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Showing posts with label gunban. Show all posts
Showing posts with label gunban. Show all posts
Concealed handgun saves man's life in National park

Concealed handgun saves man's life in National park

Remember the claims that there was no reason for people to carry handguns with them when they are in national parks?  From Arizona Central:

. . . A Tempe man who was attacked by a bear in his tent near Payson was in surgery Sunday afternoon at Scottsdale Healthcare Osborn with severe but not life-threatening injuries.
The unidentified 30-year-old man was sleeping at 5 a.m. when the black bear attacked him at Ponderosa Campground in the Tonto National Forest just off Arizona 260 about 12 miles northeast of Payson.
"He was bitten in the head and the left arm," said Jim Paxon, spokesman for the Arizona Game and Fish Department.
"The bear drug him around the tent, but he did not receive skull-crushing or neck-crushing injuries to his brain stem, so that's a marvelous thing."
As soon as the bear attacked, the man's fiancee, in the tent also, screamed and escaped from the tent with her small child.
The bear went to a nearby campsite, where a camper shot the animal several times with a 9mm handgun, and the bear disappeared. . . . .
Vet loses guns to DC police as he travels through nation's capitol

Vet loses guns to DC police as he travels through nation's capitol

A wounded Vet gets thrown in jail after stopping at Walter Reed for medical treatment. The legal costs and time in jail are something you don't want to put anyone through. Even after the charges were dropped, DC refused to return his guns. From The Washington Times:
Returning to South Carolina on June 30, 2010, Mr. Kim stopped at Walter Reed for a doctor’s appointment. Afterwards, he got lost while driving his two-door Honda Civic in downtown D.C. in the evening. He was pulled over by police. The officer said that his driver’s license had been suspended. He was unaware of this. He found out the next morning that it was wrongly suspended due to a clerical error in which North Carolina incorrectly reported to South Carolina that he didn't pay a speeding ticket. Mr. Kim called and had this cleared up the next morning. However, because of the suspended license, the D.C. police officer called for backup, and told Mr. Kim he would have to go to the police station. Then the cops asked Mr. Kim if they could search his vehicle. The lieutenant agreed because his guns were properly locked in a case in the trunk, in compliance with federal firearm transport laws. Mr. Kim was handcuffed and told to sit on the curb during the search. He recalled that the officers inspected the collection and “were upset about the fact that I had the AR-15, which D.C. considers to be an ‘assault weapon.’” The model of rifle is illegal in the District, but not in his home state. The officers then told Mr. Kim he was in violation for the carrying firearms outside the home (in his vehicle) in the District. The nation’s capital does not acknowledge the right to bear arms, so there are no carry rights. “I told them I had been under the impression that as long as the guns were locked in the back, with the ammunition separate, that I was allowed to transport them,” Mr. Kim told me in an interview. “They said, ‘That may be true, however, since you stopped at Walter Reed, that make you in violation of the registration laws.” It is illegal to possess a firearm anywhere in D.C. other than the home. Mr. Kim’s attorney, Richard Gardiner, said his client was lawfully transporting the firearms, and that would have been his defense if the matter went to trial. “The mistake he made was agreeing to a search of his vehicle,” the attorney explained in an interview. “If the police ask for consent to search, the answer is ‘no.’ If they ask, ‘why not?’ The answer is, ‘no.’” . . .
Brady Campaign supports ban on gun shows

Brady Campaign supports ban on gun shows

When I debate the Brady Campaign they say that they don't support gun bans, but every time a gun ban comes up they are supporting it. In this case, the original federal appeals court decision struck down the gun ban, but I assume that the very liberal 9th circuit appeals court case will reverse this. From the San Jose Mercury News:

Before the end of this year, Russell and Sallie Nordyke will set up shop for at least five gun shows at the Santa Clara County, Calif., fairgrounds, providing a gathering spot for thousands of gun enthusiasts to buy and sell rifles, pistols and other weapons.
For the California couple, the southern San Francisco Bay Area is a small island amid a sea of hostility toward their TS Gun Shows. Nearby counties have enacted laws that forbid the sale or possession of guns on government property, effectively banning gun shows at some of the best spots to hold them.
The Nordykes believe those laws are unconstitutional - and on Monday, a federal appeals court will once again take up their 12-year quest to strike down the regulations.
The case offers another crucial test of Second Amendment rights that could have repercussions for California's sweeping slate of state and local gun control laws.
Specifically, an 11-judge 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals panel is to hear arguments in the Nordykes' legal challenge to Alameda County's ordinance, which has outlawed gun shows at the fairgrounds in Pleasanton, Calif., since 1999.
"It has impacted our lives tremendously," Sallie Nordyke said. "We used to be able to have gun shows in a lot of other places."
With gun rights groups such as the National Rifle Association on one side and gun control advocates such as the Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence on the other, the Nordyke case is being closely watched across the country. . . .
New study for guns on college campuses

New study for guns on college campuses

Jeffrey A. Bouffard, Matt R. Nobles, William Wells, and Michael R. Cavanaugh have a new paper entitled: "How Many More Guns?
Estimating the Effect of Allowing Licensed Concealed Handguns on a College Campus." An abstract is available here:

Among other arguments, advocates for lifting bans on carrying concealed handguns on campus propose that this would increase the prevalence of legitimately carried handguns, which might then deter crimes or be used to intervene in campus shooting incidents like the one that took place at Virginia Tech in 2007. Opponents suggest that increased prevalence of concealed handguns would lead to increases in other negative consequences, such as accidental shootings. Little empirical research has examined the potential outcomes of such a policy change, nor has existing research examined the prerequisite issue of whether lifting these bans would result in substantial increases in the prevalence of concealed handguns among students. Using a sample of undergraduate classrooms selected from five academic buildings at a public university in Texas, this study examines the potential impact of lifting the concealed handgun ban on the likelihood that a given classroom would contain at least one legally carried handgun. Results reveal that the impact of potential policy changes in this area vary based on the building under consideration and the measure of potential handgun prevalence. Limitations of the study and implications for future research on the issue of concealed handgun carrying on college campuses are discussed.
Washington State Supreme Court strikes down Seattle gun ban for parks

Washington State Supreme Court strikes down Seattle gun ban for parks

It took four years to get this problem fixed. From KOMONews.com:

The Washington State Supreme Court put an end Thursday to the city of Seattle's efforts to impose a gun ban at city parks.

Attorneys for the city had asked the high court to overturn a lower court ruling that the gun ban violated state law. But the Supreme Court justices declined to even look at the case, reaffirming that the gun ban is illegal.

The National Rifle Association cheered the ruling, saying that it represents a "final victory" for Seattle gun owners.

"The Washington Supreme Court made the right decision in recognizing that the city violated state law," said Chris W. Cox, executive director of the NRA's Institute for Legislative Action. . . .

Crime down after Supreme Court overturns city gun bans



What about the claim that accidental gun injuries are rising? Despite the claim, I think that it is very hard for anyone to say that accidental gun injuries have been rising. Indeed, the general trend has been clearly downward.














Well, gun injuries are not very well tracked, but accidental gun deaths are falling.






Just a note on the claim that 30,000 people die each year from guns.

Latest numbers
8,775 firearms 2010
554 accidents 2009
18,735 suicides 2009
Total: 28,064

percent suicides: 67%

Even those few studies that say that gun bans reduce gun suicides don't find that they change total suicides.

Some nutty comments on the Fox News piece by Media Matters. Media Matters doesn't seem to understand that you can get some benefit from loosening gun control laws and still want to loosen them even more to get more benefits. I know that it is a deep concept for Media Matters. One big benefit from the Supreme Court decision is that over 70,000 DC residents who have registered long guns could now use them for self defense.
Colorado State Supreme Court rules that permit holders can carry concealed handguns on public university campuses

Colorado State Supreme Court rules that permit holders can carry concealed handguns on public university campuses

From Colorado's Boulder Camera newspaper:

The Colorado Supreme Court today ruled that University of Colorado students and employees with concealed carry permits are able to carry their weapons on campus.

Colorado's highest court sided with Students for Concealed Carry on Campus, a gun-rights group that sued CU and argued that a 1994 university policy banning concealed weapons from its campuses violates state gun laws.

