EDITORIAL

Bipartisan common sense

4/15/2018
Gov. John Kasich suggests proposed gun legislation he is supporting in the aftermath of the Parkland, Fla., school shooting should transcend political parties.
Gov. John Kasich suggests proposed gun legislation he is supporting in the aftermath of the Parkland, Fla., school shooting should transcend political parties.

Gov. John Kasich is arguing that the package of gun laws he is supporting in the Ohio general assembly should transcend partisanship.

The reforms, which Mr. Kasich first proposed after the Feb. 14 shooting that killed 17 students and adults at a Parkland, Fla., high school, would prohibit people with domestic-violence protection orders from buying or possessing guns, prohibit the sale of armor-piercing ammunition, and stop third-party “strawman” sales of guns to people prohibited from having them.

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The governor’s proposal also aims to improve the promptness with which Ohio courts report criminal data to the national background check system that gun dealers check before selling weapons.

Mr. Kasich appeared before the press outside his ceremonial statehouse office last week with the father of one of the Parkland victims to encourage bi-partisan support of the measures.

The governor called his proposals “common sense.” He is right. There should be no partisan divide on the relatively modest measures that have broad public support.

Tightening loopholes that have allowed gun sales that skirt the law only makes sense. Restricting armor-piercing ammunition is a straightforward public-safety measure. And allowing judges to intervene and temporarily remove guns from owners who have demonstrated to police or family members that they are too unstable to have access to weapons will certainly save lives.

The gun laws already in place that should restrict gun sales to people with criminal records must be enforced. That can only happen if the courts that are supposed to report convictions to the national database consistently keep up with that reporting.

The gun-reform measures before the General Assembly now are, as the governor describes them, common-sense proposals that deserve support from both parties. This is an opportunity for Ohio to lead and demonstrate that reasonable safety measures can make communities safer without infringing on the Second Amendment.