Amicus Curiae Brief — National Shooting Sports Foundation, Inc., et al., Petitioners v. Letitia James, Attorney General of New York

No. 25-1026

In The

Supreme Court of the United States

————♦————

NATIONAL SHOOTING SPORTS FOUNDATION, INC., ET AL.,

Petitioners,

v.

LETITIA JAMES, ATTORNEY GENERAL OF NEW YORK,

Respondent.

————♦————

On Petition for Writ of Certiorari to the

United States Court of Appeals

for the Second Circuit

————♦————

BRIEF OF THE NATIONAL RIFLE ASSOCIATION

OF AMERICA, SECOND AMENDMENT

FOUNDATION, AMERICAN SUPPRESSOR

ASSOCIATION, AND INDEPENDENCE

INSTITUTE AS AMICI CURIAE IN SUPPORT

OF PETITIONERS

————♦————

DAVID B. KOPEL

INDEPENDENCE INSTITUTE

727 E. 16th Ave.

Denver, CO 80203

(303) 279-6536

david@i2i.org

JOSEPH G.S. GREENLEE

Counsel of Record

NRA – INSTITUTE FOR

LEGISLATIVE ACTION

11250 Waples Mill Rd.

Fairfax, VA 22030

(703) 267-1161

jgreenlee@nrahq.org

i

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Page

TABLE OF CONTENTS............................................... i

TABLE OF AUTHORITIES ....................................... iii

INTEREST OF AMICI CURIAE ................................. 1

SUMMARY OF ARGUMENT ..................................... 3

ARGUMENT .............................................................. 5

I.

British efforts to suppress arms commerce

precipitated the Revolutionary War. .................... 5

A. Great Britain prevented domestic arms

commerce. .......................................................... 6

B. Great Britain banned the import of arms. ....... 9

C. Americans viewed arms commerce

restrictions as an effort to enslave them. ....... 11

D. Americans used force to thwart the

restrictions. ..................................................... 12

E. Americans smuggled arms imports. ............... 14

F. Americans encouraged domestic arms

manufacture and commerce. .......................... 15

II. Abusive litigation targeting arms commerce

precipitated PLCAA. ........................................... 19

A. Coordinated, meritless litigation against

firearms manufacturers threatened to

bankrupt the industry. ................................... 20

B. Congress passed PLCAA to halt the abusive

lawsuits. .......................................................... 24

ii

III. The question presented is ripe and will not

benefit from further percolation. ........................ 27

CONCLUSION .......................................................... 28

iii

TABLE OF AUTHORITIES

Page

CASES

District of Columbia v. Heller,

554 U.S. 570 (2008) .................................................. 6

Kelley v. R.G. Indus., Inc.,

304 Md. 124 (1985) ................................................. 20

Kyllo v. United States,

533 U.S. 27 (2001) .................................................. 19

Patterson v. Rohm Gesellschaft,

608 F. Supp. 1206 (N.D. Tex. 1985) ....................... 20

Smith & Wesson Brands, Inc. v. Estados Unidos

Mexicanos,

605 U.S. 280 (2025) ................................................ 27

CONSTITUTIONAL PROVISIONS

U.S. CONST. amend. II ......................................... 26, 27

U.S. CONST. amend. XIV ............................................ 26

STATUTES

15 U.S.C. §7901 .......................................................... 25

15 U.S.C. §7901(a)(5) ................................................. 27

15 U.S.C. §7901(a)(6) ........................................... 26, 27

15 U.S.C. §7901(a)(7) ................................................. 26

15 U.S.C. §7901(a)(8) ................................................. 26

15 U.S.C. §7901(b)(1) ................................................. 27

iv

15 U.S.C. §7902 .......................................................... 25

15 U.S.C. §7903 .......................................................... 25

15 U.S.C. §7903(5)(A) .......................................... 27, 28

1988 Md. Laws 3489-90 ............................................. 20

BOOKS

ACTS OF THE PRIVY COUNCIL OF ENGLAND, COLONIAL

SERIES, A.D. 1766–1783, vol. 5 (2005) (James

Munro & Almeric Fitzroy eds., 1912) ...................... 9

AMERICAN ARCHIVES, vol. 1 (4th Ser., Peter

Force ed., 1837) .............................................. 7, 8, 12

Atkinson, Rick, THE BRITISH ARE COMING (2019) ..... 15

Brown, M.L., FIREARMS IN COLONIAL AMERICA

(1980) ................................................................ 16, 17

CATALOGUE OF MANUSCRIPTS AND RELICS IN

WASHINGTON’S HEAD-QUARTERS, NEWBURGH,

N.Y. (E.M. Ruttenber ed., 1890) ............................ 16

DOCUMENTS RELATIVE TO THE COLONIAL HISTORY

OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK, vol. 8 (1857) ............... 9

