Mass shooters, like people in other groups, have patterns. One of the consistent patters is that they tend to specifically target gun-free zones: areas where carrying a gun is illegal. Why? So that that they can have a higher death count. It’s horrible that they do that, but it’s useful for you and I to know so that we can try to avoid being in gun-free zones.
But completely avoiding gun-free zones isn’t always practical. And while the ignorant may think that there is a logic to making schools gun-free zones (which prevents law-abiding people from being there to protect against active shooters), there is one place that was, until recently, a gun-free zone that will just make you scratch your head.
Because you’ll wonder why it was a gun-free zone in the first place. Naveen Athrappully writes,
A federal judge in Florida ruled on Jan. 12 that the U.S. government’s decision to arrest a man for possessing a firearm in a post office violated his Second Amendment right to bear arms.
U.S. District Judge Kathryn Kimball Mizelle for the Middle District of Florida cited the 2022 Supreme Court ruling in the New York State Rifle and Pistol Association Inc. v. Bruen case, in which the high court said that the Second Amendment protects a U.S. citizen’s right to carry a handgun in public for self-defense purposes.
That ruling also set up a new test for judging firearms laws, stating that such legal restrictions should be consistent with the country’s historical tradition of firearms regulation.
That’s right, it was illegal to carry a firearm in a post office.
And does it make any sense to anyone with a rational viewpoint on guns and gun ownership why that had been the case?
I won’t pretend that it makes sense to me, but I am glad that Judge Mizelle decided to get rid of that stupid gun-free zone designation for post offices. Americans should be able to carry to defend themselves in every public space.
