Preemption, a longstanding legal principle wherein state laws can’t be contradicted by localities, is one of the latest practices that gun control groups are targeting. Although the nature of preemption is to allow for consistent expectations across a state—whether in cities or rural areas; or northern, southern, eastern or western parts of a state—the anti-gun crowd says that preemption prevents municipalities governing their jurisdictions.
It seems the anti-gunners keep looking for ways to further infringe on our right to keep and bear arms. If they can’t win at the federal level, they try to make headway at the state level; if they can’t win there, they want to influence cities and towns to enact laws that cut into our firearms freedom.
But the thing is, preemption exists as a way to ensure uniformity of laws within a state. Imagine the chaos if you had to worry about different labor and tax laws every time you crossed from one jurisdiction to another.
NRA-ILA has published an article detailing the importance of maintaining preemption to protect gun owners from “harassment by an unreasonable and confusing patchwork of municipal gun laws.”