"It's a great victory for gun rights, and civil rights in general," said James Manley, the attorney with Mountain States Legal Foundation who represented the gun-rights group. "CU will now have to fall in line and follow the state law." . . .


A copy of the decision is available here.

The article contains a brief note on the history of guns at the University of Colorado campus.

The CU Board of Regents banned weapons in 1970 and, in 1994, strengthened the policy requiring that students be expelled and employees be fired if found guilty of using a weapon to "intimidate, harass, injure or otherwise interfere with the learning and working environment of the university." . . .
DC reluctantly moves to remove some gun control laws

DC reluctantly moves to remove some gun control laws

From the Washington Times:

A bill that cuts training sessions and other impediments to registering a gun in the District is expected to pass, perhaps unanimously, when it goes before the entire D.C. Council in coming weeks.

But its auspicious path to law is peculiar in one respect - city lawmakers may not oppose the measure, but they aren’t about to sing its praises or say much about it at all, even if restrictive gun laws in the District were the subject of a landmark U.S. Supreme Court case and loomed large in a recent pitch for D.C. statehood.

Council member Phil Mendelson, at-large Democrat, introduced the Firearms Amendment Act of 2012 to fix stumbling blocks that made it difficult for residents to meet pre-registration requirements within the city’s borders. Even as the bill heads to the council’s agenda on Tuesday, Mr. Mendelson noted his colleagues may not have delved into the subject - it is viewed as highly technical - as much as gun advocates outside of the John A. Wilson Building.

“It’s not so much they don’t have experience in relaxing gun laws,” he said Thursday. “The council doesn’t have experience with it at all.”

The Committee on the Judiciary, of which Mr. Mendelson is chairman, forwarded the bill to the full council on Wednesday with a 3-0 vote of approval, noting the reforms do not eliminate the District’s tough registration laws or its ban on automatic weapons. . . .
Virginia Governor won't allow permitted concealed handguns on college campuses

Virginia Governor won't allow permitted concealed handguns on college campuses

It seems clear that McDonnell is saying that he doesn't believe that "an armed citizenry can stop problems."

Gov. Bob McDonnell would “not be inclined” to sign legislation preventing state colleges from banning concealed firearms in campus facilities, he said Tuesday.

“I think it’s unlikely a bill like that would pass and I think at this point I would probably be unlikely to sign it,” McDonnell said during an interview in his office.

Some gun-rights advocates argue that gun owners with proper permits should not be barred from having concealed handguns on college campuses. The pro-gun Virginia Citizens Defense League has staged demonstrations at Virginia Tech, Radford University and other state colleges in recent months to protest campus gun restrictions. Activists are pushing for legislation in the upcoming General Assembly session to prevent college governing boards from prohibiting concealed carry on campus.

“There is some legitimate debate about whether an armed citizenry can stop problems, whether it’s on a college campus or any other venue, but I’d have to see what the law looks like,” McDonnell said. “I would not be inclined to support that kind of legislation.” . . .

Support for Assault Weapons Ban Falls Dramatically

Gallup's annual gun control survey is out and available here. Interestingly, support for gun control has fallen more among women and those with a college education.



Support for gun control is falling across the board. Handgun bans are no longer getting much support.

So what happened to Chicago's Murder and Violent Crime rates after the Supreme Court decision in June 2010 striking down Chicago's gun laws?

In DC, the change in gunlock laws as a result of the Supreme Court decision meant that about a third of adults already had registered long guns that they were now allowed to legally load and fire for self defense.  In Chicago, very few new guns have been allowed and that gun ownership is essentially restricted to relatively well to do areas (see below).  Yet it is the poorest parts of the city where crime is the worst and where people need guns the most for self protection.  One would thus expect a much bigger change in crime rates from the Heller than the McDonald decisions.  Still, for Chicago, the change in the law has not had the bad effect that many had predicted.



This data is available here. Since murder and other crime rates vary over the course of the year, it is important to compare the same months in 2010 and 2011. Data for other months is available here. I had some discussion on the data for the last half of last year here.

