District of Columbia Gun Law was defeated, spent large tax dollars

Outside Counsel Worked Landmark Gun Case Pro Bono

Lawyers for the District of Columbia who are fighting an effort to expose the time and money the city and its outside attorneys spent in its ultimately unsuccessful defense of the city’s handgun ban said this week that the private counsel who helped the District all served pro bono.

The District’s Office of the Attorney General does not want to provide billing record information to the attorneys who defeated the firearm ban in the U.S. Supreme Court in 2008. Those attorneys, including Alan Gura of Alexandria, Va.’s Gura & Possessky, said information about the city’s effort is relevant to the plaintiffs’ request for more than $3.5 million in fees.

The plaintiffs’ team, led by Gura and financed by the Cato Institute’s Robert Levy, said in court papers in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia that they clocked at least 3,273 hours in District of Columbia v. Heller.

On April 26, the District’s lawyers filed for a protective order to keep its records out of the hands of the plaintiffs’ attorneys. “The District of Columbia was required to defend a law it viewed as critical to its exercise of its police powers for the protection of public safety,” government attorneys Ellen Efros and Andrew Saindon said in the court papers. “Its motivations and interests simply cannot be compared to those of a private litigant.”

Efros and Saindon said the “feared precedential value of the Heller decision was a matter of a profound concern to the District.” The fact that the city may have “expended far greater effort and time in defending its law, potentially more than private counsel would invest in defense of a similar case, is of no moment.”

In court papers May 12, Gura wrote in response: “It is well-established that the government’s attorney billing records, and other basic information about attorneys engaged to represent the government, are subject to disclosure under public records laws.” Among other things, he said, the city’s records are relevant to assist the trial judge in evaluating the city’s claims about the quality of the plaintiffs’ billing records.

But District attorneys said in court papers filed Wednesday that Gura’s “ultimate proposition is based on a flawed premise—that the District retained paid counsel in this matter.” The city said all of the outside counsel—including attorneys from Covington & Burling, Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld and O’Melveny & Myers—worked pro bono.

Typically, the city receives voluntary services through a “donation retainer agreement” that does not require the law firm to maintain billing records of time spent, the District attorneys said. The city did not request billing records from any of the pro bono counsel.

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culled from:

http://legaltimes.typepad.com/blt/2010/05/dc-says-outside-counsel-worked-handgun-case-pro-bono.html

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Hillary Commits to UN Gun Ban, says Dudley Brown

Dear fellow patriot,
With willing one-world accomplices in Washington, D.C., gun-grabbers around the globe believe they have it made.
In fact, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton just announced the Obama Administration would be working hand in glove with the UN to pass a new “Small Arms Treaty.”
Disguised as legislation to help in the fight against “terrorism,” “insurgency” and “international crime syndicates,” the UN Small Arms Treaty is nothing more than a massive, GLOBAL gun control scheme.
Ultimately, the UN’s Small Arms Treaty is designed to register, ban and CONFISCATE firearms owned by private citizens like YOU.
That’s why it’s vital you sign special petition I’ve made up for your signature that DEMANDS your U.S. Senators vote AGAINST ratification of the UN’s “Small Arms Treaty!”
So far, the gun-grabbers have successfully kept the exact wording of their new scheme under wraps.
But looking at previous versions of the UN “Small Arms Treaty,” you and I can get a good idea of what’s likely in the works.
If passed by the UN and ratified by the U.S. Senate, the UN “Small Arms Treaty” would almost certainly FORCE national governments to:
*** Enact tougher licensing requirements, making law-abiding citizens cut through even more bureaucratic red tape just to own a firearm legally;
*** CONFISCATE and DESTROY ALL “unauthorized” civilian firearms (all firearms owned by the government are excluded, of course);
*** BAN the trade, sale and private ownership of ALL semi-automatic weapons;
*** Create an INTERNATIONAL gun registry, setting the stage for full-scale gun CONFISCATION.
Ever since it’s founding almost 65 years ago, the United Nations has been hell-bent on bringing the United States to its knees.
To the petty dictators and one-worlders who control the UN, the U.S. isn’t a “shining city on a hill” — it’s an affront to their grand totalitarian designs for the globe.
These anti-gun globalists know that so long as Americans remain free to make our own decisions without being bossed around by big government bureaucrats, they’ll NEVER be able to seize the worldwide oppressive power they crave.
And the UN’s apologists also know the most effective way to finally strip you and me of ALL our freedoms would be to DESTROY our gun rights.
The fact is, the last thing the gun-grabbers in the U.N. and in Washington, D.C. want is for you and me to have time to react and mobilize gun owners to defeat this radical legislation.
They’ve made that mistake before, and we’ve made them pay, defeating EVERY attempt to ram the “Treaty on Small Arms” into law since the mid-1990s.
But this time, time won’t be on our side.
In fact, we’re likely to only have a few days or weeks to defeat the treaty.
Worse, there’s no longer any pro-gun Republican Senate to kill ratification of the treaty.
There’s no longer any Republican in the White House who has stated opposition to the treaty.
And you and I know good and well how Germany, Great Britain, France, Communist China or the rest of the anti-gun members of the United Nations are going to vote.
So our ONE AND ONLY CHANCE of stopping the UN’s “Small Arms Treaty” is during the ratification process in the U.S. Senate.
As you know, it takes 67 Senate votes to ratify a treaty.
With 40 Republicans, that should be easy, right?
Unfortunately, that couldn’t be further from the truth.
First, you know just as well as I do that not all the remaining Republicans in the Senate are “pro-gun” in any sense of the term.
Second, even with the partisan rancor in Washington, D.C., many GOP Senators get “queasy” about killing treaties for fear of “embarrassing” the President — especially with “international prestige” at stake.
They look at ratifying treaties much like approving Presidents’ Supreme Court nominees.
And remember, there were NINE Republicans who voted to confirm anti-gun Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor.
A dozen more GOP Senators only voted against Sotomayor after receiving massive grassroots pressure from the folks back home.
So if we’re going to defeat the UN’s “Small Arms Treaty” we have to turn the heat up on the U.S. Senate now before it’s too late!

