless argues Parker does not 

control both because here it did not affirmatively deny 

Dearth’s application to purchase a firearm and because Dearth 

does not claim he has a right to be issued a “permit” or 

“license” by the Government. As to the first distinction, we 

hold the Government cannot so easily avoid suit when it has 

erected a regulatory scheme that precludes Dearth from

truthfully completing the application form the Government 

requires for the purchase of a firearm. Like the plaintiff in 

Parker, Dearth twice attempted to go through the “formal 

process” of applying to purchase a firearm and each time 

failed because of the laws and regulations he now challenges.

As for its second effort to distinguish Parker, the 

Government places undue weight upon our statement there 

that the plaintiff was “asserting a right to a registration 

certificate, the denial of which [was] his distinct injury.” 478 

F.3d at 376. More fundamentally, as we explained, the 

plaintiffs there were “claim[ing] a right to possess ... 

‘functional firearms[]’ ... for self-defense in the home.” Id. at 

374. That is, the right to possess, not the right to a permit or 

license, was the substance of their claim. One of those 

plaintiffs had standing because, rather than alleging merely an 

USCA Case #10-5062 Document #1303429 Filed: 04/15/2011 Page 5 of 8
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intent to violate the District’s gun laws, he had “invoked his 

rights under the Second Amendment to challenge the statutory 

classifications used to bar his ownership of a handgun.” Id. at 

376. Just so with Dearth, who raises a constitutional 

challenge to the regulatory and “statutory classifications” that 

bar him from acquiring a firearm. Id. That the regulatory 

regime does not provide for the Government’s issuance of a 

permit or license is of no moment; the challenged provisions 

have similarly thwarted Dearth’s best efforts to acquire a 

firearm.

The Government also argues Dearth cannot show he 

suffers either the “continuing, present adverse effects,” Lujan, 

504 U.S. at 564 (internal quotation marks and citation 

omitted), or the “sufficient likelihood of future injury,” Haase 

v. Sessions, 835 F.2d 902, 911 (D.C. Cir. 1987), necessary to 

support standing because he is not currently in the United 

States and because he has no concrete plan to visit the United 

States. Accordingly, the Government maintains Dearth has 

failed to show he will be injured anytime “soon.” Lujan, 504 

U.S. at 564 n.2. Not so.

In Lujan, the case upon which the Government relies for 

this point, various environmental organizations challenged a 

regulation that limited application of a section of the 

Endangered Species Act to the United States and the high 

seas. Id. at 557–59. The organizations presented evidence 

that two of their members who had in the past traveled abroad 

to visit the habitats of endangered species intended to do so 

again, but the Court held their prospective injury was 

insufficiently “actual or imminent.” Id. at 563–64. As the 

Government here emphasizes, the Court said “‘some day’ 

intentions — without any description of concrete plans, or 

indeed even any specification of when the some day will be” 

— were “simply not enough” to survive a summary judgment 

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motion. Id. at 564 (one member “confessed that she had no 

current plans” to return); see also Haase, 835 F.2d at 911 (no 

standing to challenge policy applicable to travelers entering 

the United States from Nicaragua when the plaintiff did no 

more than “assert generally that he might one day return to 

Nicaragua”).

Dearth alleges in his complaint he “has many friends and 

relatives” in the United States “whom he intends to continue 

visiting on a regular basis.” Dearth also states directly that he 

“intends to purchase firearms within the United States, which 

he would store securely at his relatives’ home in Mount 

Vernon, Ohio,” allegations that, when tested by a motion to 

dismiss, we presume to “embrace those specific facts that are 

necessary to support the claim.” Lujan, 504 U.S. at 561

(internal quotation marks and citation omitted). Dearth, 

moreover, is not alleging merely an “injury at some indefinite 

future time,” id. at 565 n.2; he claims he presently suffers a 

cognizable injury to his constitutional rights because the 

federal regulatory scheme thwarts his continuing desire to 

purchase a firearm. Parker, 478 F.3d at 376.

The Government objects that it remains speculative 

whether Dearth will again come up against the statutes and 

regulations he is challenging, citing Golden v. Zwickler, 394 

U.S. 103 (1969). In that case the Court held the plaintiff 

lacked standing to challenge the constitutionality of a New 

York law that prohibited the distribution of anonymous 

literature concerning an election campaign. Id. at 109–10. 

The plaintiff alleged he had before and intended again to 

distribute such literature criticizing a particular Congressman 

during an upcoming election. Because the Congressman had 

by then left the House of Representatives to begin a 14-year 

term as a state court judge, it was “most unlikely that [he] 

would again be a candidate for Congress.” Id. at 109 & n.4. 

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As it was therefore “wholly conjectural that another occasion 

might arise when [the plaintiff] might be prosecuted for 

distributing the handbills,” the Court concluded the plaintiff 

had failed to show “sufficient immediacy and reality to 

warrant the issuance of a declaratory judgment.” Id. at 108–

09 (internal quotation marks and citation omitted).

In this case, there is no similar contingency that makes 

Dearth’s injury conjectural; indeed his injury is present and 

continuing. In light of Dearth’s stated intent to return 

regularly to the United States, only to face a set of laws that 

undoubtedly prohibit him from purchasing a firearm, we 

conclude his injury is sufficiently real and immediate to 

support his standing to challenge those laws.*

III. Conclusion

For the foregoing reasons, the order of the district court 

dismissing this case for lack of standing is reversed and the 

matter is remanded to the district court for further 

proceedings.

So ordered.

 * Accordingly, we need not consider whether Dearth has preenforcement standing. Nor, because the SAF raises no issue not 

also raised by Dearth, need we decide whether it has standing. 

Environmental Action, Inc. v. FERC, 939 F.2d 1057, 1061 n.∗

(D.C. Cir. 1991).

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