

Editor's note: the post originally incorrectly stated that the 26 states filed a lawsuit against the city of San Francisco. They filed an amicus brief in support of a lawsuit against the city of San Francisco. The post has been corrected.

The attorneys general of 26 states filed a federal lawsuit an amicus brief in support of a lawsuit against the City of San Francisco on Thursday reports the Washington Post, opposing the city's law that guns in the home must be either locked up or have a trigger lock.

The brief, submitted by Nebraska's attorney general Jon Bruning and joined by 25 other state attorneys general, challenges the "Safe Storage Law" on the grounds that it prevents gun owners from safely using their weapon in matters of self-defense, thus infringing upon their Second Amendment rights. "Common sense dictates that in high stress, emergency situations, the ease and speed with which a person can utilize one of these mechanisms to unlock a safe drastically decreases," the suit reads. Why did just over half of the United States voice their concerns against a San Francisco city law? As Brad Schimel, attorney general of Wisconsin, said in a statement, the city law "could influence policy decisions and court holdings" at a national level.

"This requirement, in effect, renders it virtually impossible for occupants of a home to protect themselves with a firearm since most people don't have time to unlock and remove their guns from storage during an attack," said Alabama's attorney general, Luther Strange said in a statement. The brief uses the Supreme Court case District of Columbia v. Heller from 2008 to support their argument, saying that case reinforced the notion that the Second Amendment guarantees the right to bear arms for self-defense in the home.

As pointed out by SF Weekly before, Police Code section 4512 is ambiguously worded enough that "locked container" is almost left to the interpretation of the gun owner. When asked if that could include a locked car in someone's garage, a spokesman for the City Attorney's office told SF Weekly, "That's a question that has never come up. At some point, it's an enforcement question." Reassuring!

The full list of states whose attorneys general joined in on the brief are as follows: Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, Texas, Utah, West Virginia, Wisconsin and Wyoming.