A discussion on what happened in DC after the Heller decision is available here (also here).




Predictions:

District of Columbia Mayor Adrian Fenty had his own prediction: "More handguns in the District of Columbia will only lead to more handgun violence."


Or this:

Chicago's Mayor Richard Daley predicted disaster. He said that overturning the gun ban was "a very frightening decision" and predicted more deaths along with Wild West-style shootouts and that people "are going to take a gun and they are going to end their lives in a family dispute." . . .


Crime was a central concern among the dissenters in the Heller case.
If a resident has a handgun in the home that he can use for self- defense, then he has a handgun in the home that he can use to commit suicide or engage in acts of domestic violence. If it is indeed the case, as the District believes, that the number of guns contributes to the number of gun- related crimes, accidents, and deaths, then, although there may be less restrictive, less effective substitutes for an outright ban, there is no less restrictive equivalent of an outright ban. . . . In my view, there simply is no untouchable constitutional right guaranteed by the Second Amendment to keep loaded handguns in the house in crime-ridden urban areas.
—Justice Stephen Breyer, dissenting in District of Columbia v. Heller, June 26, 2008


The possible harm from guns was central to his dissent, and the words “crime,” “criminal,” “criminologist,” “homicide,” “murder,” “rape,” “robbery,” "suicide," and “victim” were used a total of 122 times in forty-four pages.

I like this justification by then Mayor Daley about his request for five round the clock armed police bodyguards for after he retires:

"The safety of my family comes first,” said Daley, who leaves office on May 16. “I’ve been mayor for 22 years, and my wife has made a commitment [to the city]. … Former mayors received security appropriately. … It’s appropriate for every former mayor. Yes, it’s always appropriate.”


A couple follow up articles on who gets handguns in Chicago http://www.chicagoreader.com/chicago/chicago-gun-registration/Content?oid=4066384">here. From Mick Dumke's article in the Chicago Reader:

John Lott, an economist who argues that gun control laws like Chicago's actually lead to higher crime, says the cost of meeting the gun application's training and registration requirements essentially discriminates against low-income black communities. In Chicago, the training and permit fees cost about $250 on top of the price of the gun.

"Those who are most likely to be victims of crime benefit the most from owning guns, and unfortunately, that is one very well defined group in our country, poor blacks who live in high crime urban areas such as Chicago," Lott wrote in an e-mail. "But these white, middle class areas can much more easily afford the fees to register their guns and to go through the training requirements."

Roderick Sawyer, alderman of the Sixth Ward, is skeptical of that theory. "It's like buying a car," he says. "If you want one you'll find a way to do it." . . .

UPDATE: Here are the crime data for Chicago in 2011.



Homicides so far this year

Homicides so far this year

From January through June, murder in New York City has risen by 21% compared to the same period last year (161 compared to 133).
For Los Angeles through either June or August, it has fallen by 11 percent (through June down to 299 from 335, through August up to 392 from 440).
From January through June, Houston's murder rate fell by 37% (90 compared to 143).
From January through June, Philadelphia's murder rate is actually up 8.9% from the same period last year (up to 159 from 146). From January 1 to September 13, it is up 4.6% (up to 229 from 219).

For those four cities, the total change in murders is -6.3%.

By contrast, as I have noted previously, Chicago's total number of murders fell by 14%. Chicago drop in murders was the largest drop since the 1982 handgun ban.

This wasn't what was supposed to happen. From the Peoria Star Journal:

Chicago Mayor Richard Daley called it a "very frightening decision" and evoked images of the "Old West" where "you have a gun and I have a gun and we'll settle it in the streets." . . .


From Fox News:

District of Columbia Mayor Adrian Fenty responded with a plan to require residents of the nation's capital to register their handguns. "More handguns in the District of Columbia will only lead to more handgun violence," Fenty said. . . .


Side note: I haven't gone through the murders for the next five largest cities, but I did notice that San Jose, the 10th largest city, had a large increase in murders this year.

In San Jose, the number of homicides rose 73% to 26 this year through July compared with the same period a year earlier, the highest year-to-year increase the city has experienced in at least the last 10 years, according to city and state records. . . .


