When Missouri passed it’s sanctuary law, the measure basically said that federal gun control laws were invalid. They just didn’t exist within the state’s borders.

Other states started trying to follow suit.

I got a fair bit of heat because I actually said I thought that was probably a bad idea. It wasn’t that I dislike Missouri’s law, only that I didn’t think it would stand up to legal challenge from the federal government. I wanted to see what the courts said so other laws could be better crafted.

In Ohio, though, it seems they are taking an approach that I personally feel is far wiser. And they’re not the only ones treading that same path.

The bill mirrors a law passed in Missouri in 2021 that restricts the enforcement of federal laws which violate the state’s view of the Second Amendment, according to the Dispatch. The Department of Justice (DOJ) sued Missouri after the law was passed, saying the state could not “simply declare federal laws invalid,” according to a DOJ press release.

Loychik believes that HB 51 is even stronger than Missouri’s law, according to the Dispatch. “There have been changes that have been made. This bill is a lot stronger,” he said, noting that the bill will not violate the Supremacy Clause.

“House Bill 51 does not challenge that,” Loychik said. “It simply states that the state of Ohio will not help the federal government agencies enforce their gun-control agenda by commandeering our local enforcement.”

Earlier in February, Republican Montana Gov. Greg Gianforte sent a letter to U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland, saying that Montana would not enforce the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives’ (ATF) final rule for pistol braces.

The letter follows HB 258, passed by the Montana Legislature in 2021, a law that blocks peace officers, state employees or employees of a political subdivision “from enforcing, assisting in the enforce of, or otherwise cooperating in the enforcement of a federal ban on firearms, magazines, or ammunition,” according to the legislation.

See, I like the Missouri law. I want it to stand up in court. I just don’t believe it will.

However, agencies like the ATF depend on local law enforcement for assistance. Without them, they can’t really do all that much in our local communities.

By laying down the law and saying that local and state law enforcement will not help enforce unconstitutional gun control laws, they’re accomplishing the same thing as the Missouri law from a far more defensible legal position, in my layman’s opinion.

After all, the feds can’t just appropriate local law enforcement for their own purposes. They can’t swoop in and just demand the county sheriff dedicate X number of deputies toward their own investigations and arrests. They need those agencies to cooperate.

These efforts basically say that’s not going to happen.

In impact, there’s not a whole lot of difference between what they’re doing in Ohio and what Montana has already done. Yet the latter will likely survive legal challenges while the former isn’t as likely to.

I could be wrong, of course, and I’d love to be. I’d love it if Missouri’s sanctuary law was upheld by the Supreme Court and numerous other states decided to follow suit.

But I don’t think I am and I think most of you probably agree that I’m not, no matter how much we hope I am.

Ohio and Montana though? I think they’re on the right road.