Lawsuit to legalize buying guns across state lines

I’m happy buying guns in my own State, but I see the logic of this lawsuit:

SHERMAN, TX — As of today, if you live in Oklahoma and you see a good deal on a handgun in Texas — you aren’t allowed to buy it.

You can currently buy rifles, shotguns and other long guns anywhere, but federal law prohibits selling handguns to anyone who doesn’t live in your state, but that could be changing.

Red River Firearms in Sherman sells just about every kind of gun you could want — and owner Jason Webb — is a stickler when it comes to identification.

“Not just somebody can come in and say yes, my name is John Smith and I live over here,” Webb said.

He said he’s thorough when it comes to checking id’s because he faces harsh penalties if he sells handguns to the wrong person, and in this case, the wrong person is anyone who is not a Texan.

“You can’t sell the firearm by federal regulation until they change their drivers license to residency of Texas,” Webb said.

An Arlington gun store owner aims to change the law, filing a lawsuit Tuesday in federal court, saying the law costs him business, handguns are quintessential for self defense, and that states, not the federal government, should decide who can buy handguns.

You don’t have to go far to find people who agree.

“It shouldn’t matter where he gets it,” gun owner Melissa Norris said. “As long as he gets in properly. Does the background check, goes through all the loops and gets it.”

The Citizens Committee for the Right to Bear Arms is also a plaintiff in the lawsuit saying the law has “…has outlived its usefulness. If a law-abiding citizen can clear a background check and legally purchase a handgun in his own state, he would pass the same background check just across the border in another state.”

But Webb worries if the federal law is changed, it could be difficult for store owners like him, because they would be responsible for knowing the law on handguns in every state, with states like California and Illinois only permitting some handguns.

“I think it would open up liability on who you sell to, due to the fact that there’s a lot of state laws that are regulatory on hand guns,” Webb said.

United States Attorney General Eric Holder has not yet responded to the lawsuit. He has several weeks to do so.

Source: http://www.kten.com/story/26038466/lawsuit-aims-to-change-federal-gun-laws

Here in Chattanooga I’m very close to Georgia and Alabama.

One Response to Lawsuit to legalize buying guns across state lines

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published.

You may use these HTML tags and attributes: <a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <cite> <code> <del datetime=""> <em> <i> <q cite=""> <s> <strike> <strong>