It also looks as if Indianapolis had an increase in murders during the first six months of the year (see here and here).
Daley asks for five round the clock armed police bodyguards for after he retires

Daley asks for five round the clock armed police bodyguards for after he retires

Chicago police might be down 2,300 below authorized strength, but soon to be retired Chicago Mayor Daley thinks that his safety is so important that he should have five armed bodyguards. It is nice to know that Daley continues to believe that guns are very important for his own and his family's personal protection.  From the Chicago Sun-Times:
Mayor Daley on Thursday defended his request to continue using Chicago Police officers as bodyguards after he leaves office — a courtesy that former Mayor Jane Byrne never received and considers unnecessary.

“There’s been threats all through my career. … The safety of my family comes first,” said Daley, who leaves office on May 16.
“I’ve been mayor for 22 years, and my wife has made a commitment [to the city]. … Former mayors received security appropriately. … It’s appropriate for every former mayor. Yes, it’s always appropriate.”

Daley refused to comment on reports that he had requested a pair of vehicles in political retirement — one for himself, the other for his wife, Maggie, who is battling breast cancer and remains hospitalized with flu-like symptoms. . . .

Byrne, Daley’s political arch rival, took issue with Daley’s claim that “former mayors received security appropriately.”

When Byrne was defeated in 1983 after serving a single term, she was neither offered nor received bodyguard protection — and that was just fine with her.

“I expected it to end, and it did. Once you leave, you leave. You have to take care of yourself. You’re no longer mayor,” Byrne said. . . .

Fraternal Order of Police President Mike Shields called the mayor’s request ill-timed when a two-year police hiring slowdown has left the Chicago Police Department more than 2,300 officers-a-day short of authorized strength, counting vacancies and officers on medical leave and limited duty.

“We have an extreme manpower shortage. The citizens of Chicago can feel that shortage. To ask for five bodyguards is ridiculously excessive,” Shields said.

“If the department were up to 13,500 officers, it would not be a problem. But officers are working in one-man cars. Police officers can’t go to weddings and family events because there is such a shortage.” . . .
"Shot down: D.C. residents unable to register handguns"

"Shot down: D.C. residents unable to register handguns"

This should bring a quick suit against DC.

The ranking member of the Senate Judiciary Committee says the D.C. government should step in to help residents of the nation's capital make legal gun purchases --something they can't do now, even though the U.S. Supreme Court overturned the city's ban on handguns nearly three years ago.

"The city government of Washington, D.C. has a responsibility to make sure that every resident of D.C. can exercise their constitutional rights. And one of those constitutional rights is the individual to have a right to bear arms," Sen. Charles Grassley (R-Iowa) told WTOP.

Grassley, after learning there's a de facto gun ban in place because the one man who could facilitate handgun ownership in Washington has stopped taking registration orders after losing his office lease, said the D.C. government needs to take action.

He says it's "absolutely wrong" that D.C. residents currently can't buy a gun legally and bring it home. . . .

Oak Park's crime rates fall after handgun ban is ended


This article is from the January 18th issue of the Wednesday Journal, the weekly newspaper for Oak Park and River Forest. Burglaries feel by 34 percent. Do you think that making it easier for people to own handguns in the home might have had some impact of this crime category? A brief history of Oak Park's gun ban is available here. On July 19, 2010, Oak Park amended its town ordinance "to allow registered owners to use handguns for protection in their homes."

Thanks very much to George Sandersfl for sending me this copy of the newspaper article.
Typical emotional rant about the risks of letting law-abiding citizens carry permitted concealed handguns, this time regarding college campuses

Typical emotional rant about the risks of letting law-abiding citizens carry permitted concealed handguns, this time regarding college campuses

Darren Bush, an associate law professor at the University of Houston, wrote an op-ed this past weekend for the Salt Lake Tribune (available here). What is most disappointing is that I debated Bush at the University of Houston last fall. He made hypothetical claims about armed students fighting over parking spaces, but I challenged him then to provide some examples among young permit holders off of campus and he couldn't. For the obvious reason that such a case doesn't exist, he has still not been able to refer to an example. But he still uses it as a serious concern.

