The Second Amendment does not cover "military-grade weapons," the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 7th Circuit averred last year, when it upheld an AR-15 ban enacted by Cook County, Illinois. The ruling reaffirmed the reasoning of a 2023 decision in which the 7th Circuit distinguished between civilian and military arms, saying the "assault weapons" that Illinois had banned "lie on the military side of that line."
That distinction is misguided and ahistorical, Solicitor General D. John Sauer argues in a brief urging the Supreme Court to reject Cook County's rifle restrictions. "The founders would have been astonished at the claim that legislatures may ban arms in common use if those arms can also be used for military purposes," he writes.
