A special to the press of the state from Raleigh says there was passed by the last session of the legislature a law which prohibits receiving pistols and other deadly weapons through the mails except upon presentation of a permit from the clerk of the court. If that law turns out to be enforceable, as it should, and probably will, it will prove a check upon the promiscuous purchasing of “deadly weapons” by criminals.
Under the state law which has been in operation two years, no dealer in the state is permitted to sell a pistol, black-jack, dirk, or other of the so-called deadly weapons except upon presentation by the would-be purchaser of a permit signed by the clerk of superior court. That law was a failure, as the class of people for whom it was designed avoided its operation by ordering their weapons from mail order houses and received them through the mails. In that way the officers wee not able to keep track of the purchases, and the dealers in this state were deprived of much of that sort of business. But, the new law, which is an amendment to the anti-weapon measure, makes it a misdemeanor, punishable by fine or imprisonment, or both, to receive a pistol, pump-gun, bowie knife, dirk, metallic knucks, or dagger from postmaster, postal clerk or employe in the parcels post department, rural mail carrier, express agent or employe without possessing and presenting a permit signed by the clerk of the court. That act seems to have plenty of teeth, and should greatly curtail indiscriminate purchasing of deadly weapons n the state. Now if there were some method of making every owner of a weapon register with the civil authorities, and with a strict enforcement of the law against carrying concealed weapons, the evil would be greatly lessened.
From the editorial page of the Durham Morning Herald, Sunday, March 25, 1923
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