The anti-gun lobby’s worst nightmare is a strong firearm industry in America. So that’s exactly what we’ll give them. Tennessee may be leading this initiative.
The Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act was a law passed in 2005. Its purpose was to protect firearm manufacturers and dealers from being held liable for crimes committed with their products. The concept was simple. You don’t sue an auto manufacturer for the negligence of a driver. Therefore, the PLCAA would uphold that same ethic when it came to the manufacturers and retailers of firearms.
But since the anti-gun lobby’s mission has been to kill gun ownership in America, attacking our firearm manufacturers and retailers has been an ongoing pursuit. The gun grabbers thought that they could cut the head off the snake by shutting down the production of guns. Restrictive gun laws at the personal level, serialization, registration, hindering gun ranges, and creating laws that would ignore due process through unconstitutional firearm confiscation was not quite enough. They wanted to run every gun shop out of town and out of business. So, the PLCAA was signed into law as a commonsense measure to protect the ability of American citizens to exercise the Second Amendment by restricting such Constitutional behavior from the very litigious and immoral anti-gun mob.
Every strategy was used since then to subvert the PLCAA, including the ATF’s Zero Tolerance Policy. This policy was put in place under the Biden administration and would undercut the PLCAA by attacking firearm retailers from a different direction. Zero Tolerance was nothing more than an unconstitutional policy created and enforced by the ATF and used simple clerical errors in paperwork, filings, and other administrative procedures to revoke firearm retailers’ licenses, ultimately eliminating their ability to sell products to the public. In other words, if a simple mistake was made on a firearms form or other documentation, it would be used as justification for revocation of the retailer’s ability to do business. And it was. Several hundred gun shops were run out of business during the Biden administration due to this policy.
SB1360 and HB873 were introduced in response to a lawsuit filed by Mexico against Smith & Wesson which also occurred during the Biden Administration. In short, Mexico sued Smith & Wesson and tried holding them responsible for their firearms getting into the hands of drug cartels in Mexico. Recently, SB1360 and HB873 passed in the Tennessee General Assembly. This legislation will significantly strengthen the firearms industry in the State of Tennessee by enhancing the legal protections for firearms manufacturers and dealers who operate within the state, shielding them from aggressive lawsuits being filed in anti-gun states. Not only did the bill pass in both chambers, but it also passed with overwhelming majority on April 15, 2025.
On May 2, 2025, Tennessee Governor Bill Lee signed the measures into law.
This new legislation expands legal protections to include additional industry players, including private sellers, suppressor manufacturers, and magazine producers.
It prohibits Tennessee courts from recognizing or enforcing out of state or foreign court judgments that conflict with Tennessee’s pro-Second Amendment public policy.
This would prevent unreasonable lawsuits like Mexico v. Smith & Wesson from taking place in the state of Tennessee
It also penalizes bad faith litigation by imposing triple damages on out of state plaintiffs and their attorneys who attempt to enforce hostile judgments in Tennessee courts, an unprecedented safeguard for gun rights, advocates, and businesses.
Not only will this new legislation protect Tennessee firearm dealers, but it may create precedent and encourage other states to follow Tennessee’s lead. The bill will also likely strengthen Tennessee’s reputation as a hub for firearm manufacturing and sales in the United States. As a matter of fact, Beretta and Smith & Wesson have already relocated to Tennessee and will proudly manufacture their products there.
