Why It Matters: State firearm preemption legislation ensures continuity in gun laws across a state and protect law-abiding gun owners from unreasonable restrictions adopted by local governments. These protections played an oversized role in keeping many firearm retailers open during the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic and, once again, are being cited in an effort to protect gun owners from new restrictions in a Missouri county.
Highlights:
- Last month, officials in Jackson County, Missouri passed a suite of new ordinances that banned anyone under the age of 21 from owning a handgun or semi-automatic rifle, with a few exceptions.
- These ordinances were passed following a fatal shooting that occurred at the Kansas City Chief’s Super Bowl celebration earlier in the year.
- Many partners in the industry have pointed out that these new ordinances appear to violate Missouri’s existing state firearm preemption laws, and the Missouri Attorney General has indicated that he plans to sue the County for this violation.
During the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Congressional Sportsmen’s Foundation (CSF) and partners closely monitored efforts to use the pandemic as a means of curbing firearm use and sales in certain areas throughout the nation. In many of these cases, CSF-supported state firearm preemption laws played an important role in defeating these efforts, meaning that law-abiding sportsmen and women were able to continue to enjoy hunting and shooting sports opportunities while practicing responsible recreation.
These challenges served as an important reminder of the role that state preemption laws can play in protecting our cherished traditions. State firearm preemption laws reserve authority of firearm legislation at the state level, ensuring that otherwise law-abiding firearm owners are not subject to a patchwork of rules and regulations that they must understand to remain compliant as they travel across a state. CSF continues to advocate for the passage of, and protect against efforts to undermine, preemption legislation across the nation, most recently in states like South Dakota.
Last month, Missouri’s existing preemption laws have come back into the spotlight following the adoption of new ordinances in Jackson County, Missouri (part of the Kansas City metro area), that prohibit anyone under the age of 21 from purchasing a handgun or semi-automatic firearm. Because Missouri has strong preemption language on the books, it did not take long for many within the industry to draw attention to this potential violation, and the Attorney General has since announced his intention to sue the county over this effort.
CSF will continue to monitor this situation while advocating for strong preemption language across the nation.
