Category: New Jersey

Last night those of us who shoot Thursday airgun silhouette at the club learned of an air pistol match held on wednesday evenings at the Delran Junior Marksman Club.  In virtually any other state, this wouldn’t really be an issue at all to go to the match.  But Delran is in New Jersey, and in New Jersey, airguns are firearms, and as we know, firearms are illegal in New Jersey.  You can only possess them under exceptions.

One of those exceptions is traveling to a shooting match, but you must go directly there.  You are only allowed to deviate in your course of travel as reasonably necessary under the circumstances.  They get to define reasonably necessary.  Considering I have to travel from work, my course of travel through New Jersey would be direct, but my entire course of travel would not be.  I’d also have to make sure I can find the range first, so I don’t risk getting lost.  And god help me if I have a hollow nose .22LR cartridge floating around in my car or range bag.

I’d like to shoot matches in New Jersey, but after hearing many a horror story from New Jersey gun attorneys of ordinary gun owners, including ones from Pennsylvania, ending up in serious trouble over there for things which are not illegal in any other state, I’m wary of traveling over there to shoot.

… gun hating family.  New Jersey State Senator Sandra Bolden hopes that one gun a month will spread to neighboring states.  What part of “No” didn’t she understand?

Bernard Bell is the associate dean at Rutgers Law School, and thinks that there should be strict liability for gun owners:

A move toward absolute liability would ideally be accompanied by private insurers’ willingness to insure gun owners against such liability. Such insurance should be separate from standard homeowners’ insurance, so that homeowners who do not own guns are not required to subsidize those who do.

The cost of insurance would reflect the expected cost of compensating gun injuries to innocent people. Individuals would then have the incentive to weigh the cost of injuries to others in deciding whether to purchase or keep firearms.

And insurance companies might well offer incentives, in the form of lower rates, to gun owners who engage in practices that decrease the likelihood of accidental injuries, such as trigger locks, safe storage and regular courses in maintenance and use of handguns.

Gun control people everywhere are thinking up ways to get around Heller, in order to discourage people from owning guns, and especially discouraging people from using them in self-defense.  Sadly, most of this stuff is probably not going to get the scrutiny they deserve from the courts, which is why the political fight is still paramount.

I wonder if Professor Bell is open to the idea that these liability issues should be applied equally to the police and military?

New Jersey Assemblywoman Joan Quigley asked the question:

I introduced that bill in the spring of 2006. If it had actually become law on the day it was introduced, Mr. Braico would have been able to accumulate 33 handguns between then and now. I fail to see how that’s an unreasonable restriction on his civil rights. And I do wonder what he might have done with all those deadly weapons.

An intrepid gun owner in The Garden State provides her with an answer:

When I first bought my XD-40 handgun, it was quite a large caliber, and so expensive to use for target practice. As my self-defense instructor told me, a large caliber is necessary for “stopping power” in self-defense situations. However, I immediately bought a smaller, inexpensive weapon – a .22-caliber Browning Buckmark – for target practice, just to save money. There, already, were two guns in one month.

However, both of those guns were too large for my wife to operate, so we bought a Lady Smith revolver, which is specially designed for the smaller hands of a woman. At that time, we discovered that the XD-40 jams quite a lot (a design flaw, I believe, but certainly a problem in a self-defense situation), so we bought a large Ruger six-shooter as a more reliable alternative to the XD-40.

The point is we bought more than one per month, for good reason.

I would say if the XD-40 jams a lot, it’s either a specific problem with the gun, or his wife is limp wristing it.  The XD line are generally pretty reliable from what I’ve heard.  But it’s a great way to point out why the one gun a month issue is a problem.  The burden should be on the people advocating it to prove it reduces crime, of which there is currently no evidence whatsoever.

Hat Tip to Cemetery’s Weblog

A Pennsylvania man gets busted for having a loaded gun in his car.  He has an LTCF in Pennsylvania, but not for New Jersey.  My bet is he forgot he had the gun in the car.  I do not normally keep loaded guns in my car, but I do often keep my range bag in the car.  You don’t know how often I’ve had to turn around because I suddenly realized I had hollow tip .22LR rounds in my vehicle, which is a serious crime in New Jersey.  Gun owners would be wise, before entering New Jersey, to do a complete vehicle search of their cars to ensure there is no hollow point ammunition floating around in it.  Definitely check to make sure you don’t have a firearm in the vehicle.

New Jersey laws are designed to do one thing: put firearms owners and shooters in jail.  Keep that in mind when traveling over the river where the second amendment does not apply.