Married couples, in possession of/use of each others firearms.

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Patriot86

New member
I am officially tying the knot on September 17th of this year and I am lucky enough to be marrying a woman who is as pro 2A as I am.

I have been researching the various firearms laws as they apply to married couples but I still have two questions I have yet to find a definitive answer to.


If I buy a handgun or rifle/shotgun, but my wife wants to take it to the range(all transport would be in state) without me are either of us committing a crime?

Next, if she were to use a handgun or other firearm that I purchased in self defense of the home and was in the right with all other applicable laws in regards to deadly force etc, would she be in violation of any laws in the use/possession of the firearm that did not technically belong to her.


I am guessing that the "technical" answer to question #1 is yes technically its illegal, and #2 is no its not illegal but I wanted to see if anyone here had a source.
 
I AM NOT A LAWYER. I LIVE IN ILLINOIS AND OWN GUNS. THIS IS ALL MY PERSONAL OPINION.

with that being said...

if she doesnt have a foid- she cant do anything except fire it at a range, with you standing right behind her, at a range that allows this type of setup.

If she has a foid, and your permission, she can do anything (thats legal) with your gun. she can transport it (legally) she can fire it (legally). Basically if your both legal gun owners and its a legal firearm in question, you/they can "borrow it."

Now the above may be incorrect, but that is the impression im under based on local law enforcement and local gun stores.

If she doesnt have a foid, have her get one...theres too much that can go wrong. like you go into a store on the way home from the range and shes in the car alone. whoops, thats illegal possession of a firearm.

for #2

in a matter of self defense its going to be a moot point who's name is on the receipt for the weapon. She doesnt have to have her own personal weapon to defend herself. However, she may be prosecuted for whatever other dumb reasons they can come up with. IL is terrible when it comes to prosecuting self defense cases.

For example: if youre out of town and theres a break in, and she goes into your nightstand and uses your pistol in self defense, the police are not going to say: "well maam, you were well within the law, and we think this was a totally reasonable self defense shooting. But however, the gun isnt in your name so were taking you to prison."

but they may very well haul her off for not retreating far enough, or however the heck it works in this state.

my advice:

1- have her get her own foid, if she doesnt have one
2- ask both your local police station and also your local gun store about concerns you have regarding transporting, range use, recreational use etc etc
3-ask a lawyer about any concerns you have regarding self defense and home defense.

EDIT- CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY, AND CERTAIN OTHER URBAN AREAS, HAVE TOTALLY INSANE DIFFERENCES THAT I AM NOT FULLY AWARE OF AND FULLY UNDERSTAND. IF YOU LIVE IN CHICAGO, COOK COUNTY, THE CITY OF AURORA, OR CERTAIN OTHER COUNTIES OR CITIES, IT MAY BE TOTALLY DIFFERENT.

i noticed it said "chicagoland" on your name, thought i should throw this in.
 
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I swear I call the gun registration department so frequently because of this forum that they are going to start recognizing my phone number.

Anyway, let's start off with some basics. In order to own a gun in the city of Chicago you need a FOID card, a Chicago Firearms Permit (CFP), and a Firearms registration certificate for each firearm you own. The certificate lists the CFP number for the person the firearm belongs to.

I am not a lawyer and everything I’m telling you is based either on what the Chicago Police Department’s gun registration unit has told me or the letter of the Chicago ordinance.

Now, with that out of the way, according to the officer I spoke with, only the CFP holder that the firearm is registered to may possess the firearm. This means that my wife (hypothetically as she has no interest in firearms), would be breaking the law if she were to transport my firearms to the range. Similarly, if taken to the logical extreme, it would also seem like she would be breaking the law simply by holding one of my guns while in our apartment! :eek: “Surely he’s mistaken” the voice in your head is saying, but read on!