Drayton, John, MEMOIRS OF THE AMERICAN

REVOLUTION (1821) ................................................. 12

FEDERAL AND STATE CONSTITUTIONS COLONIAL

CHARTERS, AND OTHER ORGANIC LAWS OF THE

STATES, TERRITORIES, AND COLONIES NOW OR

HERETOFORE FORMING THE UNITED STATES OF

AMERICA, vols. 3, 7 (Francis Thorpe ed., 1909) ....... 6

Fischer, David Hackett, PAUL REVERE’S RIDE

(1994) ...................................................................... 10

v

Gill, Jr., Harold B., THE GUNSMITH IN COLONIAL

VIRGINIA (1974)......................................................... 6

Halbrook, Stephen P., THE FOUNDERS’ SECOND

AMENDMENT: ORIGINS OF THE RIGHT TO KEEP

AND BEAR ARMS (2008) ..................................... 10, 15

JOURNALS OF THE CONTINENTAL CONGRESS, vol. 1

(1904) ...................................................................... 11

LETTERS OF HUGH EARL PERCY FROM BOSTON AND

NEW YORK, 1774–1776 (Charles Knowles Bolton

ed., 1902) ................................................................ 13

MacKenzie, Frederick, A BRITISH FUSILIER IN

REVOLUTIONARY BOSTON: DIARY OF LIEUTENANT

FREDERICK MACKENZIE (Allen French ed., 1926) . 16

Miller, Daniel A., SIR JOSEPH YORKE AND

ANGLO-DUTCH RELATIONS 1774–1780 (1970) .. 10, 14

MINUTES OF THE PROVINCIAL CONGRESS OF

PENNSYLVANIA, FROM THE ORGANIZATION TO

THE TERMINATION OF THE PROPRIETARY

GOVERNMENT, vol. 10 (1852) .................................. 15

Moore, Frank, DIARY OF THE AMERICAN

REVOLUTION, vol. 1 (1860) ...................................... 10

NAVAL DOCUMENTS OF THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION,

vol. 1 (William Bell Clark ed., 1964) ..................... 10

NEW YORK IN THE REVOLUTION AS COLONY AND

STATE SUPPLEMENT (Frederic G. Mather ed.,

1901) ....................................................................... 15

Olson, Walter, THE RULE OF LAWYERS (2003) ..... 23, 24

PARLIAMENTARY HISTORY OF ENGLAND, FROM THE

EARLIEST PERIOD TO THE YEAR 1803, vol. 18

(1813) ...................................................................... 13

vi

Richmond, Robert P., POWDER ALARM (1971) ........... 14

Rowe, John, LETTERS AND DIARY OF JOHN ROWE

(Anne Rowe Cunningham ed., 1903) ....................... 7

SOURCES OF AMERICAN INDEPENDENCE: SELECTED

MANUSCRIPTS FROM THE COLLECTIONS OF THE

WILLIAM L. CLEMENTS LIBRARY (Howard

Peckham ed., 1978) ................................................ 18

THE BOOK OF ABIGAIL & JOHN: SELECTED LETTERS

OF THE ADAMS FAMILY 1762–1784 (L.H.

Butterfield et al. eds., 2002) .................................. 13

THE JOURNALS OF EACH PROVINCIAL CONGRESS OF

MASSACHUSETTS IN 1774 AND 1775 AND OF THE

COMMITTEE OF SAFETY (William Lincoln ed.,

1838) ....................................................................... 11

THE WRITINGS OF THOMAS JEFFERSON, vol. 7 (Paul

Ford ed., 1904) ........................................................ 19

Tourtellot, Arthur B., LEXINGTON AND CONCORD:

THE BEGINNING OF THE WAR OF THE AMERICAN

REVOLUTION (1959)................................................. 17

NEWSPAPERS

Allen, Mike, Colt’s to Curtail Sale of Handguns,

N.Y. TIMES, Oct. 11, 1999....................................... 22

Barrett, Paul, Lawsuits Trigger Gun Firms’

Bankruptcy, WALL ST. J., Sept. 13, 1999 ............... 22

Boyer, Peter, Big Guns, NEW YORKER, May 17,

1999......................................................................... 21

Butterfield, Fox, Lawsuits Lead Gun Maker To

File for Bankruptcy, N.Y. TIMES, June 24, 1999… 22

vii

CONNECTICUT JOURNAL, Dec. 28, 1774 ........................ 9

Musante, Fred, After Tobacco, Handgun Lawsuits,

N.Y. TIMES, Jan. 31, 1999 ...................................... 21

Olson, Walter, Plaintiffs Lawyers Take Aim at

Democracy, WALL ST. J., Mar. 21, 2000 ................. 21

PA. GAZETTE, Dec. 21, 1774 ....................................... 10

PROVIDENCE GAZETTE, Jan. 14, 1775 ........................ 10

The HUD Gun Suit, WASH. POST, Dec. 17, 1999 ...... 21

VA. GAZETTE, Apr. 22, 1775 ....................................... 14

Walsh, Sharon, Gun Industry Views Pact as Threat

to Its Unity, WASH. POST, Mar. 18, 2000 ............... 22

Weisman, Jonathan, Gun maker, U.S. reach

agreement, BALT. SUN, Mar. 18, 2000 .............. 23, 24

OTHER AUTHORITIES

146 CONG. REC. No. 45, H2017 (Apr. 11, 2000) ........ 24

151 CONG. REC. No. 104, S9059 (July 27, 2005) ....... 25

151 CONG. REC. No. 104, S9063 (July 27, 2005) ....... 25

151 CONG. REC. No. 104, S9107 (July 27, 2005) ....... 25

151 CONG. REC. No. 104, S9395 (July 29, 2005)

.......................................................................... 26, 28

A Watchman, To the Inhabitants of British

America (Dec. 24, 1774) ......................................... 11

viii

Agreement Between Smith & Wesson and the

Departments of the Treasury and Housing and

Urban Development, Local Governments and

States, U.S. DEPARTMENT OF HOUSING AND

DEVELOPMENT, archived Dec. 13, 2009 .................. 23

Clark, Charles Hopkins, The 18th Century Diary of

Ezra Stiles, 208 N. AM. REV. 410 (Sept. 1918) ........ 8

Greenlee, Joseph G.S., The American Tradition

of Self-Made Arms, 54 ST. MARY’S L.J. 35

(2023) ............................................................ 6, 16, 18

Kopel, David B. & Gardiner, Richard E., The

Sullivan Principles: Protecting the Second

Amendment from Civil Abuse, 19 SETON HALL

LEGIS. J. 737 (1995) ................................................ 20

Kopel, David B., How the British Gun Control

Program Precipitated the American

Revolution, 6 CHARLESTON L. REV. 283 (2012) .. 9, 18

Letter from Earl of Dartmouth to the Governors in

America (Oct. 19, 1774) ............................................ 9

Letter from Gov. Gage to Lieut. Col. Smith

(Apr. 18, 1775) ........................................................ 17

Letter from Gov. Wentworth to Gov. Gage

(Dec. 14, 1774) ........................................................ 13

Letter from Thomas Gage to Earl of Dartmouth

(Nov. 2, 1774)............................................................ 8

Letter from Thomas Jefferson to George Hammond

(May 15, 1793) ........................................................ 19

Neumann, George C., American Made Muskets in

the Revolutionary War, AM. RIFLEMAN, Mar. 29,

2010......................................................................... 17

ix

Report of the Pennsylvania Committee of Safety

(Jan. 3, 1776) .......................................................... 15

Reynolds, Glenn H., Permissible Negligence and

Campaigns to Suppress Rights, 68 FLA. L. REV.

FORUM 51 (2016)..................................................... 26

Salay, David L., The Production of Gunpowder

in Pennsylvania During the American

Revolution, 99 PENN. MAG. HIST. &

BIOGRAPHY 422 (Oct. 1975) .............................. 14, 15

Stephenson, O.W., The Supply of Gunpowder in

1776, 30 AM. HIST. REV. 271 (1925) ....................... 14

Unsigned report, Sept. 5, 1774 ................................ 7, 8

1

INTEREST OF AMICI CURIAE1

The National Rifle Association of America (NRA)

is America’s oldest civil rights organization and

foremost defender of Second Amendment rights. It

was founded in 1871 by Union veterans—a general

and a colonel—who, based on their Civil War

experiences,

sought

to

promote

firearms

marksmanship and expertise amongst the citizenry.

