It's been on the book since 1982. They don't enforce it, but still, I'm surprised no one has challenged its constitutionality. The Second Amendment doesn't say, "The right of the government to require the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed".

In one U.S. town, residents are legally required to own guns and ammo
In Kennesaw, Georgia it's against the law not to own a gun

By Kendall Tietz | Fox News
Published January 11, 2025 5:00pm EST

In Kennesaw, Georgia, it's against the law not to own a gun.

The city law, dating back to the 1980s, makes it a requirement for residents to own guns and ammo.

Kennesaw's gun law states: "In order to provide for and protect the safety, security and general welfare of the city and its inhabitants, every head of household residing in city limits is required to maintain a firearm, together with ammunition." The law excludes residents with mental or physical disabilities, felony convictions or conflicting religious beliefs.

"It's not like you go around wearing it on your hip like the Wild Wild West," Derek Easterling, the town's three-term mayor, told BBC News. "We're not going to knock on your door and say, ‘Let me see your weapon.’"

The mayor told BBC that, according to his knowledge and that of multiple other local officials, there have been no prosecutions or arrests made for violating the 1982 law.

The law is a source of pride for some and embarrassment for others. Most residents told BBC that the law keeps citizens safe as there were no murders in town in 2023, according to Kennesaw Police Department data. There were two suicides, however, involving guns.

"If anything, criminals need to be concerned, because if they break into your home, and you're there, they don't know what you got," customers at a local pizza joint argued.

"It's the attitude behind the guns here in Kennesaw that keep the gun crimes down, not the guns," Blake Weatherby, a groundskeeper at the Kennesaw First Baptist Church, told the BBC. "It doesn't matter if it's a gun or a fork or a fist or a high heel shoe. We protect ourselves and our neighbors."

At one point, Weatherby said he owned over 20 guns, but now he doesn't own any.

Pat Ferris, who joined Kennesaw's city council in 1984 just years after the gun law was passed, said that it was created to be "more of a political statement than anything" and added that he isn't sure "how many people even know that the ordinance exists."

Morton Grove, Illinois, became the first city in the U.S. to ban gun ownership, but Kennesaw became the first city to require it. Similar laws have been passed in at least four other U.S. cities: Gun Barrel City, Texas; Virgin, Utah; Nelson, Georgia and Nucla, Colorado.

City council member Madelyn Orochena described the law as "a weird little factoid about our community."

"Residents will either roll their eyes in a bit of shame or laugh along about it," she told the BBC.

Lived in K-Town for years in my 20s.
Owned a Beretta and a S&W 669.

Yup.

Located NW of the big Shitty, and the crime rate there is spectacularly low.

I'd rather be unarmed in Kennesaw than carrying down Bankhead Highway*

*How did they get the crime statistics better for the Bankhead Highway corridor? Simples! Just rename the street!

I lived there for almost 20 years before moving to Florida. It was a nice place. The college expanded quite a bit while I was there and I feel like the town was getting too big and too crowded so we left. But I loved it there.

And yes, I obeyed the law from day one

This was enacted about the same time Morton Grove, Ill made the news banning the possession of firearms. At the time, I had a LES P-18 pistol, manufactured in Morton Grove. Huge gun, a fixed barrel blowback.

If you don't have a gun, will they issue one to you?

quote:

Originally posted by Fredward:
At the time, I had a LES P-18 pistol, manufactured in Morton Grove. Huge gun, a fixed barrel blowback.

Yep. Les Rogak's cheap knockoff of the Steyr GB, just straight blowback instead of the Steyr's actual gas delayed blowback. Had a lot of issues that made it borderline unsafe to shoot, and only ~1000 were ever made.

Forgotten Weapons did a good overview of it and all its problems several years back.

quote:

Originally posted by Fredward:
This was enacted about the same time Morton Grove, Ill made the news banning the possession of firearms...

And, thanks to Heller (2008), the asshole commies quietly folded their hand.

The thing I remember best about the Morton Grove handgun ban was that the village board exempted themselves from the ban.

Socialism at its finest!

I grew up in Kennesaw, and ironically the news interviewed my neighbor when this passed. I do not know here real name but we called her grovey (sp).

I know this was technically a in response to the Illinois bill but as I remember it, it was also in response to the child abductions and murders. They stopped in 1981 but they did not know if they had the guy.

I can remember the eerie announcement every night "its 11pm, do you know where your children are?".

I was with my dad in the grocery store, and they cops showed up and the whole place was locked down. A mom was hysterical that 'her boy had been taken'. We could not leave the k-mart. Later, it turned out she had left the boy at home with his dad and sisters on accident.

That summer of 1980 was weird, we rode our bikes around but were only allowed to if there were several of us. I loved riding up to the DQ on 41 and we would play pacman. What a great time to be alive.