Posted on 07/01/2013 1:28:58 PM PDT by marktwain
Over the past several months, at least four out-of-state concealed carry holders were arrested for carrying handguns in New York City. Unbeknownst to these otherwise law-abiding gun owners, NYC has an extremely tough and unforgiving gun control laws.
All of these tourists were caught when they naively sought to check their weapons with security (at an airport, at the Empire State Building, at the 9/11 memorial etc.).
So, why is NYC so tough on guns? Why do city officials lack commonsense when it comes to applying the law?
Well, to answer these questions it might help to take a brief look at the genesis of NYC’s onerous gun laws.
It all started with a corrupt politician and resident NYC gangster named ‘Big Tim’ Sullivan. ‘Big Feller’ as he was also known, held many public positions, including state assemblyman, congressman and state senator. But he was also a Tammany Hall crook and criminal overseer of the gangs of New York.
In 1911, after a particularly bloody incident in Gramercy Park, Sullivan proposed the Sullivan Act, a law that would require police-issued licenses for New Yorkers to possess firearms small enough to be concealed.
If one were to simply possess a handgun or other concealable firearm without a police-issued license, it was a misdemeanor. If one were to carry a handgun, it was a felony.
The Sullivan Act was passed into law, and this tough and arbitrary ‘may-issue’ policy is essentially how it still works in NYC today.
While Sullivan’s pretext for proposing the law was to crackdown on crime, his real intent was to exact a tighter control over the city.
By disarming ordinary citizens, his gangsters and underlings had an easier time carrying out nefarious activities. No longer did they have to worry about their victims shooting back at them.
(Excerpt) Read more at guns.com ...
Not only that but just carrying a pen knife will get you arrested as well.
What about a Big Gulp?
“So, why is NYC so tough on guns? Why do city officials lack commonsense when it comes to applying the law?”
Because New York City sucks when it comes to commonsense.
They just don’t have any and wouldn’t know what to do with
it if they had. I think it’s in the air coming down from
Canada or something. It’s also the home of the descendants
of the British loyalist that they forgot to deport after
the American revolution.
"The more corrupt the state, the more numerous the laws."
Tacitus, Roman Senator and Historian (A.D. c.56 - c. 115)
Will we one day ask ourselves how we missed the many signs calling our attention to the possibility and probability of mankind’s condition? It will be difficult to explain why we ignored the signs calling for our eternal vigilance. It will be even more difficult explaining why we exchanged liberty for tyranny.
I wonder why man felt the need to preserve wise men’s observations as historical records and then chose to ignore their warnings.
This and no other is the root from which a tyrant springs; when he first appears he is a protector (i.e. a provider) Plato: Ancient Greek philosopher (428/427-348/347 B.C.)
"Accustomed to trample on the rights of others, you have lost the genius of your own independence and become the fit subjects of the first cunning tyrant who rises among you."--Abraham Lincoln
"If thou wouldst rule well, thou must rule for God, and to do that, thou must be ruled by him ...Those who will not be governed by God will be ruled by tyrants." William Penn
“Find out just what any people will quietly submit to and you have found out the exact measure of injustice and wrong which will be imposed upon them, and these will continue till they are resisted with either words or blows, or with both. The limits of tyrants are prescribed by the endurance of those whom they oppress.” Frederick Douglass
It is in the religion of ignorance that tyranny begins. Benjamin Franklin
"The greatest tyrannies are always perpetrated in the name of the noblest causes." -- Thomas Paine
"The mob is the mother of tyrants." – Diogenes
All tyranny needs to gain a foothold is for people of good conscience to remain silent. Thomas Jefferson
“Of all tyrannies, a tyranny exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It may be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end, for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.” C.S. Lewis
“Bad laws are the worst sort of tyranny.” Edmund Burke
"'Necessity' is the plea for every infringement of human freedom. It is the argument of tyrants; it is the creed of slaves." -William Pitt, 1783
"When the tyrant has disposed of foreign enemies by conquest or treaty and there is nothing to fear from them, then he is always stirring up some war or other, in order that the people may require a leader." --- Plato
"Let this be the distinctive mark of an American, that in cases of commotion he enlists himself under no man's banner, inquires for no man's name, but repairs to the standard of the laws. Do this and you need never fear anarchy or tyranny. Your government will be perpetual."- Thomas Jefferson
A wise observation.
Corruption and tyranny seek people who they can persuade of the necessity for new laws.
Corruption and tyranny seek people they can persuade to ignore existing laws.
Corruption and tyranny appeal to the good intentions of these people.
Corruption and tyranny will burden all because of the good intentions of these very stupid people.
The accumulation of all powers, legislative, executive, and judiciary, in the same hands . . . may justly be pronounced the very definition of tyranny. —James Madison, Federalist Papers, 47
"Fragile as reason is and limited as law is as the institutionalized medium of reason, that's all we have standing between us and the tyranny of mere will and the cruelty of unbridled, undisciplined feeling." Justice Felix Frankfurter.
"Wherever the law ends, tyranny begins." John Locke.
"Experience hath shewn, that even under the best forms [of government] those entrusted with power have, in time, and by slow operations, perverted it into tyranny." President Thomas Jefferson
"Nothing is so opportune for tyrants as a people tired of its liberty." --Alan Keyes
Whenever is found what is called a paternal government, there is found state education. It has been discovered that the best way to ensure implicit obedience is to commence tyranny in the nursery. Benjamin Disraeli, 1874
How many of the signs did you miss?
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.