Court Opinion

ID: 9376448
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-03-02 19:00:29.938759+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:17:06.890443
License: Public Domain

Case: 21-11001      Document: 00516662588          Page: 1    Date Filed: 03/02/2023

            United States Court of Appeals
                 for the Fifth Circuit                            United States Court of Appeals
                                                                           Fifth Circuit

                                                                         FILED
                                                                     March 2, 2023
                                    No. 21-11001
                                                                    Lyle W. Cayce
                                                                         Clerk

   United States of America,

                                                              Plaintiff—Appellee,

                                       versus

   Zackey Rahimi,

                                                           Defendant—Appellant.

                   Appeal from the United States District Court
                       for the Northern District of Texas
                             USDC No. 4:21-CR-83-1

   Before Jones, Ho, and Wilson, Circuit Judges.
   Cory T. Wilson, Circuit Judge:
          Our prior panel opinion, United States v. Rahimi, 59 F.4th 163 (5th Cir.
   2023), is WITHDRAWN and the following opinion is SUBSTITUTED
   therefor:
          The question presented in this case is not whether prohibiting the
   possession of firearms by someone subject to a domestic violence restraining
   order is a laudable policy goal.       The question is whether 18 U.S.C.
   § 922(g)(8), a specific statute that does so, is constitutional under the Second
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   Amendment of the United States Constitution. In the light of N.Y. State Rifle
   & Pistol Ass’n, Inc. v. Bruen, 142 S. Ct. 2111 (2022), it is not.
          Zackey Rahimi levies a facial challenge to § 922(g)(8). The district
   court and a prior panel upheld the statute, applying this court’s pre-Bruen
   precedent. See United States v. Rahimi, No. 21-11001, 2022 WL 2070392 at
   *1 n.1 (5th Cir. June 8, 2022). Rahimi filed a petition for rehearing en banc;
   while that petition was pending, the Supreme Court decided Bruen. The
   prior panel withdrew its opinion and requested supplemental briefing on the
   impact of that case on this one. Considering the issue afresh, we conclude
   that Bruen requires us to re-evaluate our Second Amendment jurisprudence
   and that under Bruen, § 922(g)(8) fails to pass constitutional muster. We
   therefore reverse the district court’s ruling to the contrary and vacate
   Rahimi’s conviction.
                                           I.
          Between December 2020 and January 2021, Rahimi was involved in
   five shootings in and around Arlington, Texas.1 On December 1, after selling
   narcotics to an individual, he fired multiple shots into that individual’s
   residence. The following day, Rahimi was involved in a car accident. He
   exited his vehicle, shot at the other driver, and fled the scene. He returned
   to the scene in a different vehicle and shot at the other driver’s car. On
   December 22, Rahimi shot at a constable’s vehicle. On January 7, Rahimi
   fired multiple shots in the air after his friend’s credit card was declined at a
   Whataburger restaurant.
          Officers in the Arlington Police Department identified Rahimi as a
   suspect in the shootings and obtained a warrant to search his home. Officers

          1
            The facts are drawn from the Pre-Sentence Report, which the district court
   adopted, and the factual resume, to which Rahimi stipulated.

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   executed the warrant and found a rifle and a pistol. Rahimi admitted that he
   possessed the firearms. He also admitted that he was subject to an agreed
   civil protective order entered February 5, 2020, by a Tarrant County state
   district court after Rahimi’s alleged assault of his ex-girlfriend.                   The
   protective order prohibited Rahimi from, inter alia, “[c]ommitting family
   violence,” “[g]oing to or within 200 yards of the residence or place of
   employment” of his ex-girlfriend, and “[e]ngaging in conduct . . . including
   following the person, that is reasonably likely to harass, annoy, alarm, abuse,
   torment, or embarrass” either his ex-girlfriend or a member of her family or
   household. The order also expressly prohibited Rahimi from possessing a
   firearm.2
           A federal grand jury indicted Rahimi for possessing a firearm while
   under a domestic violence restraining order in violation of 18 U.S.C.
   § 922(g)(8), which provides:
           It shall be unlawful for any person[] who is subject to a court
           order that[:] (A) was issued after a hearing of which such
           person received actual notice, and at which such person had an
           opportunity to participate; (B) restrains such person from
           harassing, stalking, or threatening an intimate partner of such
           person or child of such intimate partner or person, or engaging
           in other conduct that would place an intimate partner in
           reasonable fear of bodily injury to the partner or child; and
           (C)(i) includes a finding that such person represents a credible
           threat to the physical safety of such intimate partner or child;
           or (ii) by its terms explicitly prohibits the use, attempted use,

           2
            The validity of the underlying protective order, and Rahimi’s breach of it, are not
   before us, though the order’s underlying prohibitions, e.g., restraining Rahimi from
   committing family violence, from using or threatening use of physical force, from following,
   harassing, annoying, abusing, or tormenting his ex-girlfriend, and from going within 200
   yards of his ex-girlfriend or her family (including their child), are plainly lawful and
   enforceable.

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           or threatened use of physical force against such intimate
           partner or child that would reasonably be expected to cause
           bodily injury . . . to . . . possess in or affecting commerce, any
           firearm or ammunition . . . .
   Rahimi moved to dismiss the indictment on the ground that § 922(g)(8) is
   unconstitutional, but he acknowledged that United States v. McGinnis, 956
   F.3d 747 (5th Cir. 2020), foreclosed his argument.3 The district court denied
   Rahimi’s motion, and he pled guilty.
           On appeal, Rahimi renewed his constitutional challenge to
   § 922(g)(8).4 Rahimi again acknowledged that his argument was foreclosed,
   and a prior panel of this court agreed. See Rahimi, 2022 WL 2070392 at *1
   n.1.   But after Bruen, the prior panel withdrew its opinion, ordered
   supplemental briefing, and ordered the clerk to expedite this case for oral
   argument before another panel of the court. Rahimi now contends that Bruen
   overrules    our precedent         and    that    under     Bruen,    § 922(g)(8) is
   unconstitutional. We agree on both points.
                                             II.
           Under the rule of orderliness, one panel of the Fifth Circuit “‘may not
   overturn another panel’s decision, absent an intervening change in the law,
   such as by a statutory amendment, or the Supreme Court, or our en banc
   court.’” In re Bonvillian Marine Serv., Inc., 19 F.4th 787, 792 (5th Cir. 2021)

           3
            The Government urged Rahimi’s argument was also foreclosed by United States
   v. Emerson, 270 F.3d 203 (5th Cir. 2001).
           4
             Rahimi also asserted that the district court erred when it ordered his federal
   sentence to run consecutively to sentences for his state crimes because the underlying
   conduct of the state sentences was relevant conduct for the purposes of U.S.S.G. § 1B1.3.
   The prior panel affirmed the district court. Because we conclude that § 922(g)(8) is
   unconstitutional and vacate Rahimi’s sentence, we do not further address the sentencing
   issue here.

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   (quoting Jacobs v. Nat’l Drug Intel. Ctr., 548 F.3d 375, 378 (5th Cir. 2008)).
   The Supreme Court need not expressly overrule our precedent. “Rather, a
   latter panel must simply determine that a former panel’s decision has fallen
   unequivocally out of step with some intervening change in the law.” Id.
   “One situation in which this may naturally occur is where an intervening
   Supreme Court decision fundamentally changes the focus of the relevant
   analysis.” Id. (internal quotation marks and alterations omitted). That is the
   case here, as the Government concedes.
          In Emerson, we held that the Second Amendment guarantees an
   individual right to keep and bear arms—the first circuit expressly to do so.
   270 F.3d at 260. But we also concluded that § 922(g)(8) was constitutional
   as applied to the defendant there. Id. at 263. “Emerson first considered the
   scope of the Second Amendment right ‘as historically understood,’ and then
   determined—presumably by applying some form of means-end scrutiny sub
   silentio—that § 922(g)(8) [was] ‘narrowly tailored’ to the goal of minimizing
   ‘the threat of lawless violence.’” McGinnis, 956 F.3d at 755 (quoting
   Emerson, 270 F.3d at 264).
          After D.C. v. Heller, 554 U.S. 570 (2008), courts coalesced around a
   similar “two-step inquiry for analyzing laws that might impact the Second
   Amendment.”       McGinnis, 956 F.3d at 753 (internal quotation marks
   omitted). First, we “ask[ed] whether the conduct at issue [fell] within the
   scope of the Second Amendment right.” Id. at 754 (internal quotation marks
   omitted). If the conduct fell outside the scope of the Second Amendment
   right, then the challenged law was constitutional. Id. But if the conduct fell
   within the scope of the right, then we proceeded to the second step of the
   analysis, which applied either intermediate or strict scrutiny. Id. at 754, 757
   (expressly applying means-end scrutiny). In McGinnis, this court upheld
   § 922(g)(8) using this two-step framework. The initial panel in this case did
   likewise, citing McGinnis. Rahimi, 2022 WL 2070392 at *1 n.1.

