Posted on 04/11/2008 6:27:14 AM PDT by 2banana
Nutter defiantly signs five gun laws
Council's measures appear to fly in the face of state law and legal precedent.
The NRA says it will sue. By Jeff Shields
Inquirer Staff Writer
Mayor Nutter likened himself and City Council members yesterday to the band of rebels who formed this country as he signed five new gun-control laws that defy the state legislature and legal precedent. "Almost 232 years ago, a group of concerned Americans took matters in their own hands and did what they needed to do by declaring that the time had come for a change," Nutter said as he signed the bills in front of a table of confiscated weapons outside the police evidence room in City Hall.
"We are going to make ourselves independent of the violence that's been taking place in this city for far too long," he said.
The five laws - called everything from unconstitutional to criminal by critics - do the following:
Limit handgun purchases to one a month.
Require lost or stolen firearms to be reported to police within 24 hours.
Prohibit individuals under protection-from-abuse orders from possessing guns if ordered by the court.
Allow removal of firearms from "persons posing a risk of imminent personal injury" to themselves or others.
Outlaw the possession and sale of certain assault weapons.
Nutter said he would begin to enforce the laws immediately, with the exception of the one-gun-a-month requirement, which takes effect in six months.
He and Council are in for a fight, however. The city has tried and failed for three decades to buck the 1974 state law that reserves gun regulation to the state legislature. The state's preeminence appeared to be cemented in a 1996 Supreme Court ruling that allowed the legislature to prevent Philadelphia and Pittsburgh from enacting local gun laws.
Recent efforts include a 2005 referendum in which city voters, by a 4-1 ratio, demanded that the state allow the city to pass its own gun laws. Council members Darrell L. Clarke and Donna Reed Miller sponsored a set of gun-control measures bills last year, then sued the legislature to allow them to move forward. That case is pending.
National Rifle Association spokesman John Hohenwarter said he expected the organization to sue "within a short time frame."
Kim Stolfer, vice chairman of the Pennsylvania Sportsmen's Association's legislative committee, said the organization was considering its legal options and suggested that the enactment of the laws was a criminal act.
"He's committing five misdemeanor crimes," Stolfer said. "What kind of message is he sending when he and City Council are willing to commit crimes for issues that are not going to work?"
Nutter and Council are not likely to find a great deal of support in the legislature.
State Representative John M. Perzel (R., Phila.) said through a spokesman that the laws were unconstitutional. House Speaker Dennis M. O'Brien (R. Phila.) did not return a call for comment, and State Sen. Vincent J. Fumo (D., Phila.) declined to comment.
Even the city's fiercest proponent of stricter gun laws in the legislature, Democratic Rep. Dwight Evans, offered only lukewarm support.
Evans spokeswoman Johnna Pro said: "No one . . . feels the frustration" of city leaders more than Evans, so he would not criticize them.
But Evans, she said, also is a leader in the House of Representatives and "believes that everyone needs to allow the process to work, even though the process, at times, may be excruciatingly slow and incredibly unresponsive."
Phil Goldsmith, president of the gun-control advocacy group CeaseFire PA, said "it's worth trying" to enact and test the laws.
"It's a shame the city has to do something like this because the legislature has failed to exercise its responsibilities," Goldsmith said.
Council members Clarke and Miller pared their package down from nine bills, including two that would create registries of gun sales, to the five that they say would stand a constitutional challenge.
Nutter embraced the idea of taking "direct action" to challenge a legal status quo to protect city residents.
"If we all sat around bemoaning what the law was on a regular basis," Nutter said. "I'd probably still be picking cotton somewhere as opposed to being mayor of the city of Philadelphia."
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Contact staff writer Jeff Shields at 215-854-4565 or jshields@phillynews.com.
This idiot Nutter has to be one of the stupidiest mayors ever. I wished I had a lot of money and lived in Filthadelphia. I would truly enjoy breaking one of these laws and being hauled into court. I would have the best argument going. If the mayor is allowed to break the states laws to create this law. Why shouldn’t I be allowed to break his law?
“Mayor Nutter likened himself and City Council members yesterday to the band of rebels ...”
Are they actually declaring themselves to be in rebellion? Perhaps a declaration of Martial Law and use of the Pennsylvania National Guard are in order.
"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus
Phila gov web site is being HAMMERED right now.
Just call up the Militia. They'll be more effective then the National Guard in this case, and you won't punish the bystanders by having martial law declared.
While they'd have taken any muskets or rifles they found, they were after the 3 cannon, not assault weapons, but something closer to WMDs of the day. They didn't get them. They did find a few musket balls which they threw in a pond (which is still there today), the colonials later retrieved most of them. They got a lot more musket balls though, the hard way.
They did get and burn the cannons' carriages, but the cannon had been hidden in furrows and then plowed over. A detachment of Redcoats marched right past them, the plow man was still plowing at the time. The field belonged, IIRC, to one of the leaders, if not THE leader, of the local colonial militia.
If the colonials had wanted to fight, rather than just defend themselves, they'd have wiped out the British column. As it was, the only thing that kept them from wiping out that column after the shooting started, was that the Redcoat follow on force brought cannon, which kept the militia from concentrating too much. But even dispersed, they shot the Shiite out of the Redcoats.
And as you point out, unlike the Philadelphia City council, they were NOT the government.
The PA state police should be arresting the mayor and council as we speak, for a blatant, and admitted, violation of state law, never mind the state and federal Constitutions, since no one pays much attention to them anymore anyway. But of course they'll do no such thing. Only us peons get arrested for breaking the law which is itself in violation of the highest law of the land.
The Guv, (Ed Rendell (D) ) is a big gun controller himself.
When asked in 1996, "Indicate which principles you support regarding guns." He gave the following answers:
Maintain and strengthen the enforcement of existing state restrictions on the purchase and possession of guns.
Require background checks on gun sales between private citizens at gun shows.
Just last November he urged passage of a law that would allow Philedelpia and Pittsburg to pass their own gun control laws. From the link:
In his unusual House Judiciary Committee appearance last week, Mr. Rendell unsuccessfully urged approval of bills that would limit handgun purchases to one a month; permit local gun ordinances tougher than state law; and require that lost or stolen guns be reported to police within 24 hours
Another gun grabbing DemonRat, Ed Rendell. Fortunately for his "subjects" the legislature has not gone along with his gun grabbing schemes.
Of course all such "laws" are in violation of the Pennsylvania Constitution, which states, as it has since 1790 :
“The right of the citizens to bear arms in defense of themselves and the State shall not be questioned.” Article 1, Section 21.
From 1776 to 1790, it read:
"That the people have a right to bear arms for the defence of themselves and the state"
Well that's what he said isn't it? But of course he's a DemonRat, so he LIED for dramatic effect.
Where is Adele Mundy when a finger needs to be shot off? (You figure it out. :) )
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