April 7, 2024 — FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
LITTLE ROCK, ARKANSAS — On Monday the Hamilton Lincoln Law Institute (HLLI) asked a federal court to stop the Biden Administration’s new rule that restricts gun sales between private citizens. Representing Phillip Journey, a firearms collector and hobbyist and shooting sports coach and instructor, HLLI joins twenty-one states in challenging the new rule as contrary to statutory authority, unconstitutional, and an arbitrary and capricious exercise of regulatory authority. This rule, Definition of “Engaged in the Business” as a Dealer in Firearms, 89 Fed. Reg. 28,968 (Apr. 19, 2024), unlawfully requires anyone who sells even one firearm for a profit to get a federal firearms license from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF). The case is before the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Arkansas.
The Biden Administration’s new rule extends federal regulation to gun sales that were previously considered lawful and private. Until now, only those who repeatedly purchased and sold firearms as a regular part of their business needed a federal firearms license. After congressional investigations uncovered massive abuse in ATF’s enforcement of firearms laws, Congress passed legislation to protect law-abiding citizens’ purchases of firearms for personal collection. But, under the new rule, ATF arguably requires that anyone selling one firearm, even to a friend or family member, obtain a firearm dealer’s license and, in turn, meet numerous regulatory requirements which include running a background check on every purchaser, or face criminal penalties. The new rule puts innocent firearms sales between law-abiding citizens within the reach of federal authorities, and contains numerous ambiguities that make it nearly impossible for individuals to determine what activities are prohibited.
The state plaintiffs in the case are Kansas, Arkansas, Iowa, Montana, Alabama, Alaska, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Kentucky, Missouri, Nebraska, New Hampshire, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Virginia, West Virginia, and Wyoming. Represented by their respective Attorneys General, they aim to protect their states’ rights and uphold their citizens’ rights to lawfully buy and sell firearms. Collectively, twenty-six states–over half the union–have challenged ATF’s bureaucratic overreach in three separate lawsuits involving the new rule.
The private plaintiffs are Phillip Journey, Allen Black, Donald Maxey, and Chisholm Trail Antique Gun Association. Journey is a firearms collector and hobbyist who buys and sells firearms, including self-defense weapons, for and from his personal collection at gun shows a few times a year. He has collected firearms for over four decades, and his personal collection includes firearms brought to the United States by his grandfather in World War I and his father in World War II, as well as historic firearms designed for and/or used in the Boar War, Korean War, Desert Storm, Desert Shield, and more. Journey does not hold a federal firearms license and is not a firearms dealer; in fact, he is a state court judge in Kansas in Division 1, 18th Judicial District. But, under the ATF’s new rule, Journey, the other private plaintiffs, and all law-abiding citizens arguably would be required to obtain a firearms license to buy and sell even a single firearm–or stop selling firearms at all.
In March 2023, President Biden issued an executive order demanding that Attorney General Merrick Garland clarify who is required to get a federal firearms license. In September of that year, ATF departed from the underlying statute passed by Congress to expand the relevant definition to include individuals who buy and sell firearms once or a few times per year, even as a hobby. Licensed dealers must follow regulatory requirements, including record-keeping for all sales and yearly inspections. Should someone selling firearms fail to follow the new rule, they may be subject to five years in prison, a fine of up to $250,000, or both.
HLLI’s president, Anna St. John, said, “HLLI is proud to represent Judge Journey and join with the Attorneys General of 21 states to protect law-abiding citizens’ rights against the same type of abusive overreach by the ATF that led Congress to limit the agency’s authority decades ago. Our constitutional system doesn’t allow unelected bureaucrats to take away citizens’ rights.”
The name of the case is Kansas, et al. v. Garland et al., 2:24-cv-88 (E.D. Ark.).
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Founded in 2019, Hamilton Lincoln Law Institute is a nonprofit public interest law firm that challenges improper restrictions on speech, administrative and regulatory actions, and abuses of the class action and civil justice system that exceed constitutional limits, promote rent-seeking, or otherwise improperly created deadweight loss.
As a nonprofit, tax-exempt organization as defined by section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code, HLLI relies on support from individuals and foundations that share a commitment to individual liberty, free enterprise, and limited government. To learn more, visit http://hlli.org.
For more information about this case, contact:
Anna St. John, President, (917) 327-2392, anna.stjohn@hlli.org