Blue city mayors, and blue-state governors and legislators, are tossing talk of ramping up radical gun control measures, ostensibly in response to some heinous crimes, but in fact mostly to raise funds and mine rage among the progressive base.
Here where I live in Minnesota, Governor Walz tried to hold a special session of the state legislature to debate gun control measures; the proposal was an embarassing flop for Walz, who is looking for a third term as governor, to try to keep his national ambitions alive (David Strom has a better chance of an extra-base hit against Yoshinobu Yamamoto than Walz has of going to DC for any elective office). Problem is, governors in Minnesota can call special sessions, but they can't set the agenda; that comes from the legislature, whose House is a 67-67 tie between the two parties, meaning nothing gets through without someone defecting.
The Governor is still trying to flog the issue - but it's going nowhere. And if it had, any laws passed would get shot down in Federal, if not state, court.
In the meantime, the mayors of Minneapolis, Saint Paul and leafy suburban Edina are all proposing bans on "assault weapons" and "large capacity magazines" within city limits.
Now, Minnesota has a state pre-emption law - passed to prevent cities from enacting gun control legislation more stringent than state law. Cities in Minnesota can't pass gun control laws above and beyond state law - at most, it's performative virtue-signalling.
And the three mayors just have to be looking at this story and tallying up their cities' "futile legal adventure" budgets.
Because Memphis just tried to pull the same trick - defying the state's pre-emption law to ratchet up rules on law-abiding gun owners:
Memphis proposed 3 specific issues in Referendum Ordinance No. 5908. The first question asked whether Memphis would ban on carrying a gun without a permit or having a gun in a car without a permit in the city of Memphis. The second question asked whether Memphis would adopt an assault weapon ban that would also prohibit the sale of assault rifles in the city unless they were to law enforcement or a government agency. The third question asked whether Memphis should ignore state law by creating a “red flag” procedure in Memphis where courts would be allowed to take someone’s gun away from them if they are found to be a significant danger or extreme risk to themselves or others. According to reports, the vote tabulation in Memphis indicated that all three issues were approved by voters and that these restrictions will go into effect in Memphis on January 1, 2025.
These issues impact not only residents of Memphis but any individual who is in Memphis for any reason.
And Memphis got its nose swatted with a rolled-up legal brief:
The following are two major points outlined in the order:
- The City CONCEDED its ordinance violates state law.
Memphis admitted that every line of its handgun-carry ban, vehicle-storage rule, so-called “assault rifle” ban, and red-flag scheme is 100% illegal under Tenn. Code Ann. § 39-17-1314. (Order pp. 3, 9–11) - The Judge called the ordinance “DEAD AS A DOORNAIL.”
The Chancellor wrote that “The Ordinance and those who proposed it engaged in ‘virtue signaling,’” but “the Ordinance is as dead as a proverbial doornail as a matter of Tennessee law.” (Order p. 6)
Simply put, the Memphis ordinance is entirely unenforceable.
“Memphis may be known as ‘Bluff City,’ but this ridiculous ordinance is a textbook example of a city passing an illegal law just to make a political point. Of course, Memphis was bluffing—and waved the white flag the moment GOA walked into court. The judge simply read their surrender out loud. Litigation like this is critical to defending law-abiding gun owners from reckless and unconstitutional actions by local politicians. Memphis’s deceitful ‘virtue signaling’ endangered residents and visitors alike, exposing them to unlawful prosecution. Such abuses have no place in a constitutional republic.”
Let's see how far pieces of Minneapolis and Saint Paul's proposals splatter when they run into the state's preemption law.
