State firearms preemption laws are critically important to lawful gun owners, that’s why more than 40 states have such laws on the books. In a nutshell, these laws prohibit local jurisdictions from imposing gun control restrictions that are more severe than state law.
That’s critical because if different municipalities had different laws, it would be nearly impossible for law-abiding gun owners to know what was legal as they traveled from city to city. One city might permit concealed carry, while another might not. Likewise, one city might allow open carry, while another might not.
While these laws help protect the rights of gun owners, anti-gun politicians hate such laws. And a current movement in Minnesota by big-city mayors to rescind the state’s preemption law proves just how much they hate not being able to ban guns in their jurisdictions.
According to a report at kare11.com, the mayors of Minnesota’s four largest cities—St. Paul, Minneapolis, Rochester and Bloomington—held a “packed” press conference on October 14 at the state capital and announced that they are all drafting gun control ordinances, despite the state’s strong preemption law that would nullify their ordinances.
At the top of the mayors’ wish list is a so-called “assault weapons” ban, otherwise known as banning popular semi-automatic rifles used by millions of lawful Americans, including Minnesotans, for hunting, sport shooting, self-defense and competition.
“We have asked, and are asking again, for our state to either act and set those things into law statewide, or remove the preemptions that prevent cities from being able to implement these laws ourselves,” Saint Paul Mayor Melvin Carter said at the press conference. “State law preempts us from even enforcing these common-sense laws.”
Carter added that despite the preemption law, the St. Paul city council will introduce an ordinance next week that would implement citywide bans on so-called “assault weapons,” binary triggers, so-called “high-capacity” magazines and ghost guns. The ordinance would also ban firearms in some public spaces like parks, libraries and recreation centers.
Of course, the proposed ordinance is all based on first doing away with the preemption law, since any ordinance passed at this time would automatically preempted. And that’s exactly why Minnesota gun owners must mobilize to keep the preemption law in place.
Imagine St. Paul passing a law banning semi-auto rifles and normal capacity magazines and Minneapolis not doing so. A person from Minneapolis through St. Paul to shoot at a nearby range would be an instant criminal due to the difference in local regulations.
Minnesota’s firearms preemption law states: “The legislature preempts all authority of a home rule charter or statutory city including a city of the first class, county, town, municipal corporation, or other governmental subdivision, or any of their instrumentalities, to regulate firearms, ammunition, or their respective components to the complete exclusion of any order, ordinance or regulation by them except that: (a) a governmental subdivision may regulate the discharge of firearms; and (b) a governmental subdivision may adopt regulations identical to state law. Local regulation inconsistent with this section is void.”
Ultimately, keeping that law intact is all that stands between many Minnesota gun owners, mass confusion, and possibly prosecution for city ordinances they might not even know about. Let’s hope Republicans in the state legislature fight this proposal and keep the law on the books.