{"id":65201,"date":"2021-02-24T22:00:07","date_gmt":"2021-02-25T04:00:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/?p=65201"},"modified":"2021-02-24T22:00:07","modified_gmt":"2021-02-25T04:00:07","slug":"65201","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/?p=65201","title":{"rendered":""},"content":{"rendered":"

Arizona House Passes Bill to End State Enforcement of Federal Gun Control<\/a><\/p>\n

PHOENIX<\/strong>, Ariz. (Feb. 24, 2021) \u2013 Today, the Arizona House passed a bill to ban state and local enforcement of federal gun control; past, present and future. Passage into law would represent an important first step towards bringing those measures to an end within the state.<\/span><\/p>\n

Rep. Leo Biasiucci (R) introduced House Bill 2111 (HB2111<\/a>) along with 16 cosponsors on Jan. 24. With an amendment proposed by cosponsor Rep. Bret M. Roberts last week,\u00a0 the legislation bans the state and all political subdivisions of the state from \u201cusing any personnel or financial resources to enforce, administer or cooperate with any act, law, treaty, order, rule or regulation of the United States government that is inconsistent with any law\u201d of the state of Arizona regarding the regulation of firearms.<\/p>\n

On Feb. 10, the House Government and Elections Committee passed HB2111 by a\u00a0vote of 7-6<\/a>. Five days later, the House Rules Committee passed it with a\u00a0vote of 5-3<\/a>. Today, the full House passed the bill with a vote of 31-29.<\/p>\n

The legislation is\u00a0similar to a bill pending consideration in the Texas House<\/a>\u00a0and the\u00a0West Virginia Senate<\/a>.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

STRATEGY<\/strong><\/p>\n

While passage into law wouldn\u2019t end all gun control in Arizona today, it would represent a\u00a0 massive shift in strategy going forward.\u00a0 Once in effect, HB2111 would immediately do the following:<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. Ban state and local enforcement of any federal gun control measures on the books that don\u2019t have concurrent measures in law in the state of Arizona.<\/li>\n
  2. Ban state and local enforcement of any new gun control measures that might come from Washington D.C. in the future that aren\u2019t on the books in Arizona<\/li>\n
  3. Shift the focus and attention to any remaining gun control measures on the books in state law<\/li>\n
  4. Encourage gun rights activists to work in future legislative sessions to repeal those state-level gun control measures as a follow up.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    Each state-level gun control repeal would then represent a one-two punch, not only ending state enforcement, but automatically ending support for any concurrent federal gun control measure as soon as the state law repeal went into effect.<\/p>\n

    ARIZONA LAWS<\/strong><\/p>\n

    According to NRA-ILA<\/a>, under Arizona law, there is no licensing requirement for ownership of rifles, shotguns or handguns. And no permit to carry or registration of firearms are on the books either.<\/p>\n

    On the other end of the spectrum, however, state law in ARS 13-3101(B) requires compliance with the National Firearms Act, but the state maintains no registry and imposes no additional requirements.<\/p>\n

    The ATF has a pdf document which lists and details all state-level gun control measures in Arizona, and would\u00a0act as a handy guide for what could be repealed in the future<\/a>.<\/p>\n

    The right to keep and bear arms in the state constitution is listed in\u00a0Article 2, Section 26.<\/span><\/p>\n

    \u201cThe right of the individual citizen to bear arms in defense of himself or the State shall not be impaired, but nothing in this section shall be construed as authorizing individuals or corporations to organize, maintain, or employ an armed body of men.\u201d<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

    EFFECTIVE<\/strong><\/p>\n

    The federal government relies heavily on state cooperation to implement and enforce almost all of its laws, regulations and acts \u2013 including gun control. By simply withdrawing this necessary cooperation, states and localities can nullify many federal actions in effect. As noted by the National Governors\u2019 Association during the partial government shutdown of 2013, \u201cstates are partners with the federal government on most federal programs.\u201d<\/p>\n

    Based on\u00a0James Madison\u2019s advice for states and individuals<\/a>\u00a0in Federalist #46, a \u201crefusal to cooperate with officers of the Union\u201d represents an extremely effective method to bring down federal gun control measures because most enforcement actions rely on help, support and leadership from state and local governments.<\/p>\n

    Fox News senior judicial analyst Judge Andrew Napolitano agreed. In a televised discussion on the issue,\u00a0he noted that a single state taking this step<\/a>\u00a0would make federal gun laws \u201cnearly impossible\u201d to enforce.<\/p>\n

    \u201cPartnerships don\u2019t work too well when half the team quits,\u201d said Michael Boldin of the Tenth Amendment Center. \u201cBy withdrawing all resources and participation in federal gun control, states and even local governments can help bring these unconstitutional acts to their much-needed end.\u201d<\/p>\n

    LEGAL BASIS<\/strong><\/p>\n

    The state of Arizona can legally bar state agents from enforcing federal gun control. Refusal to cooperate with federal enforcement rests on a well-established legal principle known as\u00a0the anti-commandeering doctrine<\/a>.<\/p>\n

    Simply put, the federal government cannot force states to help implement or enforce any federal act or program. The anti-commandeering doctrine is based primarily on five Supreme Court cases dating back to 1842.\u00a0Printz v. U.S.<\/em>\u00a0(1997) serves as the cornerstone. For the majority, Justice Scalia wrote, in part:<\/p>\n

    \u201cWe held in New York that Congress cannot compel the States to enact or enforce a federal regulatory program. Today we hold that Congress cannot circumvent that prohibition by conscripting the States\u2019 officers directly. The Federal Government may neither issue directives requiring the States to address particular problems, nor command the States\u2019 officers, or those of their political subdivisions, to administer or enforce a federal regulatory program. It matters not whether policymaking is involved, and no case by case weighing of the burdens or benefits is necessary; such commands are fundamentally incompatible with our constitutional system of dual sovereignty\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

    WHAT\u2019S NEXT<\/strong><\/p>\n

    HB2111 will now move to the Senate, where it will first need to pass out of at least one committee before the full chamber has an opportunity to concur and send it to the Governor.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    Arizona House Passes Bill to End State Enforcement of Federal Gun Control PHOENIX, Ariz. (Feb. 24, 2021) \u2013 Today, the Arizona House passed a bill to ban state and local enforcement of federal gun control; past, present and future. Passage into law would represent an important first step towards bringing those measures to an end … Continue reading “”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[79,8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-65201","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-government","category-rkba"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/65201","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=65201"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/65201\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":65202,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/65201\/revisions\/65202"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=65201"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=65201"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=65201"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}