Today, the NRA is America’s leading provider of

firearms marksmanship and safety training for both

civilians and law enforcement. The NRA has

approximately four million members, and its

programs reach millions more.

The Second Amendment Foundation (SAF) is a

nonprofit membership organization founded in 1974

with over 720,000 members and supporters in every

state of the Union. Its purposes include education,

research, publishing, and legal action focusing on the

constitutional right to keep and bear arms.

The American Suppressor Association (ASA) is a

501(c)(6) nonprofit dedicated to advancing prosuppressor reform nationwide. Founded in 2011, ASA

has lobbied for suppressor rights in dozens of states,

was instrumental in legalizing suppressors in Iowa,

Minnesota, Vermont, and Guam, and helped legalize

suppressors for hunting in 19 states. It also played a

pivotal role in eliminating the transfer tax on

suppressors, short-barreled firearms, and NFA1 Counsel for all parties received timely notice of Amici’s

intent to file this brief. No counsel for any party authored this

brief in any part. Only Amici funded its preparation and

submission.

2

defined “any other weapons” in the One Big Beautiful

Bill Act.

Founded in 1985 on the eternal truths of the

Declaration of Independence, the Independence

Institute is a 501(c)(3) public policy research

organization based in Denver, Colorado. The briefs

and scholarship of Research Director David Kopel

have been cited in seven opinions of this Court,

including Bruen, McDonald (under the name of lead

amicus Int’l Law Enforcement Educators & Trainers

Association (ILEETA)), and Heller (same). Kopel has

also been cited in 140 opinions of lower courts.

Amici are interested in this case because the

decision below will enable abusive litigation that

devastates the firearms industry—and consequently

the right to keep and bear arms.

————♦————

3

SUMMARY OF ARGUMENT

Suppressing commerce in arms has long been a

means of disarming Americans. The Founding

generation resisted such efforts through revolution;

Congress responded to the modern equivalent by

enacting the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms

Act (PLCAA).

In the years preceding the Revolutionary War, the

British attempted to prevent Americans from

acquiring arms by restricting their manufacture, sale,

and importation. Colonists correctly understood these

measures as a deliberate effort to render them

defenseless and subject to arbitrary power, and

resisted them accordingly.

In recent decades, that strategy reemerged in a

different form. Unable to secure desired legislative

restrictions, anti-gun lobbies and governments

brought coordinated lawsuits designed to impose

crippling liability on firearms manufacturers and

sellers for the criminal acts of third parties. These

suits did not seek to remedy traditional legal wrongs,

but rather to regulate and ultimately eliminate the

firearms industry through costly litigation.

Congress enacted PLCAA to halt these schemes.

The statute reflects Congress’s considered judgment

that federal legislation was required to protect lawful

commerce, the firearms industry, constitutional

rights, the separation of powers, and national security

from abusive litigation.

The decision below disregards that judgment and

allows states to nullify PLCAA by repackaging

prohibited claims under novel state-law theories—

4

permitting precisely the end-run around federal law

that Congress sought to foreclose. By allowing claims

styled as “public nuisance” to proceed—despite

targeting lawful commerce and seeking to impose

liability for third-party misuse—it invites a revival of

the very litigation campaign PLCAA was enacted to

preclude.

This case warrants immediate review. The issue

presented has already been addressed by Congress

and will not benefit from further percolation. Delay

would invite a proliferation of suits capable of

inflicting irreparable harm on a lawful industry and

the constitutional rights it supports. The petition

should be granted.

————♦————

5

ARGUMENT

Efforts to disarm the American people have often

focused not on confiscating weapons already in

private hands, but on suppressing the commerce that

makes firearms available in the first place.

On the eve of the American Revolution, the

British government sought to prevent Americans from

purchasing and importing arms and ammunition.

Colonists correctly understood these measures as a

plan to render them defenseless and subject to

arbitrary power. They resisted accordingly and

ensured that their new government could not disarm

them through similar means.

Modern litigation campaigns targeting firearms

manufacturers and dealers employ a similar

strategy—to choke off the lawful market in arms to

diminish firearms ownership. Congress enacted the

Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act

(“PLCAA”) to halt those schemes. But New York’s law

invites a revival of the very litigation campaign

PLCAA was enacted to preclude.

I.

British efforts to suppress arms commerce

precipitated the Revolutionary War.

Arms commerce in America was a protected right

from the beginning. Binding his “Heirs and

Successors,” King James I in 1606 granted the

“Southern Colony” (today’s Virginia and the entire

South) the perpetual right to import from Great

Britain, “the Goods, Chattels, Armour, Munition, and

Furniture, needful to be used by them, for their said

6

Apparel, Food, Defence or otherwise.” 7 FEDERAL AND

STATE CONSTITUTIONS, COLONIAL CHARTERS, AND

OTHER ORGANIC LAWS OF THE STATES, TERRITORIES,

AND COLONIES 3787–88 (Francis Thorpe ed., 1909).2

The 1620 Charter of New England (originally the

entire North) similarly guaranteed the right “att all

and every time and times hereafter, out of our

Realmes or Dominions whatsoever, to take, load,

carry, and transports in … Shipping, Armour,

Weapons, Ordinances, Munition, Powder, Shott,

Victuals … and all other Things necessary for the said

Plantation, and for their Use and Defense, and for

Trade with the People there.” 3 id. at 1834–35.

Over the next 150 years, Americans freely

engaged in arms commerce. See, e.g., Joseph Greenlee,

The American Tradition of Self-Made Arms, 54 ST.

MARY’S L.J. 35, 45–48 (2023). “Gunsmiths were found

nearly everywhere: in port towns along the coast, in

settled inland areas, and … on the frontier.” Harold

Gill, THE GUNSMITH IN COLONIAL VIRGINIA 1 (1974).

This tradition came to an abrupt halt, however, when

the British attempted to disarm America by

forbidding arms commerce, which led to the

Revolutionary War.

A. Great Britain prevented domestic arms

commerce.

In 1774, Massachusetts royal governor Thomas

Gage attempted to disarm the colonists by blocking

gunpowder commerce. In colonial towns, large

quantities of gunpowder were stored in central

2 “Armour” included all equipment for fighting, including

firearms. District of Columbia v. Heller, 554 U.S. 570, 581 (2008).

7

“powder houses” or “magazines.” Unlike modern

smokeless gunpowder, the black powder of the 18th

century was volatile, so merchants’ and government

reserves were often stored in reinforced brick

buildings. Boston merchant John Andrews wrote on

July 22 that “the Governor has order’d the Keeper of

the Province’s Magazine not to deliver a kernel of

powder (without his express order) of either public or

private property[.]” John Andrews, LETTERS OF JOHN

ANDREWS, ESQ., OF BOSTON, 1772–1776, at 19

(Winthrop Sargent ed., 1866) (July 22, 1774). On

September 2, Andrews reported, “A Guard of Soldiers

is set upon the Powder house at the back of ye.

