COLUMBUS — Do Ohio cities have the home-rule authority to regulate guns within their own borders in the face of constitutional language and state law protecting gun rights?

The city of Columbus on Tuesday urged the Ohio Supreme Court to overturn a preliminary injunction issued by a court in neighboring Delaware County that has blocked enforcement of its ordinance prohibiting high-capacity magazines, those with 30 or more rounds of ammunition, and requiring responsible storage of firearms in the home.

Violators could face jail time.

The city argues that, even though a final Common Pleas Court ruling is still pending, the injunction will allow gun violence harming Columbus residents to continue in the meantime.

“During the course of this case, we successfully prosecuted a person under the failure to properly secure a firearm,” city Solicitor General Richard Coglianese said. “That person had a loaded gun stored in a couch cushion.”

“A 5-year-old child picks up the loaded gun from the couch and came within an inch of blowing his head off, drops the gun,” he said. “The adult comes, picks the gun up, and shoots the gun into the couch. This is the harm that the city is attempting to redress.”

At issue is whether the preliminary injunction issued by the Delaware County court is a final order that can be appealed while the broader question of the constitutionality of the ordinance is still pending.

That order, while temporary, blocked enforcement, signaling that the court believes that the anonymous Columbus residents — identified as five John Does and one Jane Doe — are likely to prevail with their constitutional challenge.

Those plaintiffs are backed by the Buckeye Institute, a conservative think tank. The Ohio attorney general’s office also argued on their behalf before the high court.

“The harm to the individual is they might be in jail for a law that’s unconstitutional, right?” Justice Patrick Fischer said.

State lawmakers last year, angry at county common pleas judges issuing injunctions that blocked anti-abortion rights and other state laws, passed a new law saying the state does not have to wait for a final ruling to work its way up the judicial ladder before appealing a preliminary injunction.

But they did not give the same authority to cities like Columbus that have seen the same done with their laws.

The city contends its ordinance should not be shelved while courts work out other questions, including whether plaintiffs can anonymously claim their rights are threatened.

The Supreme Court has previously upheld a 19-year-old state law blocking local governments from using their constitutional home-rule authority to enact gun restrictions seen as stricter than state and federal law. Such rulings had the effect of striking down city gun restrictions, including those enacted in Toledo.

But the courts in Ohio have been inconsistent as to when they allow appeals of preliminary injunctions to proceed.

The plaintiffs contend the city must wait until its gets a final decision in the case before appealing. The Canton-based 5th District Court of Appeals, whose jurisdiction includes Delaware County, had previously refused to hear an appeal at this stage.

David A. Tryon, attorney for the Does, argued that there is a difference between a risk of losing an individual right that might never be regained and the right of a government to enact its own law.

“Here, they are saying, ‘I want it. I want it all, and I want it all right now,’” he said.

The city had tried unsuccessfully to get the Delaware court to grant a change of venue to Franklin County, where Columbus is the county seat.

First Published March 11, 2025, 3:44 p.m.