Some places are mandating gun ownership
This might be largely for show since these laws do really force people to buy a gun, but it tells potential criminals something about the mindset of the town. Tomas Philipson and Richard Posner at the University of Chicago have a paper some years ago that looked at Kennesaw, Ga and found a reduction in crime from these laws. From US News:
. . . An individual's freedom to decide whether or not to buy a gun, however, may soon be taken from residents of small towns in Maine, Georgia, and Utah.
In Nelson, Ga., city officials are mulling a proposal to mandate that its citizens take up arms for personal protection. Nelson, with a population of around 1,000 people, has just one police officer, WSB-TV reports, who patrols for eight hours a day.
"When he's not here we rely on county sheriffs—however it takes a while for them to get here," Nelson City Councilman Duane Cronic explained to the WSB. . . .
A vote on the Nelson measure is scheduled for April 1. . . .
Hundreds of miles away, a 145-person Maine town called Byron is considering a similar proposal.
The Lewiston-Auburn Sun Journal reports that all three selectmen on the town's governing body support a proposal to making owning a gun required. . . .
Spring City, Utah, is also mulling a measure that would turn the right to bear arms into a duty. In the 1,000-person town there's a debate brewing between a resolution encouraging gun ownership and an ordinance writing the encouragement into law. . . . .
Labels: GunControl, Kennesaw
posted by John Lott at 2:24 AM
5 Comments:
Mr. Lott,
Let me make a modest proposal.
Today the laws in most states require that citizens be unarmed in public unless they have a state-issued permit.
What if, instead, the law required that all citizens be armed in public, unless they possessed a state-issued permit to be unarmed?
How would that change society? How would the mindset of citizens change if this was required?
Hmmmmmm, history really does repeat itself. In 18th century America, citizens were bound by law to be not only armed, but to have minimum shot and powder on hand too.
God bless these town folks! I'm going to move soon from the Democrat controlled S.E. portion of Florida to a northern rural area with sane people in local government. The Sheriff in my new home has publicly stated that the Feds had better keep their slimy hands off his peoples weapons. I, personally, like that. I'm getting old - and you know what? I'm dying sometime soon anyway, I'll be Godamned if I'll die disarmed.
You know I've heard it said that the Sheriff's who want to "nulify" any federal gun laws in their little corner of the world are sometimes actually not in line with the "law of the land", and that perhaps what they are doing "really" will be unlawful. If there are x number of people in a rural county and they are all on the same page vis-a-vis guns, who cares what some law school professor thinks thousands of mile away?
Funny that you should mention Sheriff's who want to nullify Federal Law, Blaine.
AS a matter of fact, under U.S. / English common Law, the Sheriff is the final arbiter of who, and who cannot enforce laws within his or her jursidiction. To wit; Federal Law Enforcement cannot do a darn thing if the Sherriff forbids it.
This has happened at least once that I am aware of.
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