Common, so that people are debar’d from selling their

own property.” Id. at 39. Andrews noted, “it’s now five

or six weeks since the Governor has allow’d any

[powder] to be taken out of the magazine here,

whereby for some weeks there has not been a pound

to be sold or bought in town.” Id. at 52.

Even more provocatively, on September 1, 1774,

Gage “sent a Party of Two hundred men” to the

Charlestown powder house. John Rowe, LETTERS AND

DIARY OF JOHN ROWE 283–84 (Anne Cunningham ed.,

1903). They seized “two hundred and fifty half barrels

of powder, the whole store there.” Unsigned report,

Sept. 5, 1774, in 1 AMERICAN ARCHIVES 762 (4th Ser.,

Peter Force ed., 1837).

Rumors that the British had shot colonists while

confiscating the gunpowder set off the “Powder

Alarm” throughout New England. The colonists

“began to collect in large bodies, with their arms,

provisions, and ammunition, determining by some

means to give a check to a power which so openly

8

threatened their destruction, and in such a

clandestine manner rob them of the means of their

defence.” Id. Andrews reported that “at least a

hundred thousand men were equipt with arms, and

moving towards us from different parts of the

country.” Andrews, LETTERS, at 52. A patriot in

Litchfield, Connecticut, wrote:

all along were armed men rushing forward,

some on foot, some on horseback; at every

house women

and children making

cartridges, running bullets, making wallets,

baking biscuit, crying and bemoaning, and at

the same time animating their husbands and

sons to fight for their liberties tho not

knowing whether they should ever see them

again.

Charles Clark, The 18th Century Diary of Ezra Stiles,

208 N. AM. REV. 410, 419 (Sept. 1918). Once word

spread that the British had not shot anyone, the

assembled militias dispersed and returned to their

homes.

In November, General Gage wrote his superior in

London, explaining his “order to the Storekeeper not

to deliver out any Powder from the Magazine, where

the Merchants deposite it, which I judged a very

necessary and prudent measure in the present

circumstances, as well as removing the Ammunition

from the Provincial Arsenal at Cambridge.” Letter

from Thomas Gage to Earl of Dartmouth (Nov. 2,

1774), in 1 AMERICAN ARCHIVES, at 951.

9

B. Great Britain banned the import of arms.

King George’s government already favored the

same policy. On October 19, 1774, King George issued

an order-in-council prohibiting the importation of

arms and ammunition into America. 5 ACTS OF THE

PRIVY COUNCIL OF ENGLAND, COLONIAL SERIES, A.D.

1766–1783, at 401 (James Munro & Almeric Fitzroy

eds., 1912). Secretary of State Lord Dartmouth sent a

letter that day “to the Governors in America,”

announcing “His Majesty’s Command that [the

governors] do take the most effectual measures for

arresting, detaining and securing any Gunpowder, or

any sort of arms or ammunition, which may be

attempted to be imported into the Province under

your Government.” Letter from Earl of Dartmouth to

the Governors in America (Oct. 19, 1774), in 8

DOCUMENTS RELATIVE TO THE COLONIAL HISTORY OF

THE STATE OF NEW YORK 509 (1857). The embargo

proclamation was initially for six months, but was

“repeatedly renewed, remaining in effect until the

Anglo-American peace treaty in 1783.” David Kopel,

How the British Gun Control Program Precipitated the

American Revolution, 6 CHARLESTON L. REV. 283, 297

(2012).

The king’s “proclamation, it is said, was

occasioned by intelligence received from Sheffield and

Birmingham of amazing quantities of fire arms, &c.

being nearly ready to be sent to America.”

CONNECTICUT JOURNAL, Dec. 28, 1774, at 1.

The embargo was swiftly enforced. In October

1774, an armed British cutter near Amsterdam

blockaded a Rhode Island vessel that “had been sent

expressly to load different sorts of firearms, and had

10

already taken on board forty small pieces of cannon.”

Daniel Miller, SIR JOSEPH YORKE AND ANGLO-DUTCH

RELATIONS 1774–1780, at 39 (1970). Then, “Two

vessels, laden with gun-powder and other military

utensils, bound for the other side of the Atlantick,

were stopped at Gravesend … by the out clearers, in

consequence of the King’s proclamation.” PA.

GAZETTE, Dec. 21, 1774, at 2.

The British deployed “several capital ships of war,

and six cutters” in the Atlantic “to obstruct the

American trade, and prevent all European goods from

going there, particularly arms and ammunition.” 1

Frank Moore, DIARY OF THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION

61 (1860) (entry of Apr. 4, 1775). A December 26, 1774,

letter from Bristol, England, observed “several

frigates to be fitted out immediately to sail for

America, to be stationed there in order to cruise along

the coasts, to prevent any ammunition or arms being

sent to the Americans by any foreign power.” Stephen

Halbrook, THE FOUNDERS’ SECOND AMENDMENT:

ORIGINS OF THE RIGHT TO KEEP AND BEAR ARMS 64

(2008); see also PROVIDENCE GAZETTE, Jan. 14, 1775,

reprinted in 1 NAVAL DOCUMENTS OF THE AMERICAN

REVOLUTION 62 (William Bell Clark ed., 1964)

(“Orders have been given for the seizing every Ship, of

what Nation soever, employed in conveying Arms or

Ammunition to the Americans.”).

Additionally, “[s]tocks of powder and arms in the

possession of merchants were forcibly purchased by

the Crown.” David Hackett Fischer, PAUL REVERE’S

RIDE 50 (1994).

11

C. Americans viewed arms commerce

restrictions as an effort to enslave them.

Defying a ban on public meetings, residents of

Suffolk County (including Boston) convened in

September 1774 and adopted the Suffolk Resolves.

The Resolves expressed that General Gage’s “hostile

intention” was demonstrated when “in a very

extraordinary

manner”

he

confiscated

the

Charlestown powder, and forbade “the keeper of the

magazine at Boston to deliver out to the owners the

powder which they had lodged in said magazine.” THE

JOURNALS OF EACH PROVINCIAL CONGRESS OF

MASSACHUSETTS IN 1774 AND 1775 AND OF THE

COMMITTEE OF SAFETY 603 (William Lincoln ed.,

1838).

