How A Kid Bringing a Gun to School Led to the Federal Government Losing Power | U.S. v. Lopez

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In episode 72 of Supreme Court Briefs, a kid brings a gun to school, but ends up winning in court.

Produced by Matt Beat and Beat Productions, LLC. All images/video by Matt Beat, found in the public domain, or used under fair use guidelines. Music by Cheel.

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Here's an annotated script with footnotes: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1TNyLHh_nkcgItbzCGuMu3KpXId-igbwN_6L1Oz7r9t4/edit?usp=sharing

Check out cool primary sources here:
https://www.oyez.org/cases/1994/93-1260

Other sources used:
https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/514/549/
https://billofrightsinstitute.org/e-lessons/united-states-v-lopez-1995
https://joshblackman.com/blog/2014/02/25/constitutional-places-united-states-v-lopez/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._Lopez
https://www.thirteen.org/wnet/supremecourt/future/landmark_us.html

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San Antonio, Texas
March 10, 1992

Alfonso Lopez, Jr., a senior at Edison High School, brings a concealed .38 caliber revolver into the school. Although the gun is not loaded, he also brings bullets for it. After receiving an anonymous tip about the gun and bullets, school authorities confront Lopez about it, man. Lopez admitted to having the gun and bullets, but claimed that he brought them to school just to sell to someone. It’s not like he was gonna, ya know, SHOOT anyone at school. Like that ever happens, anyway amirite? But yeah, it didn’t matter that Alfonso just brought the gun and bullets to SELL to someone. It was ILLEGAL to do that, and frankly…terrifying to know a student brought such a dangerous weapon to school. He was charged with breaking a Texas law that banned guns on school property.

However, the next day there was good news and bad news for Lopez. The good news was that the charges against him were dropped. The bad news was that the only reason why the charges were dropped was because now he was charged for breaking a federal law, the Gun Free School Zones Act, a law that made it a federal offense for anyone to bring a gun into a school zone.

In the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Texas, Lopez’s lawyers argued that the Gun Free School Zones Act was actually unconstitutional. According to them, there was nothing in the Constitution about controlling what happened at public schools. Therefore, the Tenth Amendment applied. However, the U.S. District court disagreed, ruling that the Gun Free School Zones Act was a “constitutional exercise of Congress’ well defined power to regulate activities in and affecting commerce, and the ‘business’ of elementary, middle and high schools…affects interstate commerce.” In other words, the U.S. District Court argued that the Commerce Clause of the Constitution gave Congress the power to regulate guns in public schools, and their rationale was that, since guns in schools led to gun violence, people might be reluctant to travel through these areas from other states. The district court added that the disruptions in schools caused by weapons being there resulted in a less educated population, which could negatively affect commerce in the future.

Well, Lopez and his lawyers thought this was quite a reach, to say the least. After Lopez was found guilty and sentenced to six months in prison, followed by two years of probation, he appealed the case to the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, arguing that the Commerce Clause didn’t apply to guns in schools. The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals agreed with Lopez and reversed his conviction. After this, the federal government got the Supreme Court to weigh in.

Видео How A Kid Bringing a Gun to School Led to the Federal Government Losing Power | U.S. v. Lopez канала Mr. Beat