-- "No proof exists that concealed weapons deter crime in any setting." -- This statement is simply inaccurate. I debated Bush last fall where I went through the overwhelming majority of studies support my results. Among peer-reviewed studies in academic journals by criminologists and economists, 18 studies examining national data find that right-to-carry laws reduce violent crime, 10 indicate no discernible effect and none find a bad effect from the law. Among non-refereed studies, three find drops in crime and two say either no effect or possibly small increases in crime. For a list is available here, though I would also add my book, More Guns, Less Crime, and another recent paper in the Journal of Law and Economics.

-- The risk of students carrying concealed handguns. As the third edition of my book MGLC shows, permit holders generally are extremely law-abiding and there is no evidence that even in those states where people 18 to 20 can carry that they behave any differently. During my debate with Bush, he could not provide a single example in Utah or Colorado where a younger permit holder on campuses behaved in the manner that you hypothesize nor in the period prior to the early 1990s before universities in right-to-carry states had these prohibitions on students or faculty or staff carrying these guns.
I wrote up a discussion on Utah for the third edition of MGLC (University of Chicago Press, 2010). One can look up more recent information for Utah here.
Also take Arizona. which has been in the news recently. As of December 1, 2007, there were 99, 370 active permits. During 2007, 33 permits were revoked for any reason — a 0.03% rate — cases that did not involve using the gun to harm others. And this is true in state after state. Between October 1, 1987 and December 31, 2010, Florida issued permits to 1.9 million people. 168 permit holders had their permits revoked for any firearms related violation, a rate of 0.009%. During the last 36 months the revocation rate has been 0.0003%.

-- The claim is that "contentious campus parking dispute if students are armed," but Bush provides not one single example in Texas where you live or any other place where such an event involving a student type person has occurred off campus. With about 6.5 million current permit holders, Bush can't come up with even a few examples for a reason.

Weren't Chicago's murder rates supposed to soar after the Supreme Court Decision?


The data are available here, here, here, here, and here.

In June this last year, people were worried that Chicago's murder rates were going up:

Chicago Police Superintendent Jody Weis released sobering statistics on city crime Sunday morning, announcing that homicides were higher through May 2010 than they were to that point last year.
The results were more encouraging in other areas, as total crime was down nearly 6 percent and other violent crimes fell 12 percent.
But the murder rate was particularly troubling to Weis. "Homicides have continued to challenge us," he said.
"This is still a work in progress," Weis said of the city's effort to reduce murders. "We study it and are working to get officers in the right place to stop acts of violence."
Across Chicago, 164 homicides were recorded through May of this year. That's a 4 percent increase over the 158 homicides in January through May of 2009, according to figures reported by the Chicago Sun-Times. . . .


In late April last year with murders outpacing the rate over the same time during 2009, one headline read: "Ill. State Reps Ask Gov. For National Guard to Cut Murder Rate."

Mayor Daley was using the higher murder rate to call for even more gun control.

The homicide rate in Chicago has jumped in the past month, and the city is grappling with how best to respond.
At least two weekends in a row have been marred by multiple killings. For many Chicagoans, the breaking point was last Wednesday, when a 20-month-old girl was shot in the head while in a parked car on the South Side. The alleged gunman, who turned himself in, was reportedly aiming for the girl’s father.
As of last Sunday, Chicago tallied 113 homicides for 2010, compared with 101 for the same period last year.
The city’s mayor, state lawmakers, and the Chicago Police Department, among others, are weighing in on what should – and shouldn’t – be done.
On Sunday, state Reps. John Fritchey and LaShawn Ford, both Democrats, suggested that the National Guard should be dispatched to curb the recent rise in violence. They made the proposal to Illinois Gov. Pat Quinn (D). . . .


Among the predictions about what would happen after the court's decision, you have this:

Justice John Paul Stevens, who warned that the McDonald ruling "could prove far more destructive - quite literally - to our nation's communities" than the precedent case, Heller. He was hardly alone. The ruling is "bad news for democracy and public safety," warned the Kansas City Star. "Today's decision will only add to" the firearms death toll, wrote the Violence Policy Center's Josh Sugarman, who insisted that "more guns means more gun death." The McDonald ruling "moves us toward anarchy," shrieked The Washington Post's David Ignatius. "Perhaps Chief Justice Roberts and other enthusiasts for our newly-created universal right to bear arms should take a trip to Beirut or Baghdad and see how this idea works out in practice." . . .