You may be thinking, "Fine, we'll just both get CFPs and then register our guns to both of us." Well, the city covered that too. Apparently a firearm can only be registered to one CFP at a time. Additionally, each instance of possession changing hands is considered a transfer by the city which would be subject to this little section of the "Responsible Gun Ownership Ordinance"

no firearm may be sold, acquired or otherwise transferred within the city
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The officer literally told me that I'd have to go to a gun shop to transfer a gun to my wife.:eek:

Let’s engage in some wild speculation, shall we? :D

So, as it stands right now, every time you want to trade guns with a member of your household, you will need to do the following (assuming everyone has a FOID and CFP).

1. Remove yourselves from the city limits.
2. Draw up a bill of sale in compliance with Illinois law as outlined by this brochure
3. Return to the city.
4. Inform the gun registration department of "the sale, transfer, inheritance, or other disposition of the firearm not less than 48 hours prior to delivery. (per section 8-20-185 of the ordinance)
4. Leave the city again after 24 hours if a long gun, or 72 hours if a handgun and then transfer the gun. Yes, waiting periods apply to private sales in Illinois.
5. Return to the city and fill out a registration certificate within 5 and pay the applicable fee.

Congratulations, by Chicago's standards you've just legally transferred your firearm to your wife! Hope you don't ever want to shoot it while she's not around, because you'll have to do that process each and every time! :mad:

As to the rest of the state, I don’t think any of this will apply. According to the FAQ section on the ATF’s website, people are allowed to borrow firearms from each other. It would seem that it is legal for your wife to borrow your guns indefinitely, outside of the city of Chicago at least. :p
 
Thank god I do not live in Chicago proper, the suburb I live in is actually much less socialist than your typical Skokie/Evanston/Morton Grove areas.

I plan on moving out of Cook County all together in a few years.


Both my wife to be and I have FOID cards and the suburb we currently live in does NOT require local registration/licencing of any kind whatsoever.I guess This gives me a half assed reason to NOT let her touch my SIG hehe.

The whole convoluted part of this thing is inorder to get to my range of choice, without going on a big assed detour I have to drive through the city for about 10 mins if leaving from work, 5 if leaving from home. I don't even want to know the technicalities and legalities of that.
 
I believe Shnomido is correct for non-Chicago IL. I lived there for ~5 years, until fleeing into the arms of Louisiana.

When we bought our first gun, we consulted with various agencies in IL. The advice we received was that it would be best for both of us to get a FOID, as a narrow reading of the law may even mean that I couldn't leave the gun at home when I went to work, since she would be there in possession of it.

So we both got them. That said, I've never heard of anyone enforcing the law in this hypothetical "worst case scenario". If there was a self defense event, and you're north of I80 I would assume the worst, though.


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Patriot86 said:
The whole convoluted part of this thing is inorder to get to my range of choice, without going on a big assed detour I have to drive through the city for about 10 mins if leaving from work, 5 if leaving from home. I don't even want to know the technicalities and legalities of that.
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Too bad, I'm going to tell you anyway!:p And it's actually good news! You can transport through the city as long as you're in the city for less than 24 hours. Also the firearm needs to be unloaded and in a case. To really cover your butt, the gun should either be field stripped or have a trigger lock on it as well.

Patriot86 said:
Thank god I do not live in Chicago proper, the suburb I live in is actually much less socialist than your typical Skokie/Evanston/Morton Grove areas.
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Let's not fall into the SOCIALIST trap. Chicago is a great city. Yes its gun law is crazy, however it is constantly and successfully being challenged in the courts. The mere fact that I can have my pistols in the city is a major win.

Also, I looked these up:

Skokie’s ordinance is pretty much a copy of parts of the FOID act.
Evanston’s ordinance banned handguns, but since Heller it no longer does.
Morton Grove doesn’t even have an ordinance relating to firearms.

Not sure how these areas are “socialist.”

Playing with guns isn't exclusively an activity of the right. Some of us on the left like them too, and our numbers are growing. :cool:

Sorry, I think I just went on a bit of a rant there! :o
 
The near north suburbs I listed are every bit as anti everything fun as Chicago, im sorry if the word "socialist" offended anyone.

Chicago is a great city, I love Chicago it is where I was born.
But Chicago has some serious room for improvement.