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           Enter Bruen. Expounding on Heller, the Supreme Court held that
   “[w]hen the Second Amendment’s plain text covers an individual’s conduct,
   the Constitution presumptively protects that conduct.” Bruen, 142 S. Ct. at
   2129–30. In that context, the Government bears the burden of “justify[ing]
   its regulation by demonstrating that it is consistent with the Nation’s
   historical tradition of firearm regulation.” Id. at 2130. Put another way, “the
   [G]overnment must affirmatively prove that its firearms regulation is part of
   the historical tradition that delimits the outer bounds of the right to keep and
   bear arms.” Id. at 2127. In the course of its explication, the Court expressly
   repudiated the circuit courts’ means-end scrutiny—the second step
   embodied in Emerson and applied in McGinnis. Id. at 2128–30. To the extent
   that the Court did not overtly overrule Emerson and McGinnis—it did not cite
   those cases but discussed other circuits’ similar precedent—Bruen clearly
   “fundamentally change[d]” our analysis of laws that implicate the Second
   Amendment, Bonvillian Marine, 19 F.4th at 792, rendering our prior
   precedent obsolete.
                                              III.
           Our review of Rahimi’s facial challenge to § 922(g)(8) is de novo. See
   United States v. Bailey, 115 F.3d 1222, 1225 (5th Cir. 1997). First, the court
   addresses the Government’s argument that Rahimi is not among those
   citizens entitled to the Second Amendment’s protections. Concluding he is,
   we then turn to whether § 922(g)(8) passes muster under Bruen’s standard.5

           5
             The Government also argues that because Bruen endorsed “shall-issue” licensing
   schemes, and Texas’s shall-issue licensing scheme (since modified to allow “constitutional
   carry,” see 2021 Tex. Sess. Law Serv. Ch. 809 (West)) included the requirement that an
   applicant not be under a domestic violence restraining order, it follows that § 922(g)(8) is
   constitutional. Of course, the Bruen Court did not rule on the constitutionality of 43
   specific state licensing regimes because that was not the issue before the Court. See Bruen,

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                                              A.
           According to the Government, Heller and Bruen add a gloss on the
   Second Amendment that restricts its applicability to only “law-abiding,
   responsible citizens,” Heller, 554 U.S. at 635, and “ordinary, law-abiding
   citizens,” Bruen, 142 S. Ct. at 2122. Because Rahimi is neither responsible
   nor law-abiding, as evidenced by his conduct and by the domestic violence
   restraining order issued against him, he falls outside the ambit of the Second
   Amendment.           Therefore, argues the Government, § 922(g)(8) is
   constitutional as applied to Rahimi.
           The Second Amendment provides, simply enough:
           A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a
           free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall
           not be infringed.
   U.S. Const. amend. II. Heller explained that the words “the people” in
   the Second Amendment have been interpreted throughout the Constitution
   to “unambiguously refer[] to all members of the political community, not an
   unspecified subset.” 554 U.S. at 580. Further, “the people” “refer[] to a
   class of persons who are part of a national community or who have otherwise
   developed sufficient connection with this country to be considered part of
   that community.” Id. (citing United States v. Verdugo–Urquidez, 494 U.S.
   259, 265 (1990)). For those reasons, the Heller Court began its analysis with
   the “strong presumption that the Second Amendment right is exercised
   individually and belongs to all Americans,” id. at 581, and then confirmed
   that presumption, id. at 595. Heller’s exposition of “the people” strongly

   142 S. Ct. at 2138 n.9. Rather, the Court merely blessed the general concept of shall-issue
   regimes. Id.

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   indicates that Rahimi is included in “the people” and thus within the Second
   Amendment’s scope.
          To be sure, as the Government argues, Heller and Bruen also refer to
   “law-abiding, responsible citizens” in discussing the amendment’s scope
   (Bruen adds “ordinary, law-abiding citizens”). And there is some debate
   over the extent to which the Court’s “law-abiding” qualifier constricts the
   Second Amendment’s reach. Compare Kanter v. Barr, 919 F.3d 437, 451–53
   (7th Cir. 2019) (Barrett, J. dissenting), abrogated by Bruen, 142 S. Ct. 2111,
   with Binderup v. Att’y Gen., 836 F.3d 336, 357 (3d Cir. 2016) (en banc)
   (Hardiman, J., concurring in part and concurring in the judgments). As
   summarized by now-Justice Barrett, “one [approach] uses history and
   tradition to identify the scope of the right, and the other uses that same body
   of evidence to identify the scope of the legislature’s power to take it away.”
   Kanter, 919 F.3d at 452 (Barrett, J., dissenting).         The Government’s
   argument that Rahimi falls outside the community covered by the Second
   Amendment rests on the first approach. But it runs headlong into Heller and
   Bruen, which we read to espouse the second one.
          That reading, in turn, leads us to conclude that, in context, Heller
   simply uses “law-abiding, responsible citizens” as shorthand in explaining
   that its holding (that the amendment codifies an individual right to keep and
   bear arms) should not “be taken to cast doubt on longstanding prohibitions
   on the possession of firearms by felons and the mentally ill, or laws forbidding
   the carrying of firearms in sensitive places such as schools and government
   buildings . . . .” 554 U.S. at 626–27; accord Range v. Attorney Gen., 53 F.4th
   262, 266 (3d Cir. 2022) (upholding 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(1), which prohibits
   firearm possession by convicted felons, because “the people” categorically
   “excludes those who have demonstrated disregard for the rule of law through
   the commission of felony and felony-equivalent offenses”), reh’g en banc
   granted, opinion vacated, 56 F.4th 992 (3d Cir. 2023). In other words, Heller’s

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   reference to “law-abiding, responsible” citizens meant to exclude from the
   Court’s discussion groups that have historically been stripped of their
   Second Amendment rights, i.e., groups whose disarmament the Founders
   “presumptively” tolerated or would have tolerated. See 554 U.S. at 627, n.26
   (“We identify these presumptively lawful regulatory measures only as
   examples; our list does not purport to be exhaustive.”). Bruen’s reference to
   “ordinary, law-abiding” citizens is no different. See 142 S. Ct. at 2134.
           From the record before us, Rahimi did not fall into any such group at
   the time he was charged with violating § 922(g)(8), so the “strong
   presumption” that he remained among “the people” protected by the
   amendment holds. When he was charged, Rahimi was subject to an agreed
   domestic violence restraining order that was entered in a civil proceeding.
   That alone does not suffice to remove him from the political community
   within the amendment’s scope. And, while he was suspected of other criminal
   conduct at the time, Rahimi was not a convicted felon or otherwise subject to
   another “longstanding prohibition[] on the possession of firearms” that
   would have excluded him. Heller, 554 U.S. at 626–27; see Range, 53 F.4th at
   273 (concluding that Heller, McDonald v. City of Chicago, Ill., 561 U.S. 742
   (2010), and Bruen support that criminals, as a group, “fall[] outside ‘the
   people’ . . . and that § 922(g)(1) is well-rooted in the nation’s history and
   tradition of firearm regulation”).6

           6
             This discussion is not to cast doubt on firearm restrictions that attach during
   criminal proceedings prior to conviction. E.g., 18 U.S.C. § 922(n) (prohibiting person
   under indictment from shipping, transporting, or receiving any firearm); 18 U.S.C.
   § 3142(c)(B)(viii) (allowing judicial officer to require person released on pretrial bond to
   “refrain from possessing a firearm, destructive device, or other dangerous weapon”).
   Those restrictions are not before us. We simply hew carefully to the Supreme Court’s
   delineation of who falls within, and without, the overarching class of “law-abiding,
   responsible citizens” covered by the Second Amendment.

