Starting on November 16, any Delaware resident who wants to buy a handgun will have to provide the state police with proof that they've taken a mandatory firearms training course, and then wait up to 30 days for the agency to issue them their Second Amendment permission slip that allows them to purchase or receive a pistol.
The law, which was signed by Gov. Mark Carney almost 18 months ago, is the subject of an ongoing court challenge. Delaware contends the permit-to-purchase law "falls squarely within the group of 'shall-issue' permitting laws that are presumptively constitutional," and is nearly identical to the Handgun Qualification License in Maryland that has been upheld by the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals.
U.S. District Judge Maryellen Noreika, who was the judge overseeing Hunter Biden's case for possessing a gun as an unlawful user of drugs, has been assigned to hear Neuberger v. Delaware Department of Safety and Homeland Security. The last round of briefs in the state's request to dismiss the lawsuit were filed back in April, but so far Noreika hasn't issued any decision about whether the lawsuit can proceed, much less to grant the plaintiffs' request for an injunction blocking enforcement of the law.
With less than a month to go, though, the named plaintiff in Neuberger is predicting disastrous results if the does take effect as scheduled.
Wilmington lawyer Thomas Neuberger, one of the plaintiffs in the pending lawsuit — said the fact that no application is yet available, coupled with the 30-day turnaround period — has set the stage for a period of time when no one except those with a concealed carry permit can buy a handgun in Delaware.
“I think the state has fumbled the ball in the 18 months’’ since Carney signed the legislation, Neuberger said. “Now, in the last two minutes of the game, they’re trying to get their act together.”
“It’s too late now and I think there’s going to be a total gun ban on the 16th [of November] because dealers will not want to subject themselves to criminal liability. They’re not going to give you a handgun and sell it to you if you haven’t got the permit.“
Officials with the state police say the new applications will be available once an online portal is live, but offered no guarantees that the website will be up and running by the 16th.
Even if applications are accepted starting on November 16, the state police still have up to 30 days to approve or deny a permit, which essentially imposes a potential 30-day waiting period on handgun sales; even longer when you consider someone has to take a firearms training course before they can even submit their application.
SCOTUS declined to take up a challenge to Maryland's permit-to-purchase law, which was upheld by an en banc Fourth Circuit on the spurious grounds that the permitting measure doesn't even implicate the Second Amendment because it is a type of “shall-issue” licensing law. The only wa a "shall issue" law can infringe on the right to keep and bear arms, according to the appellate court, is if it “effectively denies” the right... and a potential 30-day waiting period doesn't meet that burden.
The problem with that argument is that there are going to be circumstances when someone absolutely needs access to a firearm and can't wait a month to get permission from the state police; a domestic violence victim who's receiving threats from their abuser, individuals with stalkers, and anyone else facing an imminent threat of violence.
Permit-to-purchase laws differ from carry laws in one crucial difference: they impact our ability to defend ourselves in our homes. Even if I possess a valid concealed carry license, there are going to be places that are off-limits to me as a gun owner. If I'm facing an imminent danger, I'm going to try to stay away from as many of those "gun-free zones" as possible.
My home, however, is my castle. I know I can carry there. If the only thing stopping me is the fact that the state police haven't signed off on my ability to purchase a firearm, even though I can pass a background check, then it is absolutely denying me my right to keep an arm in my home; not permanently, perhaps, but long enough for an abuser or a known threat to carry out an attack against a disarmed victim.
Noreika shouldn't repeat the Fourth Circuit's mistake by dismissing Neuberger. Instead, she should err on the side of both caution and the Second Amendment by granting an injunction that will prevent the permit-to-purchase law from being enforced while the lawsuit continues.
Delaware is seeing its lowest level of violent crime ever recorded, and that's without the permit-to-purchase law in place. Clearly there's no public safety emergency that demands the permit-to-purchase law go into effect. Allowing the law to be enforced, however, will create emergencies for some crime victims, and leave them disarmed and defenseless against any assailants willing to illegally acquire a firearm before carrying out a violent attack.
