LTE: Stop curtailing rights of legal gun owners

December 07, 2006
Columbus Dispatch

In response to Friday’s Dispatch editorial "Veto is way to go," concerning House Bill 347, I am sick and tired of Big Media always condemning legal gun owners for the actions of criminals.

The editorial stated that more gun restrictions are needed in cities than in rural counties. It would make more sense to say that inner-city people need firearms for protection more than people in rural areas. It’s a fact that criminals prefer unarmed victims.

The editorial also stated that the concealed-carry law has been of no benefit to Ohioans. According the several surveys, including one conducted by the U.S. Justice Department, firearms are used for self-defense up to 1.5 million times per year. Many times, firearms are used for self-defense, and it goes unreported. In the past, I used a firearm to prevent an assault, and it was not reflected in any survey.

The Dispatch, along with others, uses home rule to infringe upon U.S. and state constitutional firearm rights. What if certain jurisdictions around Ohio were to place restrictions on press rights? What if journalists were licensed in Ohio, but each city had different rules and regulations?

The Dispatch always came across as anti-gun but at the same time accepted money from firearms advertisers.

As stated in Webster’s dictionary, a hypocrite is a person who acts in contradiction to his or her stated beliefs or feelings. Isn’t that what the newspaper is doing here?

Why is it that some in our society are so willing to give away other people’s rights but don’t want their own infringed upon? As the saying goes, "It’s a lot easier to spend someone else’s money than your own."

Just remember: The rights you take from others today will be taken from you by others tomorrow.

Chris Sterner
Westerville

Click on 'Read More' for additional letters from pro-gun writers in response to Dispatch and Toledo Blade editorials.

Hang heads in shame, Toledo

December 09, 2006
Toledo Blade

The Blade’s Dec. 2 editorial regarding local governments adopting weapons laws struck me as a rather humorous opinion that only The Blade could come up with. Therefore, if local towns can pass laws over and above the state laws, there should be no reason to pay any attention to the recently passed no-smoking law. Simply override the state law.

Reduce the speed limits on I-75 and I-475 to 35 mph. Pass ordinances allowing Toledo to open brothels. Pay no attention to the fact that Toledo’s antiquated laws have prevented Bass-Pro from opening its business in Toledo (even after a parade and fly over with Carty and Company).

Pay no attention to the fact that Toledo got rid of all its gun stores so now hundreds of people drive to Cabelas in Dundee, Mich. to buy sporting goods. Pay no attention to the giant sucking sound as people leave for the suburbs. They worry about brain drain. The brains are leaving the brainless.

For a city that cannot keep a signature company’s world headquarters downtown, a city that cannot overcome a basement flooding problem after six months, for a city’s newspaper that on one side shows how cooperative the union and management were to get a new billion-dollar Chrysler plant and on the other side the same union is advising its members not to subscribe to The Blade.

Yep Toledo Pride! The leaders of the city of Toledo should hang their heads in shame. Some of the shenanigans Toledo politicians have come up with are in the same category as the comedians in “The Three Stooges.”

The remaining Toledoans ought to pray that no more paranoia sets in on the leaders or the place will collapse into a vacuum.

Philip Sanford
Perrysburg

City misinterpreted meaning of home rule

December 11, 2006
Toledo Blade

The Tuesday Dispatch article "80 local gun laws imperiled by bill" implied that the bill would leave gun dealers unregulated, etc. But all gun dealers already are regulated and licensed by the state and federal governments. Home rule was intended to give cities in Ohio limited local control over issues not otherwise regulated by state or federal law.

It wasn’t intended to apply to anything and everything a city wished to enact. Columbus has already lost in court over a prior ordinance and now will face another set of expensive lawsuits that any reasonable, intelligent person can see is a lost cause. Just read the recent Ohio Supreme Court ruling on Cleveland’s predatory-lending bill for an example of how home rule is a very limited scope of authority and not the blank check our city leaders wish it were.

Columbus, like many other leftleaning cities, wants to control and restrict the Second Amendment rights of its citizens with all of its unconscionable laws and regulations.

How many regulations or laws do we need? We already have a Second Amendment that guarantees that our right to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed. Tell me, what part of shall not be infringed do the overreaching City Council members not understand?

Do we need to pass a law telling them that they’ve exceeded their authority? Well, it appears so.

Robert Williams Sr.
Powell

Bill entails more than gun control

December 11, 2006
Columbus Dispatch

I respond to Tuesday’s Dispatch article "80 local gun laws imperiled by bill." The article seemed to indicate that the pre-emption of local firearms laws would be a clear-cut pro-gun vs. gun-control issue. This is by no means the case.

While it is currently attached to House Bill 347, the pre-emption’s impact is by no means limited to concealed-carry, even though those local ordinances affect concealedcarry greatly. Guns and criminals, but also regular citizens, travel easily between localities, so the effectiveness of local ordinances should be questionable, at best.

In fact, the laws often are very hard to discover and largely unknown to residents and sometimes even law enforcement. Even the Dispatch article listed only a small subset of local ordinances.

Having lived in California, which does have statewide pre-emption, I can say that it does help to greatly simplify firearms laws and makes it easier for both citizens and law enforcement to know the applicable law, without pandering to a particular side of the gun-ownership and concealed-carry debate.

Martin Herrmann
Marysville