My article on this subject will be coming out next year in the Stanford Law Review, and I thought I’d preview it on the blog (with the journal’s permission). I hope you folks find it interesting, and I’d very much like to have people’s comments, criticisms, and suggestions while there is still plenty of time to work them in. Let me begin with the Introduction, with the footnotes largely omitted; for the footnotes, the Appendix listing the various statutes, ordinances, and rules that I refer to, and for the body of the paper, see here.
Owning a stun gun is a crime in seven states — Hawaii, Massachusetts, Michigan, New Jersey, New York, Rhode Island, and Wisconsin — plus New Orleans, Philadelphia, South Bend (Indiana), the Virgin Islands, Washington, D.C., Wilmington (Delaware), and three counties surrounding Annapolis and Baltimore. In Illinois, possessing a stun gun in a public housing project is a crime. In Akron, Ohio, 18-to-20-year-olds aren