The Suffolk Resolves “were sent express to [the

Continental] Congress by Paul Revere,” and the

Congress unanimously denounced “these wicked

ministerial measures.” 1 JOURNALS OF THE

CONTINENTAL CONGRESS 39 & 39 n.1 (1904). The

Suffolk Resolves were reprinted verbatim in the

Journals of the Continental Congress, and the

Congress had the Resolves disseminated in

newspapers throughout America. Id. at 40. The

Massachusetts Provincial Congress—also meeting in

defiance of Gage—twice condemned him for

“unlawfully seizing and retaining large quantities of

ammunition.” JOURNALS OF EACH PROVINCIAL

CONGRESS, at 31 (Oct. 25, 1774), 47 (Oct. 29, 1774).

“A Watchman,” writing in the New Hampshire

Gazette, called the arms embargo a violation of the

right to self-defense. A Watchman, To the Inhabitants

of British America (Dec. 24, 1774), in 1 AMERICAN

12

ARCHIVES, at 1063–65. He asserted, “when we are by

an arbitrary decree prohibited the having Arms and

Ammunition by importation … the law of selfpreservation” includes “a right to seize upon those

within our power, in order to defend the liberties

which God and nature have given to us.” Id. at 1065.

A Watchman reminded readers that the

Carthaginians’ “surrender of Arms” to the Romans

“proved the destruction of that City.” Id. at 1064.

After a British seizure of imported arms in New

York, a handbill “secretly conveyed into almost every

house in town” asked, “when Slavery is clanking her

infernal chains, … will you supinely fold your arms,

and calmly see your weapons of defence torn from

you?” 1 AMERICAN ARCHIVES, at 1071.

South Carolina’s legislature, now operating

independently of British control as the General

Committee, declared: “by the late prohibition of

exporting arms and ammunition from England, it too

clearly appears a design of disarming the people of

America, in order the more speedily to dragoon and

enslave them.” 1 John Drayton, MEMOIRS OF THE

AMERICAN REVOLUTION 166 (1821).

D. Americans used force to thwart the

restrictions.

Americans emptied their own powder houses

before the British could. For example, Abigail Adams

wrote on September 17, 1774, that about 200 patriots

had seized gunpowder from the powder house in

Braintree, Massachusetts, “in consequence of the

powders being taken from Charlstown.” THE BOOK OF

ABIGAIL & JOHN: SELECTED LETTERS OF THE ADAMS

13

FAMILY 1762–1784, at 72 (L.H. Butterfield et al. eds.,

2002). Knowing Mrs. Adams to be a patriot, the men

offered her gunpowder on their way past the Adams

farm. Id.

Americans also recaptured arms the British had

confiscated. After learning that a New Hampshire fort

contained seized arms, around 400 patriots “attacked,

overpowered, wounded and confined the captain, and

thence took away all the King’s powder.” Letter from

Gov. Wentworth to Gov. Gage (Dec. 14, 1774), in 18

PARLIAMENTARY HISTORY OF ENGLAND, FROM THE

EARLIEST PERIOD TO THE YEAR 1803, at 146–47 (1813).

The patriots captured “upwards of 100 barrels of

powder, 1500 stand of small arms, and several pieces

of light cannon.” Letter from Hugh Percy to Grey

Cooper, in LETTERS OF HUGH EARL PERCY FROM

BOSTON AND NEW YORK, 1774–1776, at 46 (Charles

Bolton ed., 1902).

New Hampshire’s royal governor, John

Wentworth, understood that “this mischief originates

from the … order … prohibiting the exportation of

military stores from Great Britain.” Letter from

Wentworth to Gage, at 146. He bemoaned “the

imbecility of this government to carry into execution

his Majesty’s order in council, for seizing and

detaining arms and ammunition imported into this

province, without some strong ship in this harbour.”

Id. at 145.

Similarly, “[i]n May, 1775, the ‘Liberty Boys’ in

Savannah, Georgia, seized 600 pounds [of gunpowder]

stored in the magazine of that town, and, July 10, one

of the king’s ships was boarded and something like

12,700 pounds were carried away.” O.W. Stephenson,

14

The Supply of Gunpowder in 1776, 30 AM. HIST. REV.

271, 272 (1925).

E. Americans smuggled arms imports.

The Continental Congress established secret

committees and agents to procure arms from overseas.

Miller, YORKE AND ANGLO-DUTCH RELATIONS, at 42–

43. Benjamin Franklin masterminded smuggling

arms from the Spanish, French, and Dutch. Robert

Richmond, POWDER ALARM 95 (1971). The Continental

Congress’s agents “made contracts which totaled

about $2,000,000.00.” Miller, YORKE AND ANGLODUTCH RELATIONS, at 43. “From May to June alone, in

1775, the Pennsylvania Committee spent £20,300

(plus £4,000 for freight) to procure arms, ammunition,

and medicine from Europe[.]” David Salay, The

Production of Gunpowder in Pennsylvania During the

American Revolution, 99 PENN. MAG. HIST. &

BIOGRAPHY 422, 423 (Oct. 1975).

The Virginia Gazette in April 1775 published a

report from London that “six large ships sailed lately,

three from Holland, and the rest from France, with

arms, ammunition, and other implements of war, for

our colonies, and more are absolutely preparing for

the same place.” VA. GAZETTE, Apr. 22, 1775, at 1. In

May 1776, “eighteen Dutch ships … left Amsterdam

… with powder and ammunition for America,” in

addition to “powder shipments disguised as tea

chests, rice barrels, et cetera.” Miller, YORKE AND

ANGLO-DUTCH RELATIONS, at 41. The French covertly

increased gunpowder exports to America in the face of

the British blockade. See Stephenson, The Supply of

Gunpowder, at 279–80.

15

F. Americans encouraged domestic arms

manufacture and commerce.

Besides stepping up imports, Americans

encouraged domestic production and commerce in

arms and ammunition. Paul Revere, in August 1774,

“engraved a plate diagramming how to refine

saltpeter, an essential component in the making of

gunpowder,” and had his instructions published in the

Royal American Magazine. Halbrook, FOUNDERS’

SECOND AMENDMENT, at 33. “Saltpeter recipes …

appeared in American newspapers and pamphlets[.]”

Rick Atkinson, THE BRITISH ARE COMING 127–28

(2019). Pennsylvania’s Committee of Safety initiated

a program to “instruct the inhabitants of the different

Counties in the manufactory of Salt Petre”; the

Committee’s handbills were “printed & distributed in

the English & German Languages, setting forth the

process for extracting and refining Salt Petre.” Report

of the Pennsylvania Committee of Safety (Jan. 3,

1776), in 10 MINUTES OF THE PROVINCIAL CONGRESS

OF PENNSYLVANIA, FROM THE ORGANIZATION TO THE

TERMINATION OF THE PROPRIETARY GOVERNMENT 443

(1852). “A number of [Pennsylvania] counties

responded by establishing model works and providing

demonstrations.”