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          Indeed, the upshot of the Government’s argument is that the Second
   Amendment right can be readily divested, such that “a person could be in
   one day and out the next: . . . his rights would be stripped as a self-executing
   consequence of his new status.” Kanter, 919 F.3d at 452 (Barrett, J.,
   dissenting). But this turns the typical way of conceptualizing constitutional
   rights on its head. And the Government’s argument reads the Supreme
   Court’s “law-abiding” gloss so expansively that it risks swallowing the text
   of the amendment. Cf. Bruen, 142 S. Ct. at 2156 (“The constitutional right
   to bear arms in public for self-defense is not ‘a second-class right, subject to
   an entirely different body of rules than the other Bill of Rights guarantees.’”
   (quoting McDonald, 561 U.S. at 780)).
          Further, the Government’s proffered interpretation of “law-abiding”
   admits to no true limiting principle. Under the Government’s reading,
   Congress could remove “unordinary” or “irresponsible” or “non-law-
   abiding” people—however expediently defined—from the scope of the
   Second Amendment. Could speeders be stripped of their right to keep and
   bear arms? Political nonconformists? People who do not recycle or drive an
   electric vehicle? One easily gets the point: Neither Heller nor Bruen
   countenances such a malleable scope of the Second Amendment’s
   protections; to the contrary, the Supreme Court has made clear that “the
   Second Amendment right is exercised individually and belongs to all
   Americans,” Heller, 554 U.S. at 581. Rahimi, while hardly a model citizen, is
   nonetheless among “the people” entitled to the Second Amendment’s
   guarantees, all other things equal.
                                         B.
          Which brings us to the question of whether Rahimi’s right to keep and
   bear arms may be constitutionally restricted by operation of § 922(g)(8). The
   parties dispute Rahimi’s burden necessary to sustain his facial challenge to

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   the statute. The Government contends that Rahimi “must establish that no
   set of circumstances exists under which the Act would be valid.” United
   States v. Salerno, 481 U.S. 739, 745 (1987). Rahimi contests that assertion,
   asserting during oral argument that the Government’s interpretation of
   Salerno has fallen out of favor, though he contends that in any event, he has
   satisfied Salerno’s standard.
          Bruen instructs how to proceed. The plaintiffs there levied a facial
   challenge to New York’s public carry licensing regime. 142 S. Ct. at 2122.
   To evaluate the challenged law, the Supreme Court employed a historical
   analysis, aimed at “assess[ing] whether modern firearms regulations are
   consistent    with   the   Second     Amendment’s         text   and   historical
   understanding.” Id. at 2131. Construing Heller, the Court flatly rejected any
   means-end scrutiny as part of this analysis, id. at 2129, such that if a statute
   is inconsistent with the Second Amendment’s text and historical
   understanding, then it falls under any circumstances. Cf. Salerno, 481 U.S.
   at 745; Freedom Path, Inc. v. Internal Revenue Serv., 913 F.3d 503, 508 (5th Cir.
   2019) (“A facial challenge to a statute considers only the text of the statute
   itself, not its application to the particular circumstances of an individual.”
   (cleaned up)).
          Bruen articulated two analytical steps: First, courts must determine
   whether “the Second Amendment’s plain text covers an individual’s
   conduct[.]”      142 S. Ct. at 2129–30.          If so, then the “Constitution
   presumptively protects that conduct,” and the Government “must justify its
   regulation by demonstrating that it is consistent with the Nation’s historical
   tradition of firearm regulation.” Id. at 2130. “Only then may a court
   conclude that the individual’s conduct falls outside the Second
   Amendment’s unqualified command.”                Id. (internal quotation marks
   omitted).

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          To carry its burden, the Government must point to “historical
   precedent from before, during, and even after the founding [that] evinces a
   comparable tradition of regulation.” Id. at 2131–32 (internal quotation marks
   omitted). “[W]e are not obliged to sift the historical materials for evidence
   to sustain [§ 922(g)(8)]. That is [the Government’s] burden.” Id. at 2150.
          The Government need not identify a “historical twin”; rather, a
   “well-established and representative historical analogue” suffices. Id. at
   2133. The Supreme Court distilled two metrics for courts to compare the
   Government’s proffered analogues against the challenged law: how the
   challenged law burdens the right to armed self-defense, and why the law
   burdens that right. Id. (citing McDonald, 561 U.S. at 767, and Heller, 544 U.S.
   at 599). “[W]hether modern and historical regulations impose a comparable
   burden on the right of armed self-defense and whether that burden is
   comparably justified are central considerations when engaging in an
   analogical inquiry.” Id. (internal quotation marks and emphasis omitted).
          As to the degree of similarity required, “analogical reasoning under
   the Second Amendment is neither a regulatory straightjacket nor a regulatory
   blank check.” Id. “[C]ourts should not uphold every modern law that
   remotely resembles a historical analogue, because doing so risks endorsing
   outliers that our ancestors would never have accepted.”          Id. (internal
   quotation marks, alterations, and citations omitted). On the other hand,
   “even if a modern-day regulation is not a dead ringer for historical
   precursors, it still may be analogous enough to pass constitutional muster.”
   Id. The core question is whether the challenged law and proffered analogue
   are “relevantly similar.” Id. at 2132.
          When the challenged regulation addresses a “general societal problem
   that has persisted since the 18th century, the lack of a distinctly similar
   historical regulation addressing that problem is relevant evidence that the

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   challenged regulation is inconsistent with the Second Amendment.” Id. at
   2131. Moreover, “if earlier generations addressed the societal problem, but
   did so through materially different means, that also could be evidence that a
   modern regulation is unconstitutional.” Id.
                                             C.
          Rahimi’s possession of a pistol and a rifle easily falls within the
   purview of the Second Amendment. The amendment grants him the right
   “to keep” firearms, and “possession” is included within the meaning of
   “keep.” See id. at 2134–35. And it is undisputed that the types of firearms
   that Rahimi possessed are “in common use,” such that they fall within the
   scope of the amendment. See id. at 2143 (“[T]he Second Amendment
   protects only the carrying of weapons that are those ‘in common use at the
   time,’ as opposed to those that ‘are highly unusual in society at large.’”)
   (quoting Heller, 554 U.S. at 627)). Thus, Bruen’s first step is met, and the
   Second Amendment presumptively protects Rahimi’s right to keep the
   weapons officers discovered in his home. See id. at 2126.
          But Rahimi, like any other citizen, may have forfeited his Second
   Amendment rights if his conduct ran afoul of a “lawful regulatory
   measure[]” “prohibiting . . . the possession of firearms,” Heller, 554 U.S. at
   626–27 & 627 n.26, that is consistent with “the historical tradition that
   delimits the outer bounds of the right to keep and bear arms,” Bruen, 142 S.
   Ct. at 2127. The question turns on whether § 922(g)(8) falls within that
   historical tradition, or outside of it.
          To reiterate, the statute makes it unlawful
          for any person[] who is subject to a court order that[:] (A) was
          issued after a hearing of which such person received actual
          notice, and at which such person had an opportunity to
          participate; (B) restrains such person from harassing, stalking,

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          or threatening an intimate partner of such person or child of
          such intimate partner or person, or engaging in other conduct
          that would place an intimate partner in reasonable fear of bodily
          injury to the partner or child; and (C)(i) includes a finding that
          such person represents a credible threat to the physical safety
          of such intimate partner or child; or (ii) by its terms explicitly
          prohibits the use, attempted use, or threatened use of physical
          force against such intimate partner or child that would
          reasonably be expected to cause bodily injury . . . to . . . possess
          in or affecting commerce, any firearm or ammunition . . . .

