Federal law allows retired police officers to carry concealed firearms nationwide with some exceptions and conditions. A retired officer who resides in New Jersey must also obtain and carry a permit card from the state at a cost of $50 per year. A retired officer who lives anywhere else in the country is not required to have this card nor its equivalent (if there even is such a thing) from their home state while in NJ and retired NJ officer is not required to produce the card in any other state.
It seems to me that where you live, not the act itself, determines whether or not there is a violation of the state law. Is this even legal and, if so, what is the legal theory called? Are there any other examples of this? Fireworks possession come to mind. I think a NJ resident can buy fireworks in PA but a Pennsy resident can not? I’m not at all sure about that one.
This is perfectly ordinary and I’m not sure that there is a specific legal theory that covers it. Income tax, driver’s licenses, professional licenses, gun permits and licenses in general (not just this specific one), and a host of other laws depend on a person’s state of residence. Other legal proceedings like civil lawsuits, divorces, and custody hearings also depend on state of residence. There’s really not anything out of the ordinary with the particular law you’re talking about.
Among the conditions of the law is that the retired police officer must: (1) qualify each year to carry firearms, (2) carry appropriate ID, and (3) pay the cost of qualifying to carry a firearm.
If the retired police officer worked in New Jersey and lives in New Jersey, the answer is easy. The retired police officer must qualify under New Jersey’s standards each year and must pay New Jersey’s fee to qualify. Whether they call that a fee for qualifying or a fee for the ID seems like a distinction without a difference since, without the ID, the qualification is meaningless.
If the retired officer retired from an agency in, let’s say, North Dakota but now lives in New Jersey, my reading of the statute indicates that the retired officer may have a choice to either meet the qualification standards for the North Dakota agency from which the officer retired, or New Jersey’s standards. Then, the retired officer must get that agency to issue the appropriate identification. There is nothing in the law that compels a law enforcement agency to qualify retired officers or to issue ID under any circumstances, so, sticking with our example, if the North Dakota agency no longer wants to qualify retired officers to carry, a retired officer that lives in New Jersey could instead qualify in New Jersey and meet New Jersey standards. Likewise, if New Jersey doesn’t want to qualify retired officers to carry, it can just decline to do so altogether.
Nope - no card needed. And, as I read the NJ law, there is no specific exception for retired LEOs from other states to carry in NJ. Presumably, they are covered by the federal law. I guess it bothers me because its just another layer of unneeded bureaucracy.
“Income tax, driver’s licenses, professional licenses, gun permits and licenses in general (not just this specific one), and a host of other laws depend on a person’s state of residence. Other legal proceedings like civil lawsuits, divorces, and custody hearings also depend on state of residence.”
I think this is more akin to the Feds saying “From now on, no permits are required to build houses anywhere in the U.S.” Then a state says, “If you live here you need a permit to build a house here. If you don’t live here, you don’t need a permit to build here”. Are there existing laws like that?
For what it’s worth, the federal law basically says, “Retired cop, if you get a permit to carry a gun in your state or in the state where you retired as a cop, you can use that permit to carry that gun in another state.” So, the out-of-state retired cops don’t have to get a New Jersey permit to carry in New Jersey but they must get a permit in their own state.
I suppose the law works well enough and it certainly works better than the way you seem to be suggesting it should work. If you retire as a cop in New Jersey but New Jersey doesn’t trust you to carry a gun anymore, why should New York or any other state be required to let you carry your gun there? This isn’t needless bureaucracy; it’s a minimum standard appropriate to the legislative goal of allowing qualified law enforcement officers to carry their guns across state lines.
It’s already more permissive than it should be and against the principles of federalism. If you believe that the historical purpose of the second amendment is a bulwark against federal tyranny and that the second amendment is necessary to preserve a state’s authority to operate a militia, this law runs exactly counters that goal. The federal government has authorized people from outside a state to have and use guns in a state against that state’s wishes. In other words, the federal government has authorized the armed occupation of states by other states’ law enforcement officers and retirees. How is a New Jersey supposed to defend itself against if California decides to send a million armed law enforcement officers to Trenton? This law undermines the allocation of power between the states and federal government that the second amendment was intended to protect but nobody in the gun rights community seems to see it that way.