Category: New Jersey

Evan Nappen is the foremost authority on New Jersey gun laws, which is no small feat, given how complicated they are.  He takes a look at the new one-gun-a-month bill passed by the House and Senate and concludes it has a number of drafting problems, including restricting dealers to getting one gun a month from distributors, allowing gun owners who want to dispose of a firearm collection only transfer one-gun-a-month to a dealer, and even fails to make certain exception for armed forces.  Evan says the law is so bad, it will virtually end retail handgun sales in New Jersey.  Maybe that was the point.

We know what we need to do with Fred “One-Gun-A-Month” Madden, but there are some Senators who made a good show of opposing the gun rationing bill on the floor of the Senate, at a time when I’m sure most of them just wanted to go home and sleep (I know I did).

The people who got up on the floor and spoke against rationing your rights were Marcia Karrow (R-23), Tony Bucco (R-25), Kevin O’Toole (R-40), and Gerald Cardinale (R-39).  I will endeavor to get a hold of the video from their floor speeches.  Also to be thanked is Senator Tom Kean Jr., who is the Senate Minority Leader, and who held the Republican caucus together on this.  Those if you who know gun politics in New Jersey know keeping Republicans on the reservation on guns is like herding cats.  Senator Kean has done an admirable job.

We also owe some thanks to former GOP chair Tom Wilson, who has been supportive of the GOP in New Jersey rebuilding the trust of gun owners, and trying to better serve this abused constituency.  I sincerely hope Jay Webber will continue to advocate for the interests of New Jersey gun owners, since he’s taken over as GOP state chair a few weeks ago.

If you live in New Jersey, contact those Senators who at least were willing to call this bill out for the crap that it is, and thank them.

Fred “One-Gun-A-Month” Madden needs to start believing he made a terrible mistake by hitching his fortunes to a sinking ship (Governor Corzine).  The sooner he starts believing that, the better.  His district office number is (856) 232-6700.  At the above link, you can find his electronic contact information.  This needs to get spread far and wide, around forums, gun shops, or anywhere else where gun owners congregate.  He needs to feel heat.

Know someone in his district?  Make sure they call.  His district encompasses Clementon Borough, Franklin Township, Glassboro Borough, Gloucester Township, Laurel Springs Borough, Lindenwold Borough, Monroe Township, Newfield Borough, Pitman Borough, Washington Township.  Out of district New Jersey gun owners need to call too.  Tell them you’ll volunteer for his opponents campaign, or tell them you’ll send his opponent money for his campaign.  Even if you don’t, Madden must be made to believe he’s made a horrible mistake.

So one-gun-a-month passed, and will no doubt be signed into law by Governor Corzine with fanfare.  New Jersey gun owners, by now, are used to their politicians crapping on them.  But this one was different.  It was different because we held this bill off in the Senate for months, embarrassed and enraged Bryan Miller several times, through a bipartisan coalition of Senators that prevented the bill from having enough votes to pass.

That changed last night.  Governor Corzine put everything he had on the line to break that coalition, and he convinced Fred “One-Gun-A-Month” Madden to abandon gun owners, and abandon his oath to uphold The Constitution.  Madden must be made to feel some heat over this vote.  He will be up for re-election in 2011.

But Corzine is an entirely different weasel.  Madden might have snatched the carrot, but Corzine is the man who dangled it in front of him.  As everyone knows, Corzine is up this November.  So this leaves New Jersey gun owners will some objectives:

1. You need to get rid of Corzine.  I don’t care how much you think Chris Christie is imperfect on gun rights (and he is).  You must show you can punish Corzine for using gun owners as a political punching bag.  If the SS Corzine sinks in the Atlantic, the rats who jumped on board his ship will have a tougher time politically.
2. Speaking of rats, Fred Madden needs to lose his seat.  If you live in his district, volunteer for his opponents campaign.  If you live near his district, volunteer for his opponents campaign.  If you live too far from his district to volunteer, send money.  Again, it doesn’t really matter how pro-gun his opponent is, as long as his opponent isn’t a wildly mad gun hater, the goal needs to be to show the gun vote can hurt Madden.