Salay,

The

Production

of

Gunpowder, at 427. And on March 14, 1776, New

York’s Provincial Congress printed 3,000 copies of

Henry Wisner’s forty-page Essays Upon the Making of

Salt-Petre and GunPowder. NEW YORK IN THE

REVOLUTION AS COLONY AND STATE SUPPLEMENT 58

(Frederic Mather ed., 1901); see also CATALOGUE OF

MANUSCRIPTS AND RELICS IN WASHINGTON’S HEADQUARTERS, NEWBURGH, N.Y. 55 (E.M. Ruttenber ed.,

16

1890) (listing “Essays upon the making of Salt-Petre

and Gun-Powder Published by order of the Committee

of Safety of the Colony of New York” among the

literature present in Washington’s headquarters).

“Printing presses throughout the colonies worked

overtime, making and distributing broadsides and

pamphlets

with

explicit

instructions

for

manufacturing gunpowder and locating and

preparing the ingredients.” M.L. Brown, FIREARMS IN

COLONIAL AMERICA 301 (1980).

The patriot governments likewise encouraged

domestic production and sale of firearms.

Connecticut’s General Assembly, Maryland’s Council

of Safety, Massachusetts’s House of Representatives,

Massachusetts’s

Provincial

Congress,

New

Hampshire’s House of Representatives, New York’s

Provincial Congress, North Carolina’s Provincial

Congress, Pennsylvania’s Committee of Safety, and

South Carolina’s Provincial Congress all solicited

arms manufactured and sold by private citizens

throughout the war, guaranteeing money and often

militia exemptions for anyone willing to provide them

arms. Greenlee, American Tradition of Self-Made

Arms, at 54–61. As British Lieutenant Frederick

MacKenzie recorded in his diary: “Arms of all kinds

are so much sought after by the Country people, that

they use every means of procuring them.” Frederick

MacKenzie, A BRITISH FUSILIER IN REVOLUTIONARY

BOSTON:

DIARY

OF

LIEUTENANT

FREDERICK

MACKENZIE, at 39–40 (Allen French ed., 1926).

Of the roughly 300,000 long guns used by

American line troops in the Revolutionary War,

America’s gunsmiths manufactured over 80,000,

17

often by repairing and combining mixed parts from

damaged firearms. See George Neumann, American

Made Muskets in the Revolutionary War, AM.

RIFLEMAN, Mar. 29, 2010.3

The Revolutionary War had almost begun with

the erroneous September 1774 Powder Alarm reports

that Governor Gage’s redcoats had shot people when

seizing gunpowder. And the “War almost began in

Virginia in April 1775 when Governor Dunmore

ordered the Royal Marines to remove the colony

gunpowder supply from the magazine” in

Williamsburg. Brown, FIREARMS IN COLONIAL

AMERICA, at 298. Upon learning of the nonviolent

seizure, the Virginia militia assembled to fight, but

Governor Dunmore “placated the irate populace by

making immediate restitution for the powder.” Id.

The War did begin on April 19, 1775, at Lexington

and Concord, Massachusetts, when Governor Gage,

ruling Boston under martial law, dispatched his army

to Concord to “seize and destroy all artillery,

ammunition, provisions, tents, small arms, and all

military stores whatever.” Letter from Gov. Gage to

Lieut. Col. Smith (Apr. 18, 1775), in Arthur

Tourtellot, LEXINGTON AND CONCORD: THE BEGINNING

OF THE WAR OF THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION 103

(1959). This time, the Americans were forewarned

and forearmed.

At the Lexington Green and the Concord Bridge,

the British demonstrated that they were willing to

3 https://www.americanrifleman.org/content/americanmade-muskets-in-the-revolutionary-war/ (last visited Mar. 25,

2026).

18

kill Americans to take their arms. Coercive

disarmament initiated the war. See Kopel, How the

British Gun Control Program Precipitated the

American Revolution, at 308–12.

During the War, both sides agreed that the

suppression of arms commerce and the disarmament

of the Americans was the sine qua non of what the

Americans called the British plan to “enslave” them.

See Greenlee, American Tradition of Self-Made Arms,

at 48–62.

To the Americans, being “enslaved” included

being under the absolute will of another, as they

would be if they could not defend themselves. Instead

of saying “enslave,” the British called their objective

“due subordination,” but it meant the same thing. It

depended on terminating arms commerce in the

colonies. A 1777 British plan for what to do with

America after winning the war urged:

The Militia Laws should be repealed and none

suffered to be re-enacted, [and] the Arms of all

the People should be taken away … nor

should any Foundery or manufactuary of

Arms, Gunpowder, or Warlike Stores, be ever

suffered in America, nor should any

Gunpowder, Lead, Arms or Ordnance be

imported into it without Licence.

William Knox, Considerations on the Great Question,

What Is Fit to be Done with America (1777), in 1

SOURCES OF AMERICAN INDEPENDENCE: MANUSCRIPTS

FROM THE COLLECTIONS OF THE WILLIAM L. CLEMENTS

LIBRARY 176 (Howard Peckham ed., 1978).

19

The Bill of Rights protects against abuses that the

Founders never suffered and could not foresee, such

as warrantless thermal imaging of homes. See, e.g.,

Kyllo v. United States, 533 U.S. 27 (2001). The Bill of

Rights also protects against the abuses the Founders

did suffer—including obstructions to firearms

commerce. As Thomas Jefferson, when serving as

America’s first Secretary of State, wrote to the British

Ambassador: “Our citizens have always been free to

make, vend, and export arms. It is the constant

occupation and livelihood of some of them.” Letter

from Thomas Jefferson to George Hammond (May 15,

1793), in 7 THE WRITINGS OF THOMAS JEFFERSON 326

(Paul Ford ed., 1904).

The Founding generation thus understood that

suppressing arms commerce was a means of

disarmament. That same strategy has reemerged in

modern form—not through royal decrees, but through

coordinated litigation designed to achieve indirectly

restrictions on firearms possession that could not be

imposed directly.

II.

Abusive

litigation

targeting

commerce precipitated PLCAA.

arms

The strategy of suppressing arms commerce as a

means of disarmament did not end with the

Revolutionary War. In the late twentieth century, it

reemerged through coordinated litigation campaigns

designed to seize control of—and ultimately

eliminate—the firearms industry. Congress enacted

PLCAA to prohibit such an effort.

20

A. Coordinated, meritless litigation against

firearms manufacturers threatened to

bankrupt the industry.

