New Jersey Town To Require Distance Between Gun Stores, Schools

Bearing Arms – by Tom Knighton

In my neck of the woods, people get rather squirrely about alcohol. They don’t want it to be sold in certain places like near schools, churches, or other such places. People who support these laws forget that there’s literally nothing stopping people from bringing said alcohol as close to the church as they want–they also forget that not all faiths have a prohibition against alcohol, but that’s another topic for another time.

A town in New Jersey is looking to start treating gun stores the same as liquor stores are treated here.  

The Piscataway Town Council has passed an ordinance that would ban the sale of firearms in certain areas of the town.

Under the measure, the retail sale of guns would be banned near schools, day care sites, college campuses, medical facilities, bars, parks, places of worship and similar sites.

“The federal government has been willingly absent on the epidemic of gun violence,” Councilmember Steven Cahn said in a statement.  “It is left to states and local governments to protect our residents, so we acted.”

They acted and accomplished less than nothing.

These regulations will do nothing but make it difficult for law-abiding gun stores to open. As a result, these stores may well be forced to be located outside of the town’s jurisdiction.

Yes, I know they’re fine with that, but like with alcohol, there’s nothing that can stop those firearms from being transported back into the town. In fact, that’s probably what’s going to happen with them. They’ll be purchased and transported all over the town.

But the town won’t benefit at all from those sales. No property taxes being paid by the store, for example. And no sales tax, in case the state of New Jersey decided to allow communities to set their own sales taxes. No fees being generated. Nothing. Absolutely no benefit will be derived economically from that store even existing.

All because they wanted to make it a pain to open one.

Look, firearms are portable. If they weren’t, they’d be called “artillery.” By their very nature, they are meant to be taken anywhere they need to go. Relegating their sale to certain parts of the town won’t make anyone any safer. Not in the least.

Especially since those who are inclined to do bad things aren’t likely to be using a gun store anyway.

As things stand, everyone is still focused on how the Parkland killer got his weapon. They’re ignoring the myriad of other such killers who stole their gun. They’re ignoring the plethora of breakdowns that lead to that killer even being able to get a firearm. They’re ignoring all reality to focus on the fact that the gun sale took place at a gun store.

Stop.

There is a whole other level to gun violence in this country, and if you want to combat it, you need to consider real, concrete alternatives to trying to treat the gun like an evil talisman. It’s not. It’s a tool that has served hero and villain alike. It has no volition of its own.

The problem, as always, is people.

Unless you’re also going to keep people from those buildings, no one will ever be any safer in those places.

Bearing Arms