   § 922(g)(8); see McGinnis, 956 F.3d at 758 (stating that § 922(g)(8)’s purpose
   is to reduce “domestic gun abuse”). Distilled to its essence, the provision
   operates to deprive an individual of his right to possess (i.e., “to keep”)
   firearms once a court enters an order, after notice and a hearing, that restrains
   the individual “from harassing, stalking, or threatening an intimate partner”
   or the partner’s child. The order can rest on a specific finding that the
   restrained individual poses a “credible threat” to an intimate partner or her
   child. Or it may simply include a general prohibition on the use, attempted
   use, or threatened use of physical force reasonably expected to cause bodily
   injury. The covered individual forfeits his Second Amendment right for the
   duration of the court’s order. This is so even when the individual has not
   been criminally convicted or accused of any offense and when the underlying
   proceeding is merely civil in nature.
          These characteristics crystallize “how” and “why” § 922(g)(8)
   “burden[s] a law-abiding citizen’s right to armed self-defense.” Bruen, 142
   S. Ct. at 2133. In particular, we focus on these key features of the statute:
   (1) forfeiture of the right to possess weapons (2) after a civil proceeding 7

          7
            The distinction between a criminal and civil proceeding is important because
   criminal proceedings have afforded the accused substantial protections throughout our
   Nation’s history. In crafting the Bill of Rights, the Founders were plainly attuned to

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   (3) in which a court enters a protective order based on a finding of a “credible
   threat” to another specific person, or that includes a blanket prohibition on
   the use, of threatened use, of physical force, (4) in order to protect that
   person from “domestic gun abuse.” The first three aspects go to how the
   statute accomplishes its goal; the fourth is the statute’s goal, the why.
          To sustain § 922(g)(8)’s burden on Rahimi’s Second Amendment
   right, the Government bears the burden of proffering “relevantly similar”
   historical regulations that imposed “a comparable burden on the right of
   armed self-defense” that were also “comparably justified.” Id. at 2132–33.
   And “when it comes to interpreting the Constitution, not all history is
   created equal. Constitutional rights are enshrined with the scope they were
   understood to have when the people adopted them.” Id. at 2136 (internal
   quotation marks omitted). We thus afford greater weight to historical
   analogues more contemporaneous to the Second Amendment’s ratification.
          The Government offers potential historical analogues to § 922(g)(8)
   that fall generally into three categories: (1) English and American laws (and
   sundry unadopted proposals to modify the Second Amendment) providing
   for disarmament of “dangerous” people, (2) English and American “going
   armed” laws, and (3) colonial and early state surety laws. We discuss in turn
   why each of these historical regulations falters as “relevantly similar”
   precursors to § 922(g)(8).

   preservation of these protections. See U.S. Const. amend. IV; U.S. Const. amend. V;
   U.S. Const. amend. VI; U.S. Const. amend. VIII. It is therefore significant that
   § 922(g)(8) works to eliminate the Second Amendment right of individuals subject merely
   to civil process.

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                                         1.
          The Government relies on laws of varying antiquity as evidence of its
   “dangerousness” analogues. We sketch these chronologically, mindful that
   greater weight attaches to laws nearer in time to the Second Amendment’s
   ratification.
          Under the English Militia Act of 1662, officers of the Crown could
   “seize all arms in the custody or possession of any person” whom they
   “judge[d] dangerous to the Peace of the Kingdom.” 13 & 14 Car. 2, c.3, § 13
   (1662). Citing scholarship, the Government thus posits that “by the time of
   American independence, England had established a well-practiced tradition
   of disarming dangerous persons—violent persons and disaffected persons
   perceived as threatening to the crown.” Joseph G.S. Greenlee, The Historical
   Justification for Prohibiting Dangerous Persons from Possessing Firearms, 20
   Wyo. L. Rev. 249, 261 (2020).
          But the Militia Act’s provenance demonstrates that it is not a
   forerunner of our Nation’s historical tradition of firearm regulation. Under
   Charles I (who reigned 1625–1649), the Crown and Parliament contested for
   control of the militia. Nelson Lund, The Past and Future of the Individual’s
   Right to Arms, 31 Ga. L. Rev. 1, 8 (1996). After the resulting civil war and
   Oliver Cromwell’s interregnum, the monarchy was restored in 1660 when
   Charles II took the throne. Charles II began using the militia to disarm his
   political opponents. Id. (citing J. Malcolm, To Keep and Bear
   Arms: The Origins of an Anglo-American Right (1994) 35–
   38 (1994). The Militia Act of 1662 facilitated this disarmament, which
   escalated under the Catholic James II once he took the throne in 1685. Id.;
   see Heller, 554 U.S. at 593 (noting that the disarmaments “caused
   Englishmen . . . to be jealous of their arms”). After the Glorious Revolution,
   which enthroned Protestants William and Mary, the Declaration of Rights,

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   codified as the 1689 English Bill of Rights, qualified the Militia Act by
   guaranteeing “[t]hat the subjects which are Protestants may have arms for
   their defence suitable to their Conditions and as allowed by Law.” 1 W. &
   M., ch. 2, § 7, in 3 Eng. Stat. at Large 441. “This right,” which restricted the
   Militia Act’s reach in order to prevent the kind of politically motivated
   disarmaments pursued by Charles II and James II, “has long been understood
   to be the predecessor to our Second Amendment.” Heller, 554 U.S. at 593.
   This understanding, and the history behind it, defeats any utility of the
   Militia Act of 1662 as a historical analogue for § 922(g)(8).
          The Government next points to laws in several colonies and states that
   disarmed classes of people considered to be dangerous, specifically including
   those unwilling to take an oath of allegiance, slaves, and Native Americans.
   See Robert H. Churchill, Gun Regulation, the Police Power, and the Right to
   Keep Arms in Early America: The Legal Context of the Second Amendment, 25
   Law & Hist. Rev. 139, 157–60 (2007). These laws disarmed people
   thought to pose a threat to the security of the state due to their perceived lack
   of loyalty or societal status. See Nat’l Rifle Ass’n of Am., Inc. v. Bureau of
   Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, & Explosives, 700 F.3d 185, 200–01 (5th Cir. 2012)
   (discussing relevant scholarship), abrogated by Bruen, 142 S. Ct. at 2126–30.
   “While public safety was a concern, most disarmament efforts were meant
   to prevent armed rebellions. The early Americans adopted much of that
   tradition in the colonies.” Greenlee, supra, at 261.
          But we question at a threshold level whether colonial and state laws
   disarming categories of “disloyal” or “unacceptable” people present tenable
   analogues to § 922(g)(8). Laws that disarmed slaves, Native Americans, and
   disloyal people may well have been targeted at groups excluded from the
   political community—i.e., written out of “the people” altogether—as much
   as they were about curtailing violence or ensuring the security of the state.
   Their utility as historical analogues is therefore dubious, at best. In any

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   event, these laws fail on substance as analogues to § 922(g)(8), because out
   of the gate, why they disarmed people was different. The purpose of laws
   disarming “disloyal” or “unacceptable” groups was ostensibly the
   preservation of political and social order, not the protection of an identified
   person from the threat of “domestic gun abuse,” McGinnis, 956 F.3d at 758,
   posed by another individual. Thus, laws disarming “dangerous” classes of
   people are not “relevantly similar” to § 922(g)(8) such that they can serve
   as historical analogues.
          Finally, the Government offers two proposals that emerged in state
   ratification conventions considering the proposed Constitution. A minority
   of Pennsylvania’s convention authored a report in which they contended that
   citizens have a right to bear arms “unless for crimes committed, or real danger
   of public injury.” 2 Bernard Schwartz, The Bill of Rights: A
   Documentary History 662, 665 (1971) (emphasis added). And at the
   Massachusetts convention, Samuel Adams proposed a qualifier to the
   Second Amendment that limited the scope of the right to “peaceable
   citizens.” Id. at 681.
          But these proposed amendments are not reflective of the Nation’s
   early understanding of the scope of the Second Amendment right. While
   they were influential proposals, see Heller, 554 U.S. at 604, neither became
   part of the Second Amendment as ratified. Thus, the proposals might
   somewhat illuminate the scope of firearm rights at the time of ratification,
   but they cannot counter the Second Amendment’s text, or serve as an
   analogue for § 922(g)(8) because, inter alia, they were not enacted. Cf.
   Bruen, 142 S. Ct. at 2137 (“[T]o the extent later history contradicts what the
   text [of the Second Amendment] says, the text controls.”).

