Nullifying Future Fed Gun Regs

The legislative history of Idaho’s Senate Bill 1332 can be briskly told; its enactment was swift indeed. The Federal Firearm, Magazine and Register Ban Enforcement Act was

• introduced on the tenth of February;
• unanimously approved by the full Senate nine days later;
• leapt out of House committee, on March 10, with a Do Pass recommendation;
• read in full in the House two days later, and
• passed unanimously; whereupon it
• went to the governor, who signed it into law March 19.

Because of an emergency clause, SB-​1332 went into full effect on that date.

The new law instructs Idaho’s public servants not to co-​operate with the federal government on any future gun and ammo registration, prohibition or regulation passed by the U.S. Congress. It also provides a civil penalty of a maximum $1000 fine for each instance of co-operation.

It’s part of the low-​key rebellion that many state legislatures and governors are waging  against the federal government. Claiming something like a right to nullify unconstitutional laws — a right enumerated, after all, as the Tenth Amendment to the Constitution — at issue is the usurpation of state prerogatives by the feds.

We’ve seen a number of states resist the federal government’s attempt to “organize” a grand (and catastrophic) public-​private alliance known as Obamacare.

The current Idaho effort doesn’t strike me as pure nullification, however. It relies on a proven principle of federalism: the states may not be commandeered to enforce federal law. Specifically, any future federal law attacking our essential Second Amendment rights.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.