Frustrated

by

insufficient

progress

in

legislatures, gun control advocates in the 1980s

brought product liability suits against firearms

manufacturers and retailers. See David Kopel &

Richard Gardiner, The Sullivan Principles: Protecting

the Second Amendment from Civil Abuse, 19 SETON

HALL LEGIS. J. 737, 750 n.43 (1995) (listing 26 cases

from 1983 to 1990, plus one from 1973). The cases

involved many novel theories. For example, guns wellsuited for self-defense were said to be “defective”

because criminals also used them. The mere

manufacture of a handgun was alleged to be

“ultrahazardous activity” like blasting with dynamite.

As one court observed, “the plaintiff’s attorneys

simply want[ed] to eliminate handguns.” Patterson v.

Rohm Gesellschaft, 608 F. Supp. 1206, 1212 (N.D. Tex.

1985). Although plaintiffs prevailed only once,4 every

case generated attorney fees and a threat of financial

doom for the manufacturers and retailers.

In the 1990s, suits against firearms businesses

were based on even more inventive grounds: public

nuisance, recovery of government medical expenses

for crime victims, unfair trade practices, deceptive

advertising, and so on. Starting in 1998, a coordinated

series of such lawsuits was filed by dozens of local

governments. Secretary of Housing and Urban

4 Kelley v. R.G. Indus., Inc., 304 Md. 124 (1985). The novel

legal theory was later overturned by statute. 1988 Md. Laws

3489–90.

21

Development Andrew Cuomo organized federally

funded housing authorities to bring additional suits.

The HUD Gun Suit, WASH. POST, Dec. 17, 1999. Filed

in as many jurisdictions as possible and designed to

resist consolidation, these suits were organized to

destroy, even if they could never win a verdict.

Secretary Cuomo thus threatened manufacturers

with “death by a thousand cuts.” Walter Olson,

Plaintiffs Lawyers Take Aim at Democracy, WALL ST.

J., Mar. 21, 2000.

The lawsuits aimed to bankrupt firearms

manufacturers. Bridgeport, Connecticut, mayor

Joseph Ganim described his lawsuit as “creating law

with litigation.” Fred Musante, After Tobacco,

Handgun Lawsuits, N.Y. TIMES, Jan. 31, 1999.5 “The

Bridgeport suit named 12 American firearms

manufacturers, three handgun trade associations,

and a dozen southwestern Connecticut gun dealers,

and asked for damages in excess of $100 million.” Id.

(quotation marks omitted).

“If twenty cities” bring such suits, a reporter

noted, “defending against them, according to some

estimates, could cost the gun manufacturers as much

as a million dollars a day.” Peter Boyer, Big Guns,

NEW YORKER, May 17, 1999.6 Plaintiffs’ attorney John

Coale thus aimed for “critical mass … where the costs

alone of defending these suits are going to eat up the

gun companies.” Fox Butterfield, Lawsuits Lead Gun

5 https://www.nytimes.com/1999/01/31/nyregion/after-

tobacco-handgun-lawsuits.html.

6 https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/1999/05/17/big-

guns.

22

Maker To File for Bankruptcy, N.Y. TIMES, June 24,

1999.7 The plaintiffs did not need to win their cases to

accomplish their goals, because as Coale boasted, “the

legal fees alone are enough to bankrupt the

industry[.]” Sharon Walsh, Gun Industry Views Pact

as Threat to Its Unity, WASH. POST, Mar. 18, 2000.8

Some manufacturers indeed went bankrupt,

including Sundance Industries, Lorcin Engineering,

and Davis Industries. Paul Barrett, Lawsuits Trigger

Gun Firms’ Bankruptcy, WALL ST. J., Sept. 13, 1999.

Davis Industries was “one of the 10 largest makers of

handguns.” Butterfield, supra.

The most venerable manufacturers were driven to

the brink. Colt’s Manufacturing Company stopped

producing handguns for the public. Facing “28

lawsuits from cities and counties hoping to punish gun

makers…. the company could no longer get loans to

finance manufacturing because the lawsuits ‘could be

worth zero, or a trillion dollars.’” Mike Allen, Colt’s to

Curtail Sale of Handguns, N.Y. TIMES, Oct. 11, 1999.9

Then-owned by a British conglomerate, Smith &

Wesson (S&W) was ordered to accept Cuomo’s

demands in exchange for immunity from some of the

7 https://www.nytimes.com/1999/06/24/us/lawsuits-leadgun-maker-to-file-for-bankruptcy.html#:~:text=''If%20New%20

York%20comes%20into,other%20cities%20that%20have%20sue

d.

8 https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/2000/03/

18/gun-industry-views-pact-as-threat-to-its-unity/b18b920fafdf-44d1-a252-68b12863a032/.

9 https://www.nytimes.com/1999/10/11/nyregion/colt-s-tocurtail-sale-of-handguns.html.

23

litigation. See Agreement Between Smith & Wesson

and the Departments of the Treasury and Housing and

Urban Development, Local Governments and States,

U.S. DEPARTMENT OF HOUSING AND DEVELOPMENT,

archived Dec. 13, 2009 (summary).10 S&W was

ordered to “not sell large capacity magazines or

semiautomatic assault weapons,” restrict “[m]ultiple

handgun sales,” add “[s]econd ‘hidden’ serial

numbers” on handguns, impose extra restrictions to

prevent “straw purchasers,” and develop “Smart Gun”

technology. Id. Additionally, the company’s practices

would be perpetually controlled by a five-member

Oversight Commission. Id. The cities, counties, and

states that joined the litigation would select three

members, while those that had declined to sue were

excluded. The ATF would select one member, leaving

gun manufacturers with only one member of their

own. Id.; Walter Olson, THE RULE OF LAWYERS 125–26

(2003). In effect, corporate control would be removed

from the stockholders and given to the new gun

control committee.

“Smith & Wesson made it clear … that the

company was driven to the agreement by the lawsuits.

The settlement would ensure ‘the viability of Smith &

Wesson as an ongoing business entity in the face of

the crippling cost of litigation,’ the company said in a

statement.” Jonathan Weisman, Gun maker, U.S.

reach agreement, BALT. SUN, Mar. 18, 2000.

“[T]he litigants vowed to press on until all the

manufacturers joined”—indeed, “to get more

aggressive.” Id. Alex Panelas, mayor of Miami-Dade

10 https://archives.hud.gov/news/2000/gunagree.html.

24

County, Florida, warned that the S&W deal would be

“‘a floor, not a ceiling’ for any other gun maker that

wants to sign on.” Id.

No other company joined. Glock came closest. As

it wavered, New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer

warned a Glock executive: “if you do not sign, your

bankruptcy lawyers will be knocking at your door.”