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                                           2.
          The Government also relies on the ancient criminal offense of “going
   armed to terrify the King’s subjects.” Bruen, 142 S. Ct. at 2141 (alteration
   and emphasis omitted). This common law offense persisted in America and
   was in some cases codified. Id. at 2144. The Government offers four
   exemplars codified in the Massachusetts Bay Colony, the state of Virginia,
   and the colonies of New Hampshire and North Carolina.
          The Massachusetts law provided “[t]hat every justice of the
   peace . . . may cause to be staid and arrested all affrayers, rioters, disturbers
   or breakers of the peace, and such as shall ride, or go armed
   offensively . . . and upon view of such justice or justices, confession of the
   party or other legal conviction of any such offence, shall commit the offender
   to prison . . . and seize and take away his armor or weapons . . . .” 1 Acts and
   Resolves, Public and Private, of the Province of the Massachusetts Bay, 52–
   53 (1869) (1692 statute) (cleaned up). Similarly, the New Hampshire statute
   authorized justices of the peace “upon view of such justice, confession of the
   party, or legal proof of any such offense . . . [to] cause the [offender’s] arms
   or weapons to be taken away . . . .” Acts and Laws of His Majesty’s Province
   of New-Hampshire: In New-England; with Sundry Acts of Parliament, 17
   (1771) (1701 statute); see Bruen, 142 S. Ct. at 2142–43 (noting that
   Massachusetts and New Hampshire laws “were substantively identical”).
   Virginia’s law differed slightly: “[N]o man . . . [shall] go []or ride armed by
   night or by day, in fairs or markets, or in other places, in terror of the country,
   upon pain of being arrested and committed to prison by any justice on his
   view, or proof of others, there to a time for so long a time as a jury, to be
   sworn for that purpose by the said justice, shall direct, and in like manner to
   forfeit his armour to the Commonwealth . . . .” Revised Code of the State of
   Virginia: Collection of All Such Acts of the General Assembly of Virginia, of
   a Public and Permanent Nature, as Are Now in Force, 554 (1819) (1786

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   statute). North Carolina’s colonial law was contained within its constable’s
   oath, which required constables to “arrest all such persons as, in your sight,
   shall ride or go armed offensively, or shall commit or make any riot, affray, or
   other breach of his Majesty’s peace . . . .” Collection of All of the Public Acts
   of Assembly of the Province of North-Carolina: Now in Force and Use, 131
   (1751) (1741 statute) (cleaned up). While similarly aimed at curbing “going
   armed offensively,” the North Carolina law did not provide for forfeiture.
           These proffered analogues fall short for several reasons.                      An
   overarching one is that it is doubtful these “going armed” laws are reflective
   of our Nation’s historical tradition of firearm regulation, at least as to
   forfeiture of firearms. See Bruen, 142 S. Ct. at 2142 (“[W]e doubt that three
   colonial regulations could suffice to show a tradition of public carry
   regulation.”). North Carolina’s law did not provide for forfeiture, so it
   quickly falls out of the mix. And fairly early on, Massachusetts and Virginia
   dropped forfeiture as a penalty, going the way of North Carolina and thereby
   undercutting the Government’s reliance on those laws.                            Indeed,
   Massachusetts amended its law to remove the forfeiture provision in 1795,
   just four years after the ratification of the Second Amendment. 2 Laws of the
   Commonwealth of Massachusetts, from November 28, 1780 to February 28,
   1807, 653 (1807) (statute enacted Jan. 29, 1795). Virginia had done so by
   1847, shortly before the Commonwealth re-codified its laws in 1849. See
   Code of Virginia: With the Declaration of Independence and Constitution of
   the United States and the Declaration of Rights and Constitution of Virginia,
   756 (1849).8 It is unclear how long New Hampshire’s “going armed” law
   preserved its forfeiture provision, but assuming arguendo it persisted longer

           8
             By the 1849 code, Virginia’s going armed law had evolved into its anti-riot law
   (chapter 195) and surety law (chapter 201). See id. Neither chapter provided for forfeiture
   of an offender’s weapons.

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   than the others, one outlier is not enough “to show a tradition of public carry
   regulation.” Bruen, 142 S. Ct. at 2142.
          And on substance, the early “going armed” laws that led to weapons
   forfeiture are not relevantly similar to § 922(g)(8). First, those laws only
   disarmed an offender after criminal proceedings and conviction. By contrast,
   § 922(g)(8) disarms people who have merely been civilly adjudicated to be a
   threat to another person—or, who are simply governed by a civil order that
   “by its terms explicitly prohibits the use, attempted use, or threatened use of
   physical force,” § 922(g)(8)(C)(ii), whether or not there is a “credible threat
   to the physical safety” of anyone else, § 922(g)(8)(C)(i). Rahimi’s domestic
   violence restraining order satisfied both conditions; but it bears emphasis that
   the order at issue here was entered by agreement, in a civil proceeding, after
   Rahimi apparently waived hearing (the order states no formal hearing was
   held, and no record was created), and without counsel or other safeguards
   that would be afforded him in the criminal context. These distinctions alone
   defeat the “going armed” laws as useful analogues for § 922(g)(8).
          Moreover, the “going armed” laws, like the “dangerousness” laws
   discussed above, appear to have been aimed at curbing terroristic or riotous
   behavior, i.e., disarming those who had been adjudicated to be a threat to
   society generally, rather than to identified individuals. And § 922(g)(8)
   works to disarm not only individuals who are threats to other individuals but
   also every party to a domestic proceeding (think: divorce court) who, with no
   history of violence whatever, becomes subject to a domestic restraining order
   that contains boilerplate language that tracks § 922(g)(8)(C)(ii). In other
   words, where “going armed” laws were tied to violent or riotous conduct and
   threats to society, § 922(g)(8) implicates a much wider swath of conduct, not
   inherently dependent on any actual violence or threat. Thus, these “going
   armed” laws are not viable historical analogues for § 922(g)(8).

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                                                3.
           Lastly, the Government points to historical surety laws. At common
   law, an individual who could show that he had “just cause to fear” that
   another would injure him or destroy his property could “demand surety of
   the peace against such person.”                     4 William Blackstone,
   Commentaries on the Laws of England 252 (1769). The surety
   “was intended merely for prevention, without any crime actually committed
   by the party; but arising only from probable suspicion, that some crime [wa]s
   intended or likely to happen.” Id. at 249. If the party of whom surety was
   demanded refused to post surety, he would be forbidden from carrying a
   weapon in public absent special need. See Bruen, 142 S. Ct. at 2148–49
   (discussing operation of historical surety laws). Many jurisdictions codified
   this tradition, either before ratification of the Bill of Rights or in early decades
   thereafter.9
           The surety laws come closer to being “relevantly similar” to
   § 922(g)(8) than the “dangerousness” and “going armed” laws discussed
   supra. First, they are more clearly a part of our tradition of firearm regulation.
   And they were “comparably justified,” id. at 2133, in that they were meant
   to protect an identified person (who sought surety) from the risk of harm
   posed by another identified individual (who had to post surety to carry arms).

           9
              E.g., 1 Acts and Resolves, Public and Private, of the Province of the Massachusetts
   Bay, 52–53 (1869) (1692 statute); Acts and Laws of His Majesty’s Province of New-
   Hampshire: In New-England; with Sundry Acts of Parliament, 17 (1771) (1701 statute); 2
   Statutes at Large of Pennsylvania from 1682 to 1801, pg. 23 (1896) (1700 statute); 1 Laws
   of the State of Delaware from the Fourteenth Day of October, One Thousand Seven
   Hundred, to the Eighteenth Day of August, One Thousand Seven Hundred and Ninety-
   Seven, pg. 52 (1797) (1700 statute); Acts and Laws of His Majesties Colony of Connecticut
   in New-England 91 (1901) (1702 statute); see also Bruen, 142 S. Ct. at 2148 (stating that at
   least ten jurisdictions enacted surety laws between 1836 and 1871).

