Sklar v. Byrne, 82 C 4287.

• Decision Date: 14 February 1983
• Docket Number: No. 82 C 4287.,82 C 4287.
• Citation: 556 F. Supp. 736
• Parties: Jerome SKLAR, Plaintiff, v. Jane M. BYRNE, individually and as Mayor of the City of Chicago, and Richard J. Brzeczek, individually and as Superintendent of the Chicago Police Department, Defendants.
• Court: U.S. District Court — Northern District of Illinois

556 F. Supp. 736

Jerome SKLAR, Plaintiff, v. Jane M. BYRNE, individually and as Mayor of the City of Chicago, and Richard J. Brzeczek, individually and as Superintendent of the Chicago Police Department, Defendants.

No. 82 C 4287.

United States District Court, N.D. Illinois, E.D.

February 14, 1983.

Kenneth H. Denberg, Siegel, Denberg, Vanasco, Shukovsky, Moses & Schoenstadt, Chicago, Ill., for plaintiff.

Stanley Garber, Corp. Counsel, Chicago, Ill., for defendant.

Memorandum

LEIGHTON, District Judge.

Jerome Sklar has filed a complaint challenging the constitutionality of Chapter 11.1-3 of the Municipal Code of the City of Chicago, which regulates the registration of handguns within the City. The cause is before the court on defendants' motion to dismiss the complaint for failure to state a claim entitling plaintiff to relief. For the following reasons, defendants' motion is granted.

On March 19, 1982, the Chicago City Council passed an ordinance which prohibits the registration of any handgun after April 10, 1982, the effective date of the ordinance, unless it was "validly registered to a current owner in the City of Chicago" before April 10. Municipal Code of the City of Chicago, Chapter 11.1-3(c). During the period between March 19 and April 10, 1982, plaintiff was a resident of Skokie, Illinois. He possessed a valid, current Illinois Firearms Identification Card, owned a handgun, and moved to Chicago on April 15, 1982, after the effective date of the ordinance. Therefore, plaintiff is unable to register the handgun that he owns and, consequently, is unable to bring the gun into the city.

In the preamble of the ordinance, the City Council made six findings necessitating its passage:

The annual sales of firearms in the United States is ever increasing; and Firearms, and especially handguns, play a major role in the commission of homicide, aggravated assaults and armed robbery; and

The improper storage of firearms and ammunition is a major factor in accidental deaths and injury in homes; and The City Council of the City of Chicago has found and determined that the convenient availability of firearms and ammunition has increased the incidence of firearm related deaths and injuries; and The City Council of the City of Chicago has found and determined that it is necessary and desirable to protect the residents of the City of Chicago from the loss of property and injury or death from firearms; and

The City Council of the City of Chicago has found and determined that proper registration of firearms in the community will aid in achieving these goals;

Plaintiff's complaint, brought pursuant to 42 U.S.C. § 1983, and seeking relief under the Declaratory Judgment Act, 28 U.S.C. § 2201, claims that the City Council's passage of the ordinance violates equal protection rights secured plaintiff by the Fourteenth Amendment of the United States Constitution and by Article I, Section 2 of the Illinois Constitution. Accordingly, he urges the court to enjoin defendants from enforcing the ordinance. In essence, plaintiff argues that defendants have violated the Equal Protection Clause because he is unable to register the gun that he owns, while owners of guns who resided in Chicago prior to the effective date of the ordinance had an opportunity to take advantage of the ordinance's registration provisions.

A determination of the proper standard of judicial review is the first task that this court confronts in assessing the constitutionality of this gun registration ordinance. Memorial Hospital v. Maricopa County, 415 U.S. 250, 253, 94 S.Ct. 1076, 1079, 39 L.Ed.2d 306 (1974). Strict scrutiny is appropriate when a legislative classification operates to the peculiar disadvantage of a suspect class or infringes on the exercise of a fundamental right secured by the Constitution. See, e.g., Massachusetts Board of Retirement v. Murgia, 427 U.S. 307, 312, 96 S.Ct. 2562, 2566, 49 L.Ed.2d 520 (1976). But the present case presents neither of the predicates for heightened constitutional scrutiny. Only where a classification involves an inherently invidious distinction like race, religion, or alienage can a legislative body be considered to have discriminated against a suspect class. City of New Orleans v. Dukes, 427 U.S. 297, 303, 96 S.Ct. 2513, 2516, 49 L.Ed.2d 511 (1976). Plaintiff argues that the Supreme Court in cases like Dunn v. Blumstein, 405 U.S. 330, 92 S.Ct. 995, 31 L.Ed.2d 274 (1972), and Shapiro v. Thompson, 394 U.S. 618, 89 S.Ct. 1322, 22 L.Ed.2d 600 (1969), recognized that distinctions based on residency also are inherently suspect and, therefore, deserving of heightened constitutional scrutiny. The cases relied on by plaintiff in support of this proposition are all inapposite, however; the Supreme Court applied strict scrutiny, not because residency distinctions were involved, but because plaintiffs were able to demonstrate that fundamental rights secured them by the United States Constitution were impaired by the legislative distinctions. See 405 U.S. at 338, 92 S.Ct. at 1001. Accordingly, there is no basis for concluding that the City of Chicago's firearms ordinance disadvantages a suspect class.

The Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit, in Quilici v. Village of Morton Grove, 695 F.2d 261 (7th Cir.1982), recently addressed the question whether the right to possess a handgun is a right secured citizens by the Constitution of the United States. There, after an extensive review of pertinent constitutional provisions, and many of the same arguments advanced by plaintiff in this suit, the court concluded that the second, ninth, and fourteenth amendments do not confer on an individual a constitutional right to possess firearms. Quilici, 695 F.2d at 271.¹ Quilici compels this court to conclude that the Chicago firearms ordinance does not infringe on a constitutionally protected right.

Since the Chicago firearms ordinance neither trammels a fundamental personal right nor is drawn upon an inherently suspect distinction, this court must presume the statute's validity and, accordingly, use the rational basis standard of review. See, e.g., City of New Orleans v. Dukes, 427 U.S. 297, 303, 96 S.Ct. 2513, 2516, 49 L.Ed.2d 511 (1976). The ordinance must be sustained if the court concludes that it is rationally related to a legitimate state purpose. Id. The preamble of the ordinance, where the City Council lists considerations necessitating the enactment of the measure, establishes...