Just filed before the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals, an amicus brief on behalf of the International Law Enforcement Educators & Trainers Association, Independence Institute, The Heartland Institute, Prof. David Bordua, Prof. William Tonso, and the Law Enforcement Alliance of America.

This is a Brandeis Brief, providing social science evidence showing that guns in the hands of law-abiding people make a substantial contribution to public safety. The brief also explains why civilian handgun ownership helps so much with the training of new police officers. Finally, the brief provides data from Chicago showing that crime in Chicago (particularly, burglary and assault) sky-rocketed after the ban was enacted, and that the percentage of Chicago homicides committed with handguns has nearly doubled.

Because of the word limits in the 7th Circuit, this Brandeis brief is much shorter than the original Brandeis brief, which was 113 pages. But I'm proud that the 2009 brief upholds the freedom-loving spirit of Justice Brandeis, who stated: "We shall have lost something vital and beyond price on the day when the state denies us the right to resort to force." [The Brandeis Guide to the Modern World, ed., Alfred Lief (Boston: Little, Brown & Co., 1941), p. 212.]

A comprehensive set of all the court documents in the Chicago handgun ban cases is available here.