Gun Laws
Published December 21, 2015
Editorial by Charlotte Observer, reprinted in The Greenville Daily Reflector, December 20, 2015.
In June 2013, months after the horrific shootings in Newtown, Conn., the town of Highland Park, Ill., passed an ordinance prohibiting the ownership of semi-automatic assault weapons with high-capacity magazines.
Besides reacting to the killing of 26 people at Sandy Hook, the town council was trying to beat the clock on a new state law that would soon block local governments from enacting gun control measures.
The Illinois State Rifle Association and a local resident challenged the law. Twenty-four states would file a supporting brief in the case. But a federal appeals court in Chicago sided with the town, and on Monday the U.S. Supreme Court effectively did too.
It’s far from the first time the Supreme Court has declined to hear a Second Amendment challenge against local and state gun control measures. In June, for example, the court declined to hear a challenge to two San Francisco ordinances challenged by the NRA. As with the Highland Park law, only Justices Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas voted to hear the case.
The court’s non-action in those two cases and others will likely embolden cities and states to pass their own gun-control provisions rather than waiting on a Congress loyal to the NRA to do so. While certain regulations need to be national in scope to be effective, a place-by-place response acknowledges that the gun culture in Miami is different from the one in Cheyenne.
Perhaps Charlotte and other N.C. cities will now consider banning certain weapons? If they do, they’re wasting their time. North Carolina’s Democrat-led legislature passed a so-called preemption law in 1995 preventing it.
“Unless otherwise permitted by statute,” GS 14-409.40(b) reads, “no county or municipality, by ordinance, resolution, or other enactment, shall regulate in any manner the possession, ownership, storage, transfer, sale, purchase, licensing, or registration of firearms, firearms ammunition, components of firearms, dealers in firearms, or dealers in handgun components or parts.”
Well that pretty much covers it, doesn’t it? We’re guessing that this legislature, even with its conservative bent, would not back the conservative idea of pushing control of this issue to the level of government closest to the people.
But it should. Besides furthering local self-governance, lawmakers could do so with the confidence that the basic Second Amendment right the preemption law was designed to protect has been explicitly affirmed by the Supreme Court in 2008 and again in 2010.
Duke Law professor Joseph Blocher pointed out in the New York Times this week that there’s no reason gun restrictions need to be the same in urban areas as in rural ones. Stricter regulation in urban areas makes sense. “This kind of geographic tailoring offers some political and constitutional solutions to the current stalemate,” Blocher writes.
North Carolina’s legislature should consider that, in this case, different approaches in different areas make a lot of sense.
From The Charlotte Observer via The Associated Press.
http://www.reflector.com/opinion/editorials/nc-editorial-gun-laws-3096637
December 21, 2015 at 10:49 am
Norm Kelly says:
Democrats did something RIGHT? I can't believe it! If this hadn't appeared in a 'news' paper, where only truth & full, unbiased stories are ever printed, there is absolutely no way this would be believed. This sounds more like one of those Internet myth stories.
But since it was printed in a 'news' paper, run by liberals, in constant support of liberal pols, it must be true. Is it possible that Democrats, when they ruled Raleigh, passed legislation to SUPPORT the 2nd Amendment? This has got to be a first! Somehow there should be a way to raise a banner above the state capitol, above every Town Hall, and a special banner on the front page of every 'news' paper in the state praising democrats for having done SOMETHING right! When it happens, it's so rare, that we must all acknowledge the miracle. At least this is the right time of year to recognize a miracle.
But, since lib pols passed this initial law protecting citizens' right to own firearms, would it be proper for conservatives/Republicans who ALWAYS support the 2nd Amendment to actually repeal it? Talk about mixed messages. The libs pass a bill to protect the rule of law and Republicans repeal the law allowing the opportunity to create chaos. This would definitely confuse voters. But it would give an inroad to lib pols at the next election.
AAAAHHHH!! There's the reason a normally lib supporting printed media ran this story. It will give their allies in the liberal party an item to run on. They could blast residents with some garbage about demons protecting the 2nd Amendment only to have Republicans trample all over it. They could claim that they are the party to support gun rights. Right up until they took over the majority in the Legislature again and then they would implement their idea of 'support' for the 2nd Amendment. It's likely that if demons take over again, the restrictions they put on gun ownership in NC would make California look like babies! There's not a SINGLE demon pol who supports the 2nd Amendment. To hear that it was actually the demons in Raleigh that passed this protection back in the 90's is mind boggling. To expect liberal pols to maintain their support of 2nd Amendment rights is unbelievable. And I don't. Liberal pols have become even more socialist, more central-planner oriented, more party oriented, more partisan than ever. They have destroyed marriage, they are working on both religious protections and gun rights at the same time. They have virtually eliminated free-speech on college campuses and they are working on destroying free-speech everywhere else. Why would anyone believe that if demons take over Raleigh again they would continue to support 2nd Amendment rights? That's like believing they would cut ANY tax if they took over again. Not gonna happen with taxes, ain't gonna happen with gun rights, marriage protection, religious protections, or free-speech protections. The socialist party is the party of government control, complete & destructive control. Which certainly explains obamacancer! It's hard to imagine anything that intrudes on peoples' lives more than getting between me & my doctor. Which socialized medicine IS! No need to wonder what the definition of 'is' is on this one!