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   Put simply, the why behind historical surety laws analogously aligns with that
   underlying § 922(g)(8).10
           Aspects of how the surety laws worked resemble certain of the
   mechanics of § 922(g)(8) as well. The surety laws required only a civil
   proceeding, not a criminal conviction.                 The “credible threat” finding
   required to trigger § 922(g)(8)(C)(i)’s prohibition on possession of weapons
   echoes the showing that was required to justify posting of surety to avoid
   forfeiture. But that is where the analogy breaks down: As the Government
   acknowledges, historical surety laws did not prohibit public carry, much less
   possession of weapons, so long as the offender posted surety. See also id. at
   2149 (noting that there is “little evidence that authorities ever enforced
   surety laws”).        Where the surety laws imposed a conditional, partial
   restriction on the Second Amendment right, § 922(g)(8) works an absolute
   deprivation of the right, not only publicly to carry, but to possess any firearm,
   upon entry of a sufficient protective order.                 And, as discussed supra,
   § 922(g)(8)(C)(ii) works that deprivation based on an order that “prohibits
   the use, attempted use, or threatened use of physical force,” whether there
   is a “just cause to fear” any harm, or not. At bottom, the historical surety

           10
               The parties spar somewhat over the required granularity of the underlying
   problem in comparing § 922(g)(8) to proffered analogues. Rahimi contends more generally
   that domestic violence was, and remains, a persistent social ill that society has taken
   numerous actions against—though not disarmament. The Government counters that
   “crime statistics from the founding era are hard to come by,” but that “there is reason to
   doubt that domestic homicide was as prevalent at the founding as it is in the modern era.”
   To be sure, historical surety laws were not targeted to domestic violence or even more
   specifically to domestic homicide. But somewhat abstracting the laws’ justifications, as we
   do above the line, strikes us as consistent with Bruen’s instruction that “even if a modern-
   day regulation is not a dead ringer for historical precursors, it still may be analogous enough
   to pass constitutional muster.” 142 S. Ct. at 2133.

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   laws did not impose “a comparable burden on the right of armed self-
   defense,” id. at 2133, as § 922(g)(8).
                                       *        *         *
           The Government fails to demonstrate that § 922(g)(8)’s restriction of
   the Second Amendment right fits within our Nation’s historical tradition of
   firearm regulation. The Government’s proffered analogues falter under one
   or both of the metrics the Supreme Court articulated in Bruen as the baseline
   for measuring “relevantly similar” analogues: “how and why the regulations
   burden a law-abiding citizen’s right to armed self-defense.” Id.11 As a result,
   § 922(g)(8) falls outside the class of firearm regulations countenanced by the
   Second Amendment.

           11
              Accord David B. Kopel & Joseph G. S. Greenlee, The Federal Circuits’ Second
   Amendment Doctrines, 61 St. Louis L.J. 193, 244 (2017) (“[T]here is simply no
   tradition—from 1791 or 1866—of prohibiting gun possession (or voting, jury service, or
   government service) for people convicted of misdemeanors or subject to civil protective
   orders.”); Carolyn B. Ramsey, Firearms in the Family, 78 Ohio St. L.J. 1257, 1301 (2017)
   (“Historical support for the exclusion of domestic violence offenders from Second
   Amendment protection appears rather thin.”); Keateon G. Hille, The Second Amendment:
   From Miller to Chovan, and Why the Marzzarella Framework is the Best Shot Courts Have, 50
   Gonz. L. Rev. 377, 392 (2015) (acknowledging that the “prohibition on firearms
   possession by domestic violence misdemeanants is not longstanding” and advocating for a
   means-ends test); Allen Rostron, Justice Breyer’s Triumph in the Third Battle Over the
   Second Amendment, 80 Geo. Wash. L. Rev. 703, 741 (2012) (“If longstanding tradition
   is the key common characteristic of the items on the Heller list, modern legal innovations
   like the ban on guns for domestic violence misdemeanants, however much they may reduce
   risks and benefit society, do not qualify.”).

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                                         IV.
          Doubtless, 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(8) embodies salutary policy goals
   meant to protect vulnerable people in our society. Weighing those policy
   goals’ merits through the sort of means-end scrutiny our prior precedent
   indulged, we previously concluded that the societal benefits of § 922(g)(8)
   outweighed its burden on Rahimi’s Second Amendment rights. But Bruen
   forecloses any such analysis in favor of a historical analogical inquiry into the
   scope of the allowable burden on the Second Amendment right. Through
   that lens, we conclude that § 922(g)(8)’s ban on possession of firearms is an
   “outlier[] that our ancestors would never have accepted.” Id. Therefore,
   the statute is unconstitutional, and Rahimi’s conviction under that statute
   must be vacated.
                                REVERSED; CONVICTION VACATED.

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   James C. Ho, Circuit Judge, concurring:
          The right to keep and bear arms has long been recognized as a
   fundamental civil right. Blackstone saw it as an essential component of “‘the
   natural right’” to “‘self-preservation and defence.’” District of Columbia v.
   Heller, 554 U.S. 570, 593–94 (2008) (quoting 1 William Blackstone,
   Commentaries on the Laws of England 139–40 (1765)). And
   the Supreme Court has repeatedly analogized the Second Amendment to
   other constitutional rights guaranteed to every American. See, e.g., Johnson
   v. Eisentrager, 339 U.S. 763, 784 (1950) (describing the First, Second, Fourth,
   Fifth, and Sixth Amendments as the “civil-rights Amendments”);
   Konigsberg v. State Bar of Cal., 366 U.S. 36, 49–50 n.10 (1961) (comparing
   “the commands of the First Amendment” to “the equally unqualified
   command of the Second Amendment”); N.Y. State Rifle & Pistol Ass’n v.
   Bruen, 142 S. Ct. 2111, 2126, 2130 (2022) (quoting Konigsberg).
          But lower courts have routinely ignored these principles, treating the
   Second Amendment as “a second-class right.” McDonald v. City of Chicago,
   561 U.S. 742, 780 (2010) (plurality opinion). So the Supreme Court has now
   commanded lower courts to be more forceful guardians of the right to keep
   and bear arms, by establishing a new framework for lower courts to apply
   under the Second Amendment.
          “When the Second Amendment’s plain text covers an individual’s
   conduct, the Constitution presumptively protects that conduct.” Bruen, 142
   S. Ct. at 2129–30. “The government must then justify its regulation by
   demonstrating that it is consistent with the Nation’s historical tradition of
   firearm regulation.” Id. at 2130. “[T]his historical inquiry that courts must
   conduct will often involve reasoning by analogy—a commonplace task for
   any lawyer or judge. Like all analogical reasoning, determining whether a
   historical regulation is a proper analogue for a distinctly modern firearm

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   regulation requires a determination of whether the two regulations are
   ‘relevantly similar.’” Id. at 2132. This framework “is neither a regulatory
   straightjacket nor a regulatory blank check.” Id. at 2133. It requires the
   government to “identify a well-established and representative historical
   analogue, not a historical twin.” Id.
          Our court’s decision today dutifully applies Bruen, and I join it in full.
   I write separately to explain how respect for the Second Amendment is
   entirely compatible with respect for our profound societal interest in
   protecting citizens from violent criminals. Our Founders firmly believed in
   both the fundamental right to keep and bear arms and the fundamental role
   of government in combating violent crime.
                                           I.
          “[T]he right to keep and bear arms . . . has controversial public safety
   implications.” Bruen, 142 S. Ct. at 2126 n.3 (quotations omitted). But it’s
   hardly “the only constitutional right” that does. Id. (quotations omitted,
   emphasis added). To the contrary, “[a]ll of the constitutional provisions that
   impose restrictions on law enforcement and on the prosecution of crimes fall
   into the same category.” McDonald, 561 U.S. at 783 (plurality opinion).
          So any legal framework that involves any of these constitutional
   provisions can have significant and controversial public safety consequences.
   A framework that under-protects a right unduly deprives citizens of liberty.
   But a framework that over-protects a right unduly deprives citizens of
   competing interests like public safety.
          Take, for example, the exclusionary rule. See Mapp v. Ohio, 367 U.S.
   643 (1961). Since its inception, the rule has been sharply criticized for over-
   protecting the accused and releasing dangerous criminals into our
   neighborhoods. It’s often said that nothing in the Constitution requires the
   criminal to “go free because the constable has blundered.” Herring v. United

