Okay, okay… this is seriously good news:
Renowned firearms manufacturer Smith & Wesson ditched deep blue Massachusetts and moved its headquarters to friendlier pastures in Tennessee. Although the move was announced in 2021, it was on Saturday that the company officially opened its new 650,000-square feet building in Maryville as part of a $125 million relocation effort.
The company has been in New England since its founding in 1852, but Massachusetts’ strict gun laws are at least partly to blame for their exodus.
Not to mention the Massholes’ steep taxes, which the article notes.
And there was shooty fun and joyousness all round, you betcha:
Yesterday at Smith & Wesson’s new headquarters in Tennessee, Jerry Miculek set the #NRA World Record for hitting six steel plates with a 9 mm revolver at seven yards after a 1.88-second run.
So: apart from not wanting to stay in the People’s Soviet of Massachusetts, why the move?
S&W CEO Mark Smith cited a welcoming regulatory environment and close collaboration with the Tennessee state government as a crucial piece of the plan to relocate. The company has said the new facility would create hundreds of jobs.
Tennessee has moved to loosen gun restrictions in recent years under Republican leadership. In 2021, the state passed a law to allow most adults 21 and older to carry handguns without a permit that requires first clearing a state-level background check and training.
Yeah, okay fine, but what are we Texans? Chopped liver? We have all the good stuff that Tennessee has, also better BBQ.
But let me not quibble. Anytime a company — any company — comes to its senses and gets out of Communist America, it’s a good thing.
These are just a few of the S&W guns I used to own (before that tragic day crossing the Brazos by canoe), and under the right circumstances, I’d own quite a few more again.