If gun owners in New Jersey can do those two things, they might be able to promote some fear of the gun vote in Trenton.  Corzine has essentially convinced them that they have nothing to fear from gun owners in New Jersey.  True, there are only about a million gun owners in The Garden State, but if you could just get half of those gun owners to vote like gun owners, get involved, and get active, those in Trenton would fear you.  NRA and ANJRPC’s job is now done.  They’ve done all they can do.  The rest is up to New Jersey gun owners.

The Senate was supposed to go into session two hours ago, but have not yet.  This could be a good sign on the gun rationing bill, as it might mean Corzine and Cody are having difficulty coming up with the votes they need.  Keep the pressure on, because we could still get screwed.  Stay tuned.

UPDATE: Senate just went into session.

UPDATE: Novelty lighters which were clearly a threat to New Jersey citizens are now banned in the Garden State by a vote of 37-1. It is just one of many fascinating things you can learn by watching the NJ Senate video feed.

UPDATE: I’m not ready to celebrate yet, but the Senate has gone into recess until after dinner. Supposedly, they will only be voting on budget matters, nominations, and bills currently coming over from the Assembly tonight. We’ll try to keep an eye on it later or see if there’s chatter out of Trenton that gives us a reason to be happy for today.

UPDATE: According to Sen. Dick Codey, George Bush is responsible for the overspending of the NJ Legislature this year. At least it’s keeping them from voting to ration guns.

It’s also amazing that the Democrats, via Sen. Barbara Buono, are making an issue of the horrors of a Republican proposal to cut down on prison inmate wages. She argued they absolutely could not be cut, even in difficult times when the money isn’t there. A Republican with a pulse should be able to defeat her on that bizarre speech alone.

UPDATE: The Republican Senators are getting up and making impassioned stands against this bill, but my fear is that it will pass. I don’t think it would be up if it wasn’t already a done deal.

UPDATE: Some Democratic Senators, namely Ronald Rice of Newark, don’t seem to have ever heard of Heller, and are still saying the Second Amendment is a collective right about the National Guard.

UPDATE: It’s 12:12AM, and I’m listening to the New Jersey Senate, so you don’t have to.  It’ll be great if we prevail this evening.  But I am not optimistic.  Republicans wouldn’t be piling on like this against the bill if they didn’t know it was going to pass.

UPDATE: Senator M. Teresa Ruiz — vote her out!  She does not honor her oath to uphold the Constitution.  Senator John A. Girgenti can go join her in private life.  “The right to bear arms is subject to restrictions.”  “You need more than 12 guns a year to protect yourself?  I don’t even understand that.”

UPDATE: Senator Loretta Weinberg says “You will have a right to bear 12 guns as arms. […] more than enough to compile a complete arsenal.   This bill merely limits the proliferation of guns in the state of New Jersey.”

UPDATE: I would just like to note that Richard Codey is a grade A, USDA pure asshole.  He lives up to his name.

UPDATE: Senator Cunningam “Justice Scalia was clear that this kind of legislation was constitutional.”  “Our streets are filled with illegal handguns.”   No Senator, your streets are filled with illegal criminals.  “Would we need bulletproof vests if we did not have handguns on the streets?”   Do you really think you can keep criminals from getting handguns, such that our police officers can walk around protecting themselves with rainbow farting unicorns?

UPDATE: 12:23AM.   Passed 21 yeah, and 15 nea.  New Jersey is now a one-gun-a-month state.  I will have more later, including which Senators betrayed the Second Amendment.  My message to New Jersey gun owners is don’t get mad… get even.  You will have that opportunity come November.  Vote the bastards out!

UPDATE: Watching the New Jersey Senate cannot be done without drinking.  It really does help.  A lot.  There’s not much that makes me proud to be Pennsylvanian, but watching what goes on in Trenton is one of those things.

UPDATE: Your battle cry is Fred “One-Gun-A-Month” Madden.  I will explain later.  This man needs to feel the pressure from gun owners.

Corzine is attempting to make guns a big issue in this election, and in that vain, there’s going to be a vote today on one-gun-a-month.  NRA is urging people to contact their Senators today.  Scott Bach is also calling Corzine out for trying to distract voters from his horrible mismanagement of the state.