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   States, 555 U.S. 135, 148 (2009) (quoting People v. Defore, 150 N.E. 585, 587
   (N.Y. 1926)). “The exclusionary rule generates substantial social costs” by
   “setting the guilty free and the dangerous at large.” Hudson v. Michigan, 547
   U.S. 586, 591 (2006) (cleaned up).
          The same can be said about Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436 (1966).
   The Supreme Court has “repeatedly referred to the Miranda warnings as
   ‘prophylactic’ and ‘not themselves rights protected by the Constitution.’”
   Dickerson v. United States, 530 U.S. 428, 437–38 (2000) (citations omitted).
   What’s more, “[i]n some unknown number of cases the Court’s rule will
   return a killer, a rapist or other criminal to the streets and to the environment
   which produced him, to repeat his crime whenever it pleases him.” Miranda,
   384 U.S. at 542 (White, J., dissenting).
          So it’s easy to see why decisions like Mapp and Miranda have been
   criticized for over-protecting constitutional rights and harming public safety.
          But there’s a big difference between the first criticism and the second,
   at least as far as the judiciary is concerned. It’s our duty as judges to interpret
   the Constitution based on the text and original understanding of the relevant
   provision—not on public policy considerations, or worse, fear of public
   opprobrium or criticism from the political branches. See, e.g., McDonald, 561
   U.S. at 783 (plurality opinion) (finding “no case in which we have refrained
   from holding that a provision of the Bill of Rights is binding on the States on
   the ground that the right at issue has disputed public safety implications”);
   Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Org., 142 S. Ct. 2228, 2278 (2022) (“[W]e
   cannot allow our decisions to be affected by any extraneous influences such
   as concern about the public’s reaction to our work.”); Mance v. Sessions, 896
   F.3d 390, 405 (5th Cir. 2018) (Ho, J., dissenting from denial of rehearing en
   banc) (“Constitutional rights must not give way to hoplophobia.”).

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           And that’s precisely the problem here: Members of the Supreme
   Court have repeatedly criticized lower courts for disfavoring the Second
   Amendment.1 The Supreme Court has now responded by setting forth a new
   legal framework in Bruen. It is incumbent on lower courts to implement
   Bruen in good faith and to the best of our ability.
           Bruen calls on us to examine our Nation’s history and traditions to
   determine the meaning and scope of the Second Amendment. It’s hardly the
   first time that the Supreme Court has looked to history and tradition to
   interpret constitutional provisions.2 And it surely won’t be the last.

           1
              See, e.g., Silvester v. Becerra, 138 S. Ct. 945, 945 (2018) (Thomas, J., dissenting
   from denial of certiorari) (bemoaning “lower courts’ general failure to afford the Second
   Amendment the respect due an enumerated constitutional right”); Peruta v. California, 137
   S. Ct. 1995, 1999 (2017) (Thomas, J., joined by Gorsuch, J., dissenting from denial of
   certiorari) (lamenting “distressing trend” of “the treatment of the Second Amendment as
   a disfavored right”); Friedman v. City of Highland Park, 136 S. Ct. 447, 447 (2015) (Thomas,
   J., joined by Scalia, J., dissenting from denial of certiorari) (criticizing “noncompliance with
   our Second Amendment precedents” by “several Courts of Appeals”); Jackson v. City &
   Cty. of San Francisco, 135 S. Ct. 2799, 2799 (2015) (Thomas, J., joined by Scalia, J.,
   dissenting from denial of certiorari) (“lower courts, including the ones here, have failed to
   protect [the Second Amendment right]”); id. at 2802 (“‘A constitutional guarantee
   subject to future judges’ assessments of its usefulness is no constitutional guarantee at
   all.’”) (quoting Heller, 554 U.S. at 634).
           2
             See, e.g., Myers v. United States, 272 U.S. 52, 109–76 (1926) (noting that “the
   power of removal of executive officers . . . was presented early in the first session of the
   First Congress,” known as the “decision of 1789,” and also surveying English and colonial
   history and subsequent Congressional and Executive practice); Marsh v. Chambers, 463
   U.S. 783, 786–92 (1983) (noting that “[t]he opening of sessions of legislative and other
   deliberative public bodies with prayer is deeply embedded in the history and tradition of
   this country” and surveying colonial history, the deliberations of the First Congress, and
   “unambiguous and unbroken history of more than 200 years”); Crawford v. Washington,
   541 U.S. 36, 43–50 (2004) (examining the “historical background” of the Confrontation
   Clause, noting that “[t]he right to confront one’s accusers is a concept that dates back to
   Roman times,” and surveying English history and colonial and early state practice); United
   States v. Stevens, 559 U.S. 460, 468–69 (2010) (reviewing “historic and traditional
   categories” of speech that government has been allowed to regulate “[f]rom 1791 to the

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                                              II.
           Those who commit violence, including domestic violence, shouldn’t
   just be disarmed—they should be detained, prosecuted, convicted, and
   incarcerated. And that’s exactly why we have a criminal justice system—to
   punish criminals and disable them from engaging in further crimes.
           The Constitution presumes the existence of a criminal justice system.
   See, e.g., U.S. Const. amends. V, VI (setting forth various rights of the
   accused in criminal proceedings); U.S. Const. amend. VIII (prohibiting
   cruel and unusual punishments). That system allows the government to deny
   convicted criminals a wide range of liberties that it could not deny to
   innocent, law-abiding citizens. For example, the government cannot deprive
   innocent citizens of their liberty of movement. See, e.g., Williams v. Fears,
   179 U.S. 270, 274 (1900); City of Chicago v. Morales, 527 U.S. 41, 53 (1999).
   But it can certainly arrest and incarcerate violent criminals.
           Arrest and incarceration naturally entail the loss of a wide range of
   liberties—including the loss of access to weapons. See, e.g., Chimel v.
   California, 395 U.S. 752, 762–63 (1969) (“When an arrest is made, it is
   reasonable for the arresting officer to search the person arrested in order to
   remove any weapons that the latter might seek to use in order to resist arrest
   or effect his escape.”); State v. Buzzard, 4 Ark. 18, 21 (1842) (Ringo, C.J.)
   (“Persons accused of crime, upon their arrest, have constantly been divested
   of their arms, without the legality of the act having ever been questioned.”).
           The Supreme Court has also made clear that our Nation’s history and
   traditions include “longstanding prohibitions on the possession of firearms

   present”); Timbs v. Indiana, 139 S. Ct. 682, 687–89 (2019) (observing that “[t]he Excessive
   Fines Clause traces its venerable lineage back to at least 1215” and surveying authorities
   from English history and colonial practice).

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   by felons”—and that such measures are “presumptively lawful.” Heller, 554
   U.S. at 626 & n.26. See also McDonald, 561 U.S. at 786 (plurality opinion)
   (“We made it clear in Heller that our holding did not cast doubt on such
   longstanding regulatory measures as ‘prohibitions on the possession of
   firearms by felons,’” and “[w]e repeat those assurances here. . . .
   [I]ncorporation does not imperil every law regulating firearms.”). So the
   government can presumably disarm dangerous convicted felons, whether
   they’re incarcerated or not, without violating the Second Amendment.
          The Second Amendment is not “a second-class right.” Bruen, 142 S.
   Ct. at 2156. It is not “subject to an entirely different body of rules than the
   other Bill of Rights guarantees.” Id. That principle guides us here: The
   government can impose various restrictions on the rights of dangerous
   convicted felons, consistent with our Nation’s history and traditions—and
   that includes the right to keep and bear arms.
                                          III.
          The power to incarcerate violent criminals is not just constitutionally
   permissible—it’s imperative to protecting victims. After all, anyone who’s
   willing to break the law when it comes to domestic violence is presumably
   willing to break the law when it comes to guns as well. The only way to
   protect the victim may be to detain as well as disarm the violent criminal.
          For example, the government can detain and disarm, not just after
   conviction, but also before trial. Pre-trial detention is presumed by the
   Excessive Bail Clause and the Speedy Trial Clause. And it plays a significant
   role in protecting citizens from violence, including domestic violence. See,
   e.g., United States v. Salerno, 481 U.S. 739, 755 (1987) (permitting “the
   detention prior to trial of arrestees charged with serious felonies who . . . pose
   a threat to the safety of individuals or to the community”).