Dudley Brown
Executive Director
National Association for Gun Rights

(culled from newsmax.com)

Now ‘all Guns’ must be listed on your next (2010) tax return!

This was sent to me:
As if we didnt have enough to get upset about!
If you have a gun, I hope it isn’t registered!
Senate Bill SB-2099 will require us to put on our 2009 1040 federal tax form all guns that you have or own. It will require fingerprints and a tax of $50 per gun.
This bill was introduced on Feb..24, 2009, by the Obama staff. BUT..this bill will only become public knowledge 30 days after the new law becomes effective! This is an amendment to the Internal Revenue Act of 1986. This means that the Finance Committee has passed this without the Senate voting on it at all.
Trust Obama?…… you must be kidding!
The full text of the IRS amendment is on the U.S. Senate homepage, U.S. Senate http://www.senate.gov/ You can find the bill by doing a search by the bill number, SB-2099.
| You know who to call; I strongly suggest you do. Please send a copy of this e-mail to every gun owner you know.|
Text of H.R.45 as Introduced in House: Blair Holt’s Firearm Licensing and Record of Sale Act of 2009 – U..S. … OpenCongress http://www.opencongress.org/bill/111-h45/text
Obama’s Congress is now starting on the firearms confiscation bill. If it passes, gun owners will become criminals if you don’t fully comply.
It has begun . . .Whatever Obama’s secret Master Plan is…..this is just the ‘tip of the iceberg!’
Very Important for you to be aware of a new bill HR 45 introduced into the House. This is the Blair Holt Firearm Licensing & Record of Sale Act of 2009.
Even gun shop owners didn’t know about this because the government is trying to fly it under the radar as a ‘minor’ IRS revision, and, as usual, the ‘political’ lawmakers did not read this bill before signing and approving it!
To find out about this – go to any government website and type in HR 45 or Google HR 45 Blair Holt Firearm Licensing & Record of Sales Act of 2009..
You will get all the information.
Basically this would make it illegal to own a firearm – any rifle with a clip or ANY pistol unless:
-It is registered -You are fingerprinted -You supply a current Driver’s License -You supply your Social Security # -You will submit to a physical & mental evaluation at any time of their choosing -Each update – change or ownership through private or public sale must be reported and costs $25 – Failure to do so you automatically lose the right to own a firearm and are subject up to a year in jail. -There is a child provision clause on page 16 section 305 stating a child-access provision. Gun must be locked and inaccessible to any child under 18. -They would have the right to come and inspect that you are storing your gun safely away from accessibility to children and fine is punishable for up to 5 yrs. in prison.
If you think this is a joke – go to the website and take your pick of many options to read this. It is long and lengthy. But, more and more people are becoming aware of this. Pass the word along. Any hunters in your family pass this along.
This is just a “termite” approach to complete confiscation of guns and disarming of our society to the point we have no defense – chip away a little here and there until the goal is accomplished before anyone realizes it.
This is one to act on whether you own a gun or not…
Search Results – THOMAS (Library of Congress) target=_blankhttp://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c111:H.R.45
H.R.45: Blair Holt’s Firearm Licensing and Record of Sale Act of 2009 – U.S. Congress – OpenCongress http://www.opencongress.org/bill/111-h45/show
H.R. 45: Blair Holt’s Firearm Licensing and Record of Sale Act of 2009 (GovTrack.us) target=_blankhttp://www.govtrack.us/congress/bill.xpd?bill=h111-45
Please.. copy and send this out to EVERYONE in the USA , whether you support the Right to Bear Arms or are for gun control. We all should have the right to choose.
I refuse to allow anybody to nullify the 2nd amendment!