Do Judges NOW Decide Who Is American? "We The People" DISSENT | PART 4

Quick Overview

The majority decision in the current context implicitly suggests that future panels might extend constitutional rights based on panel composition, potentially leading to the granting of constitutional protections to illegal aliens, which the speaker strongly disagrees with based on historical and textual analysis of the Constitution.

Key Points: The majority decision relies heavily on an extraneous statement from Verdugo-Urquidez (a Fourth Amendment case) to conclude that illegal aliens have Second Amendment rights. The speaker argues that the majority's reasoning contradicts the text, history, and tradition that the Supreme Court has instructed lower courts to consider. The text of the Constitution, founding-era history, and Supreme Court precedent all point to 'the people' meaning citizens, not illegal aliens. The Court in Heller clarified that 'the people' unambiguously refers to all members of the political community, which excludes illegal aliens. The majority's reliance on Verdugo-Urquidez is flawed because that case dealt with the Fourth Amendment and explicitly reserved rights to citizens, not aliens. The majority's analysis raises more questions than it answers regarding issues like the duration of presence (e.g., five years) and the weight of factors like having children. The speaker concurs only in the judgment regarding the conviction's consistency with the Second Amendment, explicitly disagreeing with the majority's reasoning on alien rights.

Context: This video segment, labeled 'PART 4,' is part of a detailed legal analysis by Andrew Branca, a SCOTUS Bar Attorney, concerning a judicial opinion (likely related to the Second Amendment rights of illegal aliens, referencing cases like Verdugo-Urquidez and Heller). The attorney is dissecting the majority's reasoning, specifically focusing on how the majority interprets 'the people' in the Constitution and how that interpretation might be extended to non-citizens, which he disputes based on textual and historical evidence.