Posted on 11/19/2019 4:52:27 AM PST by Lowell1775
The idea of alcohol prohibition was settled almost a century ago when the Volstead Act was repealed by yet another constitutional amendment. It’s the only amendment that’s been passed, then repealed a short time later. In truth, prohibition was a complete and total disaster.
Luckily, we’ve left that behind. While some faiths take issue with alcohol consumption, that’s generally left to each individual to decide for themselves. Though, admittedly, there’s something to be said about using alcohol to combat some anti-gun arguments.
However, in Ohio, arguments are gearing up to determine whether drinking at home should make use of a firearm illegal.
The Ohio Supreme Court will hear arguments in February to decide whether a law prohibiting gun owners from carrying firearms while intoxicated should be applied inside a gun owner’s home.
Lawyers for a Clermont County man arrested in 2018 after he acknowledged having an unloaded shotgun while drunk say the law is unconstitutional when applied to homeowners.
They say a person’s sobriety or intoxication level should have nothing to do with possessing a weapon “in the hearth and home.”
And, honestly, they’re right.
Now, I’m a big believer in the idea that guns and alcohol don’t mix. I don’t recommend a range day with a cooler of beer and, in fact, will rail against it to anyone who cares to listen. It’s just a bad idea any way you slice it.
The thing is, though, you don’t forfeit your right to self-defense simply because you’ve had a few drinks.
A law that says possession of a firearm while above the legal alcohol limit essentially says that if you drink and your life is in danger, you’re slap out of luck because if you do use a firearm in self-defense, you could be prosecuted. Now, it’s better to be tried by 12 than carried by six, but that’s still not a good position to put anyone in.
That’s especially true since it’s possible to try and be responsible with your firearms and your drinking and still end up in a position like that.
Laws against carrying while drinking are predicated at least in part on the idea that you aren’t being responsible. Whether you agree or not is irrelevant. This is the law as it stands in Ohio and a lot of other places.
The problem is that it also regulates lawful behavior inside the home. After all, drinking at home is legal, as is carrying a firearm. It just says you can’t do both inside your home.
Normally, no one would know you did any such thing. The problem arises when you need to act in self-defense.
Frankly, that should never be an issue. While it’s unlikely that most prosecutors would make a stink over something like that–it doesn’t sound like the man in question was acting in such a manner–it doesn’t mean no one ever will. No one should be prosecuted for protecting their own life. Moreover, no one should have to be worried about it.
Let’s hope the Ohio State Supreme Court makes the right call on this one.
OHIO PING!
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“ Ohio Supreme Court To Decide Whether Gun Owners Can Drink At Home
Posted at 4:30 pm on November 18, 2019 by Tom Knighton”
So, if there is to be war, go first for the prosecutors.
A real club trumps a bogus legal club
I know a Marine who owns a gun shop/shooting range in Ohio who’d piss himself laughing at this idea.
As would I.
They’re going on the presumption that all gun owners are morons, and should have their rights removed like flicking a switch.
It’s not really enforceable, though it may have saved Terry Kath’s life. :)
How can such a law be enforced? That is the main problem as I see it. It’s as thought it would be one of those “secondary” violations, like seat belt laws used to be. They are in the house on a domestic violence call, the man or the woman is intoxicated, and there is a gun on the kitchen table. Busted.
That’s All I’m really seeing here.
It’s time we start going after those individual prohibition laws and that should include smoking. Which supporters of alcohol prohibition will be using to promote their cause.
The word “supreme” went to their heads. They should just declare that this is NOT a matter for the courts, or for the state at all and drop the matter entirely.
Yep.
Or an anti gun neighbor walks by the gun owner’s trash barrels on trash day, throws a few empty beer bottles next to the empty ammo boxes and calls police.
Like the idiotic red flag laws, this is ripe for abuse.
Whatever happened to stay out of my bedroom?
Can we bring back anti-sodomy laws again now?
Didn’t our Founding Fathers meet in pubs, drink the swill and plan the departure from old England?
So if they come to your house, find you intoxicated, find your car keys on your kitchen table, then do you also lose your driving privileges? After all, you could, in your intoxicated condition, decide to get in your car and get involved in an accident that kills someone.
Now mind you, the Constitution grants you the right to own a gun—without any reference to whether you are sober or intoxicated. The Constitution says nothing about who can drive.
Or an anti gun neighbor walks by the gun owner’s trash barrels on trash day, throws a few empty beer bottles next to the empty ammo boxes and calls police.
In England they are arguing about Kitchen Knives in ethnically English homes... as of yet no one has introduced the idea of banning household knives because of occupant drinking. Of course we the problem is Muslim’s knifing people outside their homes.
Following through with this we should ban liberals from breathing.
“So if they come to your house, find you intoxicated, find your car keys on your kitchen table, then do you also lose your driving privileges? ”
Excellent point. Or, at a restaurant having a drink with dinner. Apply the reasoning elsewhere, how’s it sound?
This “because you might ___________” ‘reasoning’ is abominably unAmerican, invasive and 1984ish.
DAs and prosecutors are big causes of this bullshit. Lawyers — enemies within.
I think it means that if you were in your home and have had a drink and some clown breaks in and you shoot him it’s your fault that he broke in.
Also, suppose you use your gun in self-defense in the house and in the course of the investigation the police discover that you have beer in the refrigerator or a liquor cabinet, I think the law would then be used to prosecute you.
We should never underestimate the overzealousness of anti-gun prosecutors.
It wouldn’t take a very good attorney to make the “beer in the fridge” excuse irrelevant.
If I’m driving home from the liquor store and get pulled over, having unopened containers in the car can not be used against me. Same thing here.
I’m not saying I’m for this law. I’m just saying that it really would not be all that impactive on most people. It would be a little like the “stop and frisk” thing.
Maybe the delusion Democrats are going to try for another National Prohibition and legalize Pot.
While I agree with your comment, an anti-gun prosecutor could carry this on long enough to bankrupt the average person with legal fees. In the end it would be a pyrrhic victory for the homeowner.
Been done before with similar laws.
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