Redneck States Are Borrowing a Confederate Plan to Protect Their Guns
Have you heard of "gun nullification"? It's all the rage. Seriously, so hot. It's especially popular in these Southern states who've used nullification before to tell the federales to butt the hell out of their business. Back then, nullification protected slavery and Jim Crow. Now, it protects your Smith & Wesson.
Missouri senators endorsed legislation on Tuesday that seeks to nullify U.S. gun restrictions and send federal agents to jail for enforcing such laws, though the measure would likely face a court challenge if it gets approved in the state.
Courts have consistently ruled that states cannot nullify federal laws, but that hasn't stopped Missouri and other states from trying.
Sen. Brian Nieves, the Republican sponsoring the bill, said the legislation would protect law-abiding gun owners from federal encroachments and regulations. Missouri Republicans began pushing for the legislation following President Barack Obama's call last year for increased background checks and a ban on assault weapons.
..."This is primarily purposed to protect liberties of Missourians," said Nieves, of Washington.
Since the time of John Calhoun in South Carolina, nullification doctrine—the fancy-bred, college-educated stepbrother of those mental deficients, the militia and sovereign citizen movements—has held that America's several states have the right to nullify federal laws that infringe on their constitutional liberties. Unless we're talking about the 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendment rights of minorities in these nullificationist states, in which case their freedom is totally treading on our freedom, dude.
But no matter. Liberty-loving bears of small brain have found a five-syllable word, and it must necessarily lead to their promised land. Kansas and Alaska have already passed gun nullification laws, while Pennsylvania, Tennessee, and Missouri have been pushing. Nine states, led by Montana, have passed laws asserting that gunmakers in their states are exempt from federal regulations, and so they can make all the full-auto machine guns and assault weapons they want.
The real fun comes when local politicians and law enforcement officers get in the nullification game: Nearly 250 sheriffs from Oregon to California to Arizona to Minnesota have written open letters defying federal gun laws and threatening to arrest U.S. government officials working in their jurisdictions. One rural Florida sheriff even beat prosecution last fall for releasing (and destroying evidence related to) a suspect who'd illegally held a concealed weapon.
It's fun times in America when libertarians and John Birchers are openly praising law enforcement officers for picking and choosing which laws they'll enforce, you know, to protect the good, law-abiding folk from federal interference. What could go wrong?
