PA House Moves to Spank Scofflaw Governments, Concurs with HB80 (preemption enforcement)

Gun Watch ^ | 23 October, 2014 | Dean Weingarten

[marktwain]

Every one of the 50 states has some kind of firearms preemption law.   This makes perfect sense, as otherwise each town, county, and local government could enact a local ordinance to invalidate your right to keep and bear arms.   You could easily be placed in jail for an inadvertent violation of an ordiance that you never knew existed, just because you crossed an invisible political boundary.

Pennsylvania has such a law, and it is a well thought out example.  There is only one problem; the means to enforce it is weak.   To prevent local governments form flouting the rule of law, Pennsylvania has passed a simple revision:  If a local government violates the law, they can be sued, and they have to pay the legal fees of the other side if they lose.     Once the suit has been filed, they cannot simply revoke the law and walk away, smug in knowing that they cost those attempting to enforce their rights, and did not have to pay anything.  It is a trick that has been used successfully in Pennsylvania, but it seems that it is headed for the dust bin of history.   HB80 started out as HB 2011.  It passed the House on 6 October, 143 to 54.    It went on to the Senate as HB1243.   In what has become a common legislative maneuver, it passed the Senate 36-14, on 16 October.    The vote was originally reported as 32-16, then later revised to 34-14


Because of the amendment maneuver,  HB80 had to have a concurrence vote in the House.   On 20 October, it passed,  138 to 56.    It has been signed in the Senate, and now goes to Governor Corbett. 

Governor Corbett has said that he will sign the bill. 

©2014 by Dean Weingarten: Permission to share is granted when this notice is included.
Link to Gun Watch

[marktwain]

The old media in PA worked hard to stop this bill. They never mentioned the fact that the local governments were violating the law. They characterized the bill as a way for the NRA to force local governments to remove laws that protected the public. It was an incredible display of propaganda worthy of Pravda.

[Renegade]

The same bill was passed when Commie Rendell was gov. and he refused to sign it.Her let it die without a sig. becayse his term ran out.

[GeneralisimoFranciscoFranco]

I was thinking on this yesterday. Why has the state allowed these municipalities to violate state law for so long? Why has the state not withheld funds from these municipalities like the feds do to the states when they don’t comply? Why do the PA State Police continue to violate the state law by maintaining a defacto gun registry?

Answer to all is the same- because the republicans in our state legislature are just like the republicans in the US Congress- coward.

[Clean_Sweep]

Who says there is no difference between parties? Vote Corbett for Governor!

[marktwain]

“Answer to all is the same- because the republicans in our state legislature are just like the republicans in the US Congress- coward.”

Except they just passed this law.

The Republicans may be afraid, but it is the old media that they fear. The old media is the reason that we get such bad laws and governance.