146 CONG. REC. No. 45, H2017 (Apr. 11, 2000). Spitzer

and Connecticut Attorney

General

Richard

Blumenthal announced they would sue other

manufacturers for shunning S&W—for instance, by

no longer sharing joint legal defense with S&W.

Walter Olson, THE RULE OF LAWYERS 127 (2003). This

would have been “the first antitrust action in history

aimed at punishing smaller companies for not

cooperating with the largest company in the market

in an agreement restraining trade.” Id. Blumenthal

had no evidence of illegal behavior; “the point was

sheer intimidation.” Id.

Ultimately, the S&W consent decree never went

into force. But the lawsuits against the companies

continued. Although most cases were eventually

dismissed, litigation costs mounted ever higher.

B. Congress passed PLCAA to halt the

abusive lawsuits.

Representative Cliff Stearns (R-Fla.) denounced

“the government lawyers and private lawyers

conspiring, conspiring to coerce private industry into

adopting public policy changes through the threat of

abusive litigation. The option? Adopt our proposals or

you will go bankrupt.” 146 CONG. REC., at H2017.

Stearns thus cosponsored PLCAA to protect the

25

firearms industry from abusive litigation. Pub. L. No.

109-92, 119 Stat. 2095 (2005) (codified at 15 U.S.C.

§§7901–03).

According to another PLCAA cosponsor, Senator

Max Baucus (D-Mont.), PLCAA was “intended to

protect law-abiding members of the firearms

industry” from suits “that are only intended to

regulate the industry or harass the industry or put it

out of business.” 151 CONG. REC. No. 104, S9107 (July

27, 2005). Senator Thomas Coburn (R-Okla.) called

PLCAA necessary “to put a stop to the unmeritorious

litigation that threatens to bankrupt a vital industry

in this country.” Id. at S9059. The suits, he

recognized, were designed “to constrict the right to

bear arms and attack the Bill of Rights and attack the

Constitution.” Id.

Senator Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.) acknowledged that

“the ultimate goal of these suits” was “the elimination

of th[e] arms industry,” and noted that by the time

PLCAA was enacted in 2005, “33 State legislatures

have acted to block similar lawsuits…. However, it

only takes one lawsuit in one State to bankrupt the

entire industry, making all those State laws

inconsequential. That is why it is essential that we

pass Federal legislation.” Id. at S9063.

The attempt to bankrupt the gun industry via

litigation had—and continues to have—national

security implications. The Department of Defense

“strongly support[ed]” PLCAA to “safeguard our

national security by limiting unnecessary lawsuits

against an industry that plays a critical role in

meeting the procurement needs of our men and

26

women in uniform.” 151 CONG. REC., at S9395 (July

29, 2005).

The bipartisan, filibuster-proof majority that

enacted PLCAA found that imposing liability on the

firearms industry for third-party crimes violates the

Second Amendment and “the rights, privileges, and

immunities guaranteed” by the Fourteenth

Amendment. 15 U.S.C. §7901(a)(6), (7).

PLCAA also protects the legislative branch,

because “The liability actions … attempt to use the

judicial branch to circumvent the Legislative branch

of government … thereby threatening the Separation

of Powers doctrine.” Id. §7901(a)(8). “Put differently,

PLCAA reflects Congress’s view that the democratic

process, not litigation, should set the terms of gun

control.” Smith & Wesson Brands, Inc. v. Estados

Unidos Mexicanos, 605 U.S. 280, 301 (2025) (Jackson,

J., concurring); see also Glenn Reynolds, Permissible

Negligence and Campaigns to Suppress Rights, 68

FLA. L. REV. FORUM 51, 57 (2016).

In sum, Congress determined that federal

legislation was required to protect lawful commerce,

the firearms industry, constitutional rights, the

separation of powers, and national security. The

decision below disregards that determination and

allows states to nullify Congress’s judgment by

repackaging prohibited claims under novel state-law

theories.

27

III. The question presented is ripe and will not

benefit from further percolation.

This case warrants review. The issue is not new.

Congress already addressed it by enacting PLCAA “to

halt a flurry of lawsuits attempting to make gun

manufacturers pay for the downstream harms

resulting from misuse of their products.” Smith &

Wesson Brands, Inc., 605 U.S. at 298; see also 15

U.S.C. §7901(a)(5), (b)(1). Repackaging barred claims

as “public nuisance” does not alter their substance. It

runs afoul of Congress’s intent to preclude attempts to

evade the statute through novel labels and invites the

very end-run around federal law that Congress acted

to prevent. See id. §7903(5)(A) (defining and

prohibiting “qualified civil liability actions”).

Congress “did not” draft PLCAA in “such a capacious

way” as to allow the predicate exception to “swallow

most of the rule.” Smith & Wesson Brands, Inc., 605

U.S. at 299.

It would be perilous to await further

developments in the lower courts. Allowing a

proliferation of the very lawsuits that PLCAA forbids

would result in “an abuse of the legal system,” “erode[]

the public confidence in our Nation’s laws,”

“threaten[] the diminution of [the Second

Amendment],” and “constitute[] an unreasonable

burden on interstate and foreign commerce.” 15

U.S.C. §7901(a)(6). Such lawsuits are already being

filed in New York, see Pet. Cert. 32–33, and ten other

states have already enacted similar laws to enable

such suits, id. at 4. Because “it only takes one lawsuit

in one State to bankrupt the entire industry,” 151

28

CONG. REC., at S9063 (Sen. Sessions, July 27, 2005),

delay would defeat the statute’s purpose.

PLCAA preserves traditional causes of action for

wrongdoing. 15 U.S.C. §7903(5)(A). But it forbids the

use of tort law to suppress lawful commerce. That

limitation reflects a basic principle: tort law redresses

legally cognizable injury caused by wrongful conduct;

it does not serve as a vehicle for eliminating

disfavored but lawful activity.

In short, the decision below permits the very

litigation campaign Congress enacted PLCAA to stop.

The question presented is settled by statute, the

conflict is immediate, and the consequences of delay

are substantial. This Court should grant certiorari

and reaffirm that states may not evade federal law by

relabeling prohibited claims.

————♦————

CONCLUSION

The petition for a writ of certiorari should be

granted.

Respectfully submitted,

JOSEPH G.S. GREENLEE

Counsel of Record

NRA – INSTITUTE FOR

LEGISLATIVE ACTION

11250 Waples Mill Rd.

Fairfax, VA 22030

(703) 267-1161

jgreenlee@nrahq.org

29

March 30, 2026

DAVID B. KOPEL

INDEPENDENCE INSTITUTE

727 E. 16th Ave.

Denver, CO 80203

(303) 279-6536

david@i2i.org