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          In addition, the government can detain and disarm, based not just on
   acts of violence, but criminal threats of violence as well. See, e.g., United
   States v. Ackell, 907 F.3d 67 (1st Cir. 2018) (upholding criminal stalking law);
   United States v. Gonzalez, 905 F.3d 165 (3rd Cir. 2018) (same); United States
   v. Osinger, 753 F.3d 939 (9th Cir. 2014) (same); United States v. Petrovic, 701
   F.3d 849 (8th Cir. 2012) (same); see also People v. Counterman, 497 P.3d 1039
   (Colo. App. 2021) (same), cert. granted sub nom. Counterman v. Colorado, 143
   S. Ct. 644 (2023). After all, to the victim, such actions are not only life-
   threatening—they’re life-altering, even if they don’t eventually result in
   violence.
                                         IV.
          18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(8) disarms individuals based on civil protective
   orders—not criminal proceedings. As the court today explains, there is no
   analogous historical tradition sufficient to support § 922(g)(8) under Bruen.
          Moreover, there are additional reasons why disarmament based on
   civil protective orders should give us pause. Scholars and judges have
   expressed alarm that civil protective orders are too often misused as a tactical
   device in divorce proceedings—and issued without any actual threat of
   danger. That makes it difficult to justify § 922(g)(8) as a measure to disarm
   dangerous individuals.
                                          A.
          “Many divorce lawyers routinely recommend pursuit of civil
   protection orders for clients in divorce proceedings . . . as a tactical leverage
   device.” Jeannie Suk, Criminal Law Comes Home, 116 Yale L.J. 2, 62 n.257
   (2006). See also, e.g., Randy Frances Kandel, Squabbling in the Shadows: What
   the Law Can Learn from the Way Divorcing Couples Use Protective Orders as
   Bargaining Chips in Domestic Spats and Child Custody Mediation, 48 S.C. L.

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   Rev. 441, 448 (1997) (civil protective orders are deployed as “an affirmative
   element of divorce strategy”).
          That’s because civil protective orders can help a party in a divorce
   proceeding to “secure [favorable] rulings on critical issues such as [marital
   and child] support, exclusion from marital residence and property
   disposition.” Murray v. Murray, 631 A.2d 984, 986 (N.J. Super. Ct. App.
   Div. 1993). Protective orders can also be “a powerful strategic tool in custody
   disputes.” Suk, supra, at 62.
          That makes civil protective orders a tempting target for abuse. Judges
   have expressed “concern[] . . . with the serious policy implications of
   permitting allegations of . . . domestic violence” to be used in divorce
   proceedings. Murray, 631 A.2d at 986. See also City of Seattle v. May, 256
   P.3d 1161, 1166 n.1 (Wash. 2011) (Sanders, J., dissenting) (noting “the
   growing trend to use protection orders as tactical weapons in divorce cases”).
   And for good reason. “[N]ot all parties to divorce are above using [protective
   orders] not for their intended purpose but solely to gain advantage in a
   dissolution.”   Scott A. Lerner, Sword or Shield? Combating Orders–of–
   Protection Abuse in Divorce, 95 Ill. Bar J. 590, 591 (2007). Anyone who
   is “willing to commit perjury can spend months or even years . . . planning to
   file a domestic violence complaint at an opportune moment in order to gain
   the upper hand in a divorce proceeding.” David N. Heleniak, The New Star
   Chamber: The New Jersey Family Court and the Prevention of Domestic Violence
   Act, 57 Rutgers L. Rev. 1009, 1014 (2005). So “[a] plaintiff willing to
   exaggerate past incidents or even commit perjury can have access to a
   responsive support group, a sympathetic court, and a litany of immediate
   relief.”   Peter Slocum, Biting the D.V. Bullet: Are Domestic-Violence
   Restraining Orders Trampling on Second Amendment Rights?, 40 Seton
   Hall L. Rev. 639, 662–63 (2010).

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          Moreover, these concerns are exacerbated by the fact that judges are
   too often ill-equipped to prevent abuse. Family court judges may face
   enormous pressure to grant civil protective orders—and no incentive to deny
   them. For example, family court judges may receive mandatory training in
   which they’re warned about “the unfavorable publicity” that could result if
   they deny requests for civil protective orders. Id. at 668. As one judge has
   noted, “[a] newspaper headline can be death to a municipal court judge’s
   career.” Id. at 667 n.213 (quotations omitted). So “the prospect of an
   unfavorable newspaper headline is a frightening one.” Id. To quote another
   judge: “Your job is not to become concerned about all the constitutional
   rights of the [defendant] you’re violating as you grant a restraining order.
   Throw him out on the street, give him the clothes on his back and tell him,
   ‘See ya’ around.’” Id. at 668. Yet another judge said: “If there is any doubt
   in your mind about what to do, you should issue the restraining order.” Id.
          As a result, “[r]estraining orders . . . are granted to virtually all who
   apply.” May, 256 P.3d at 1166 n.1 (Sanders, J., dissenting) (quotations
   omitted). So there’s a “tremendous” risk that courts will enter protective
   orders automatically—despite the absence of any real threat of danger.
   Heleniak, supra, at 1014. See generally Slocum, supra. In one case, for
   example, a family court judge granted a restraining order on the ground that
   the husband told his wife that he did not love her and was no longer attracted
   to her. See Murray, 631 A.2d at 984. “There was no prior history of domestic
   violence,” yet the judge issued the order anyway. Id. Another judge issued
   a restraining order against David Letterman on the ground that his presence
   on television harassed the plaintiff. See Todd Peterson, David Letterman
   Fights Restraining Order, People (Dec. 21, 2005).
          These orders were later rescinded.               But the defendants were
   nevertheless prohibited from possessing a firearm while the orders were in
   effect, as a result of § 922(g)(8).

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                                         B.
          Moreover, the consequences of disarming citizens under § 922(g)(8)
   may be especially perverse considering the common practice of “mutual”
   protective orders.
          In any domestic violence dispute, a judge may see no downside in
   forbidding both parties from harming one another. A judge “may think that
   mutual restraining orders are not substantially different from regular
   restraining orders—after all, the goal is to keep the parties away from one
   another so that the violence will not continue.” Jacquie Andreano, The
   Disproportionate Effect of Mutual Restraining Orders on Same-Sex Domestic
   Violence Victims, 108 Cal. L. Rev. 1047, 1054 (2020). “Judges may also
   feel that issuing a mutual restraining order saves time because they do not
   have to hear testimony and make a finding regarding which party is a primary
   aggressor or even that one party has committed domestic violence.” Id.
          But “[t]hese judicial assessments have often led to the issuance of
   unmerited mutual restraining orders, namely in situations where one party is
   the abuser and the other party is a victim.” Id. (emphasis added). As a result,
   “both parties are restrained even if only one is an abuser.” Id. at 1055
   (emphasis added). See also Elizabeth Topliffe, Why Civil Protection Orders
   Are Effective Remedies for Domestic Violence but Mutual Protective Orders Are
   Not, 67 Ind. L.J. 1039, 1055–56 (1992) (“[J]udges often issue a mutual
   protection order without any request from the respondent or his lawyer. . . .
   [J]udges and lawyers . . . may be tempted to resort to mutual protective orders
   frequently. However, when they do this in cases where there truly is one
   victim and one batterer, they ignore some of the real difficulties of mutual
   protection orders.”).      See generally David Hirschel, Nat’l
   Criminal Justice Reference Serv., Domestic Violence

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   Cases: What Research Shows About Arrest and Dual
   Arrest Rates (2008).
          The net result of all this is profoundly perverse, because it means that
   § 922(g)(8) effectively disarms victims of domestic violence. What’s worse,
   victims of domestic violence may even be put in greater danger than before.
   Abusers may know or assume that their victims are law-abiding citizens who
   will comply with their legal obligation not to arm themselves in self-defense
   due to § 922(g)(8). Abusers might even remind their victims of the existence
   of § 922(g)(8) and the entry of a mutual protective order to taunt and subdue
   their victims. Meanwhile, the abusers are criminals who have already
   demonstrated that they have zero propensity to obey the dictates of criminal
   statutes. As a result, § 922(g)(8) effectively empowers and enables abusers
   by guaranteeing that their victims will be unable to fight back.
                                        ***
          We must protect citizens against domestic violence. And we can do
   so without offending the Second Amendment framework set forth in Bruen.
          Those who commit or criminally threaten domestic violence have
   already demonstrated an utter lack of respect for the rights of others and the
   rule of law. So merely enacting laws that tell them to disarm is a woefully
   inadequate solution.      Abusers must be detained, prosecuted, and
   incarcerated. And that’s what the criminal justice system is for. I concur.

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