Here’s my analysis of the game that Corzine is playing.  Gun politics in New Jersey is difficult.  The vast majority of the state are not gun owners, and have no familiarity with them.  Figures on household gun ownership are as low as 14%, whereas the rest of the country hovers closer to 40%.  Politicians that court the gun vote in the Garden State have to be careful not to come off as radical to the rest of the state.  It’s a fine balancing act that’s hard to manage, and Corzine is hoping to push Christie off the balance beam.

The last thing Corzine wants is for Christie to be able to count on the gun vote in the election.  By forcing a vote on one-gun-a-month, he’s going to try to force Christie to take a stand on it.  Take a stand against it, and the majority of New Jersians who are not gun owners will think he’s a radical conservative.  Take a stand in favor of it, you can count on gun owners to stay home on election day.  What New Jersey gun owners can do is help give their local politicians, and Chris Christie, some cover to either take the issue head on, or at least dodge it.  Send letters to the editor.  Talk about how Corzine is using this silly gun issue to distract from his mismanagement of the state’s finances.  Call your state rep and Senators and tell them the same thing.  Tell them not to play along with the governor’s beating up on gun owners, and to get back to fixing the state’s finances.  The only way gun owners are going to keep Christie on the reservation is to give him some cover.  Corzine is showing he’s going to make guns an issue in this election, and it is imperative to make sure it’s Corzine, and not Christie, who ends up on the wrong side of the issue.

I’ve seen this mailer making the rounds for a while now.  I can’t speak for Chris Christie, but I’ve spoken to Rick Merkt at a few ANJRPC events, and don’t believe he supports this position any longer.  He’s one of those folks who was duped by the fully automatic/semi-automatic confusion, and no longer supports the ban, and in the mean time has become a gun collector himself.  Having said that, it’s a moot issue, because the ban isn’t going away any time soon.  Commenter NJSoldier hit the nail on the head when he said this:

It would be great to replace Corzine with any Republican. Further erosion of our rights, and further wasteful spending would be halted. But to make real reforms and roll back the damage done will require some serious gains in the legislature.

Emphasis mine.  That’s one of the problems I had with Steve Lonegan’s candidacy, is that he was telling people he’ll get right-to-carry through the legislature.  It’s a nice thought, and I appreciate Lonegan being willing to talk favorably on the issue in New Jersey, but anyone who knows Trenton knows that bill is going nowhere, and Corzine will be happy to scare voters in November about Lonegan favoring all manner of gun wielding lunatics running around their kids soccer games, around churches, shopping malls, and restaurants waving guns around.  In New Jersey, that rhetoric works.

New Jersey’s percentage of gun ownship is 12.3%.  Compare that to Delaware’s 25.5%, Pennsylvania’s 34.7%, even New York’s 18%, and Maryland’s 21.3%.   Even Guam has a higher percentage of gun owners! The goal in the New Jersey’s governor’s race is to get someone in who will veto bad legislation, and give Second Amendemnt activists time to work on the legislature.  The overall goal now is to stop losing ground, and see if perhaps we can gain in some minor areas that would allow that number to creep back up.  Garden State gun enthusiasts need to mint more of yourselves.  That’s going to be the only real way to turn things around.  As much as I would like to be able to carry in New Jersey, or take my ARs over there to shoot high-power, your laws that make it tough for people to be introduced to the sport do far more harm than either of those things.  I’d start there.

If only it were actually true.  New Jersey is a tough state.  Christie is not going to be able to be overtly pro-gun in his rhetoric, and still come out in the race.  It’s one of the few states I know of where politicians smear their opponents as being pro-gun, and it actually works.  Christie will be an improvement over Corzine, and will at least block New Jersey’s laws from getting any worse.  Don’t expect him to lead the charge on concealed carry, or repealing New Jersey’s assault weapons ban, but being able to stop bad legislation is an advantage, and is step one in turning things around.

New Jersey has been on this path in 1966, when it passed most of its onerous gun laws.  It’s going to be tough to get things turned around, and it’s going to take a long time.  But I admire the folks who stay there, and don’t give up.  It prevents the anti-gun folks from moving on to other states.