Today, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch's editorial board used Winston Calvert's arguments to support a new idea on gun control. As the paper explained:
In an interesting argument about the city’s right to set its own minimum wage, Winston Calvert, the St. Louis city counselor, makes a point that could be applied to another crucial problem in the city: guns.
On July 10, Gov. Jay Nixon vetoed House Bill 722, wherein the Legislature attempted to pre-empt local jurisdictions from setting minimum wages any higher than the state’s $7.65-an-hour rate. The veto took some pressure off the Board of Aldermen, which was trying to raise the wage in the city before the state law would have taken effect Aug. 28.
But in May, well before Mr. Nixon’s veto, Mr. Calvert wrote a memo in which he argued that by passing HB 722, the Legislature tacitly acknowledged that cities have the right to pass their own laws. The “regulation of wages is not uniform throughout the state, thus undermining any suggestion that the attached ordinance would conflict with state law,” Mr. Calvert wrote in a memo first obtained by Jason Rosenbaum of St. Louis Public Radio.
Republicans, who hold veto-proof majorities in both chambers of the Legislature, may try to override Mr. Nixon’s veto in the veto session that begins Sept. 16. But if they are successful, does that tacit admission of cities’ rights again become effective? . . .
St. Louis is enduring a wave of homicides this year, nearly all of them shooting deaths. Mayor Francis Slay, Police Chief Sam Dotson and Circuit Attorney Jennifer Joyce all believe that stricter gun laws would help. Of course, they’re right. . . . These are facts, and so is this: Missouri’s urban centers are facing a public health crisis created by a Legislature dominated by rural and suburban lawmakers in thrall to the gun lobby. To borrow their argument, Missouri’s cities have a right to defend themselves.