Federal Judge Rules Chicago's Ban On Licensed Gun Dealers Unconstitutional

wooferhound writes with news that a federal judge has overturned part of Chicago's firearm laws. From CNN: "A federal judge ruled Monday that Chicago's ban on virtually all sales and transfers of firearms is unconstitutional. 'The stark reality facing the City each year is thousands of shooting victims and hundreds of murders committed with a gun. But on the other side of this case is another feature of government: certain fundamental rights are protected by the Constitution, put outside government's reach, including the right to keep and bear arms for self-defense under the Second Amendment,' wrote U.S. District Judge Edmond Chang." The Chicago Tribune notes: "The ruling also would make it legal for individuals to transfer ownership of a firearm as a gift or through a private sale as long as the recipient was at least 18 and had a firearm owner's identification card." The ruling doesn't change anything yet: the ruling's effect was delayed to give the city time to appeal.

Comments

Re:Took them long enough...

[lgw]

No, the wild west was open carry. Open carry seems provocative. The primary point of most states' concealed carry laws is that your gun must remain concealed at all times. Flashing or suggesting you carry can cost your license, and is assault if it can be construed as a threat - which is an automatic 10 year sentence in some states.

The best part of concealed carry is herd immunity - you can benefit from other's carrying and the deterrent effect that has. It's no coincidence that all but one mass shooting in the past few decades happened in a "gun free zone" of some sort (and the one exception was likely a political assassination with collateral damage, not a random shooting).

Re:Took them long enough...

[MBGMorden]

I think you'll find that the murder rate (RATE - not total which was much lower) was actually lower during the "wild" west than it is today.

The reality is that the the "wild" west is mostly an invention of the mid-20th century movie industry that took a handful of historical events and portrayed it such that people think that it was completely normal for the town to be shot up.

As a matter of fact specifically in Dodge City as you mention from 1870 to 1885 there were a total of 45 homicides, putting the murder rate at 1 per 100k people.
http://www.examiner.com/article/dispelling-the-myth-of-the-wild-west

The current murder rate as of 2010 is 4.8 per 100k for the overall country and is much higher than that in some urban areas.
http://www.fbi.gov/about-us/cjis/ucr/crime-in-the-u.s/2010/crime-in-the-u.s.-2010/tables/10tbl01.xls

The simple fact is that the "wild" west wasn't as wild as you'd believe.