One Handgun A Month Purchase Law In NJ Also Limits Firearms Dealers To One Handgun A Month Purchases

The now, thankfully, lame duck Governor, John Corzine signed into law the new measure limiting New Jersey resident to the purchase of just one handgun per month.

The "feels good" objective was to cut down on the supply of handguns to criminals. That is, assuming that gang members, drug dealers, and career criminals buy their handguns through legitimate dealers. And, that is not a correct assumption.

But in the fevered liberal frenzied rush to limit handgun purchases, the Legislature also banned legitimate gun dealers from buying more than one handgun a month too.

The law does not apply to Police purchases and Curio & Relic Licensees’ purchases.

Nor, does it apply to transfers of handguns between licensed retail dealers. However, transfers between retail dealers are not where gun dealers get the vast majority of their handguns for stock inventory.

The problem is that it does not exempt dealer purchases from wholesale distributor suppliers, the middle men from where the retail dealers get the majority of their new handgun stock.

So, since they can’t buy from wholesale distributors, they are limited to buying one handgun a month too.

The State’s Firearms task force has asked the Legislature to fix that mistake.

This new law, former Senate Bill S-1774, is known as the one handgun a month law, and as all gun laws do, it only affects the law abiding citizens.

For what it’s worth, even the anti gun Ceasefire New Jersey is for the fix.

But, the Executive Director of Ceasefire NJ's response to a commenter on his blog criticizing his one handgun every 30 days stance was blunt. He said, “So tell me…do you really “need” to be able to buy more than 13 guns a year? Hmmm?

As if “Need” is a Constitutional requirement to buy a handgun. But anti gun groups have never let Constitutional rights stand between them and their agenda.

Some might suggest that we need a law to limit the amount of vehicles a person or a family can own, as this will reduce the number of cars on the road, and cut down on accidents. This is the same tortured logic that Ceasefire NJ uses.

UPDATE ON THIS STORY FROM THE NRA: 12/14/09

The Senate gave final approval yesterday to amending a controversial law limiting handgun purchases to one every 30 days. One bill (S 3104) would allow need based exemptions to the one handgun a month requirement, allowing people who want to buy multiple handguns from an estate, for a collection or for competitive shooting to apply to the State Police for the ability to buy numerous weapons. Another bill (S 3068) would exempt licensed retailers from the limit. It also would clarify that registered gun wholesalers and manufacturers are not held to the one a month limit.