We got a good reminder of the concept expressed in the headline with DC’s Supreme Court ruling, Bondi v Vanderstok, decided 26 March 2025.  The issue in controversy was whether the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) could lawfully ban kits used to assemble untraceable ghost guns.  The ruling stumbles right out of the gate, basing its decision on the federal Gun Control Act of 1968 (GCA).  According to the Court’s reasoning, the ATF’s ban was not in violation of the GCA (we’ll spare you the protracted legalese of the ruling itself), so they held it to be a proper act of executive rule-making.

But there is a significant problem with this decision:  The Supreme Court used an illegal law, the GCA, as the yardstick against which to measure the propriety of the ATF’s rule.  The proper measuring rod that the justices should have used is the federal constitution’s 2^nd Amendment, not a congressional act that violates it.

The 2^nd Amendment is quite clear, ‘ . . . the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.’  The GCA of 1968, by the standard of the 2^nd Amendment, is unlawful.  Therefore, any regulations that spring from it – like the ghost gun ban in question – are also null and void.

This brings to mind a quote by the well-known 19^th-century Yankee libertarian, Lysander Spooner:  ‘An unconstitutional judicial decision is no more binding than an unconstitutional legislative act’ (Michael Boldin, ‘Lysander Spooner’s Case Against Judicial Supremacy,’ tenthamendmentcenter.com).

What a State or local government does with regard to gun regulation is up to them, in accordance with their respective constitutions, laws, and traditions (the 14^th Amendment does not apply the federal Bill of Rights, including the 2^nd Amendment, to the States, as we have pointed out before).  Whether they want to allow ghost guns is a question for each State and locality to decide for herself.

The problem we often run into, though, is that in those States where a proper understanding of the 2^nd Amendment is prevalent (i.e., it is a prohibition upon the federal government’s restricting of firearm ownership in any way), instead of effective action to nullify unlawful federal restrictions, there is merely a lot despicable grandstanding by State and local officials.  Wyoming is a case-in-point:

‘We don’t like saying we told you so. But sometimes, it’s the only way to break through the noise.

‘In 2022, we warned that Wyoming’s “Second Amendment Protection Act” was nothing more than political theater – a facade meant to fool gun owners into thinking their rights were being defended while the state continued helping the feds enforce unconstitutional gun control.

‘Even some of our allies, like Gun Owners of America, backed it. And that changed everything. They put their very good reputation on the line to support a bill we knew was worthless. We told them not to. We explained in detail why the bill was utterly ineffective. They ignored us.

‘And it cannot be overstated: this bill only passed because GOA supported it. Full stop.

‘Now, three years later, even Gov. Mark Gordon admits we were right.

‘In his March 2025 veto message of a minor improvement to the original law, Gordon wrote:

‘“Since I signed Wyoming’s first Second Amendment Protection Act in 2022… the law has never been utilized. Not once!”

‘Let that sink in.

‘A law passed with fanfare and hailed as a “protection” for the Second Amendment had zero impact for three straight years. Not a single act of federal gun control enforcement was blocked. Not one Wyoming officer was told to stop helping the feds. Nothing changed in practice. Just like we warned.

‘As we said at the time:

‘“Passage of this bill just gives cover to the gun grabbers… they’ve done absolutely nothing but protect the status quo of helping the federal government violate the 2nd Amendment”’ (Michael Boldin, ‘We Warned. They Ignored. Fake 2nd Amendment “Protection” Act Was a Scam,’ tenthamendmentcenter.com).

Thankfully, here in Louisiana, la Nouvelle France, Rep Danny McCormick, his allies in the House and Senate, and Gov Landry all pulled themselves together and gave us a permitless carry law that really did expand the freedom of action of gun owners in Louisiana.  We could use a lot more of that unapologetic, single-minded determination vis-à-vis unlawful federal acts (whether from the federal legislature, executive, or judiciary) by the officers of Louisiana, Wyoming, and every other State in the union.

With the issuing of the Bondi v Vanderstok ruling, we have entered into that time of year when the federal Supreme Court hands down a flurry of rulings.  For too many citizens of the States, whether in the Rocky Mountains or Dixie or etc., what the justices of that court say is taken as the final word on a constitutional matter.  That is terribly unfortunate, for that is not a power granted them by the States.  The States themselves are the final arbiters of constitutional questions.  Thus, whenever a ruling is given from the federal bench, we ought to read it with Mr Spooner’s words in the back of our minds:

‘A judicial decision, as such, has therefore no intrinsic authority at all; its constitutional authority rests wholly upon its being in accordance with the constitution’ (Boldin, ‘Lysander Spooner’s Case’).

‘If a judicial decision contrary to the Constitution were binding simply because it were a judicial decision, the judiciary could constitutionally make themselves absolute sovereigns at once’ (Ibid.).

‘If we take the decision as authority for the meaning of the constitution, all decisions will of necessity be constitutional, and the judges are of course, constitutionally speaking, absolute despots’ (Ibid.).

Final constitutional review of all laws, regulations, etc., in the US by the federal Supreme Court was an usurpation of power by Chief Justice John Marshall in the famous Marbury v Madison decision of 1803.  It is high time that the States revoked that ruling and reasserted their rightful authority as the final arbiters of constitutional questions.  That would make the months from March to June less exciting for federal Supreme Court watchers; but it would make the sessions of the State legislatures, the actions of State executives (governors, lieutenant governors, attorneys general, and so forth and so along), the rulings of State courts, and even the actions of parish/county and city sheriffs much more interesting.