Now what a difference six months makes. This month the Chicago Tribune's headline read: "Chicago homicides in 2010 fell to lowest level since 1965."

Chicago police Superintendent Jody Weis largely credited computerized research that helps police determine where violent crimes are likely to occur for what he called a historic drop in homicides in 2010.
Homicides fell to 435, the city's lowest total in almost half a century and a 5.4 percent drop from 460 in 2009. That marked the fewest murders since Chicago recorded 395 homicides in 1965, Weis said at a news conference Monday. . . .


Note that Chicago enacted a new gun control law that went into effect two weeks after the Supreme Court decision in McDonald.

Bucking a national trend toward more tolerance for firearms, Chicago today begins enforcing the toughest gun law in the nation -- and it's already under fire.
Two lawsuits have already been filed against the ordinance, which bans gun shops in the city and limits permit holders to one ready-to-fire weapon inside the home -- excluding the porch, the garage or the yard. People are allowed to own more guns, but they cannot be loaded.
Legal experts say the law is not bulletproof and could be headed toward the U.S. Supreme Court, which ruled in June that Americans have the right to possess handguns for self-defense. That ruling made the Chicago's existing gun ban, which had been in effect for 28 years, unenforceable. In its place Mayor Richard M. Daley and the City Council created the new law that goes into effect today. . . .


Some anecdotal evidence of increased gun sales.

After a Supreme Court decision affirming the right to bear arms was handed down in June, the owners of Midwest Sporting Goods, just outside of Chicago, started noticed something any retailer would find encouraging – an increasing number of customers. . . .
"It's not like sales suddenly went through the roof," he said. "There are still restrictions and waiting periods. But we are anticipating a major increase in sales going forward. It's not going to happen overnight, but it's going to happen."
Others in the industry agree that sales of firearms, particularly pistols and revolvers, could explode. . . .


My discussion on the new law is here.

For a discussion of the rate that new permits have been issued see here.
Crazy gun free zone laws messes up Honor student's life

Crazy gun free zone laws messes up Honor student's life

The fact that the government can't differentiate between good people and bad people with guns is a big mistake. The fact that the gun free zone laws only really stop good people and not criminals needs to be recognized. These bans attract problems rather than stop them.

On the morning of Dec.1, Demari DeReu drove to Columbia Falls High School in Montana and parked her blue-green Honda Accord in the lot, just as she does every morning. The 16-year-old honor roll student, class treasurer and varsity cheerleader walked in to school, forgetting entirely about the unloaded hunting rifle locked in the trunk of her car.
Later that day, there was an announcement telling students contraband sniffing dogs were scouting the parking lot, sparking her memory. She immediately told administrators that she’d forgotten to remove her scoped hunting rifle from the trunk following a Thanksgiving family hunting excursion.
She was suspended from school for violating federal and state gun laws.
On Monday, the school board will convene for a hearing to decide the fate and academic future of the high school junior, who recently was voted most dedicated cheerleader by her teammates and coach. . . . .


Here is another piece about another type of gun free zone.

Thanks to Jean Wigle for this last link.
Colorado Supreme Court to review lower court decisions preventing Colorado public universities from banning concealed carry permit holders

Colorado Supreme Court to review lower court decisions preventing Colorado public universities from banning concealed carry permit holders

Students for Concealed Carry on Campus has posted this:

On Monday, the Colorado Supreme Court agreed to grant a writ of certiorari to CU in their appeal.
At issue, states the court, is:
Whether the General Assembly intended the Concealed Carry Act to divest the Board of Regents of its constitutional and statutory authority to enact safety and welfare measures for the University of Colorado’s campuses.
Whether a constitutional challenge to a statute or ordinance regulating the right to bear arms is governed by the deferential “rational basis” standard of review or a more stringent “reasonable exercise” standard of review.
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