“The Chicago suburb of Lyons, one of three Illinois communities sued earlier this year for alleged weak oversight of gun stores, passed a new ordinance Tuesday that spells out procedures for more closely monitoring firearms sales,” the AP reports. “The ordinance passed Tuesday calls for close cooperation between the village of Lyons and its lone gun shop, Midwest Sporting Goods. The gun shop must keep electronic records of anyone who purchases more than one firearm within a 12-month period. Records and documents must be turned over to local law enforcement within 48 hours if the gun shop determines the potential buyer is not a ‘valid or lawful” purchaser.'” Hang on . . .
It’s already against the law – federal law – for a gun store to sell a gun to a prohibited person. Under the new ordinance Midwest Sporting Goods has to report gun buyers that they think are not a “valid or lawful” buyer. A buyer who, for example, answered the required ATF form 4473 truthfully in a way that prohibits them from a purchasing a firearm.
What could possibly go wrong? But wait, there’s more! “The ordinance also requires the shop to maintain a ‘do not sell’ list of people who purchased a gun that was later traced to a crime.” So a gun buyer whose firearm is stolen and traced to a crime becomes a prohibited person at Midwest Sporting Goods.
The ordinance requires Midwest Sporting Goods to commit commercial suicide. How many gun owners would put up with this Big Brother law?
Lyons, Illinois has now been dropped from a lawsuit “filed in July [by] two mothers who lost sons to gun violence, ministers and an activist group. They accused Lyons and the suburbs of Riverdale and Lincolnwood of violating the civil rights of residents in Chicago’s largely African-American neighborhoods by failing to take steps to make sure gun stores are not selling firearms to people who should not be allowed to carry them.”
Off to the courts we go….
[NOTE: An earlier version of this post stated that the city ordinance violated the Firearms Owners Protection Act. It does not.]