Morton Grove, was THE first locality to ban handguns explicitly. They did away with the law as memory serves just after heller.


Skokie has an interesting "Moral Character" clause and the way I read it requires someone to get a Skokie licence to buy a handgun. They also do not appear to give an exemption for the law against discharging a gun in village limits to cases of lawful self defense. Northbrook has a similar law, but gives you an exemption if lawfully defending your home.

About 1/3 the way down page 19, I am NOT sure if this is enforced or not though.
http://www.isp.state.il.us/docs/ordinances/skokies_.pdf


Also, good to know FOR SURE (no more crossing my fingers while I am technically in the city damn!) I am in the legal green when transporting through Chicago, that whole annex of the airport area thing trips me up.



Another thing, I was curious after seeing something happen on COPS(I know laugh at me) a few times. When a LEO runs the serial number of a gun in your possession to see if it is stolen, is the 'list" a list of "all" guns or a list of just"stolen" guns? If it is a list of "all" guns , I am assuming it has the name of the R/0, then what happens if the person in possession (for example a spouse) is not the technical "registered" owner.
 
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Hazborgufen said:
As to the rest of the state, I don’t think any of this will apply. According to the FAQ section on the ATF’s website, people are allowed to borrow firearms from each other. It would seem that it is legal for your wife to borrow your guns indefinitely, outside of the city of Chicago at least.
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That's not correct, either. What the BATFE FAQ says (and it references the underlying sections of the US Code if you want to check it -- I have) is that you can lend a firearm to another non-prohibited person for "temporary" use for legitimate sporting purposes.

"Temporary" is not "indefinite." In fact, "temporary" is probably not even overnight. I think it means you're at the range, your friend's pistol breaks down, and you lend him your spare to finish the event.

But wait! WHAT event? The BATFE has a limited view of what constitutes a legitimate sporting purpose. Trap and skeet? Aye. Traditional bullseye? Aye. IDPA? IPSC? CAS? NOPE

Don't get trapped into thinking it's legal to let anyone borrow a gun from you for as long as they want/need it, for any old purpose. It isn't that easy (naturally).
 
Well, that's good to know. But now I'm confused. Are you saying that it's illegal to share a gun with a spouse regardless of what state you're in? I mean, let's disregard Illinois here. If a couple lives in Montana, or wherever, and they share a couple of pistols between them, sometimes switching off which ones they each carry, they are breaking the law?

Or are you saying that each time they do that, they have performed a private party transfer, and would only be breaking the law of they failed to document the transfer, assuming there are documentation requirements?
 
Hazborgufen said:
Well, that's good to know. But now I'm confused. Are you saying that it's illegal to share a gun with a spouse regardless of what state you're in? I mean, let's disregard Illinois here. If a couple lives in Montana, or wherever, and they share a couple of pistols between them, sometimes switching off which ones they each carry, they are breaking the law?

Or are you saying that each time they do that, they have performed a private party transfer, and would only be breaking the law of they failed to document the transfer, assuming there are documentation requirements?
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Most states don't have a requirement for an FOID, and most states don't "register" individual pistols by serial number to the carry permit. And, although I am not a lawyer, I suppose in states that don't have an FOID but are community property states, it might be argued that even if hubby bought a particular pistol, as long as wifey isn't prohibited she can claim sufficient ownership interest to carry it without having it considered a transfer.

On the other hand, a lot of states (not mine, sadly) allow face to face transfers with no paperwork. In those states, even if wifey borrowing hubby's blaster for a trip to the mall is a transfer -- it's legal and doesn't have to be documented so the discussion becomes irrelevant.

We have fifty states (unless you're President Obama), and that means fifty different sets of laws PLUS Federal laws. We can never assume that one size fits all.
 
Most states don't have a requirement for an FOID, and most states don't "register" individual pistols by serial number to the carry permit. And, although I am not a lawyer, I suppose in states that don't have an FOID but are community property states, it might be argued that even if hubby bought a particular pistol, as long as wifey isn't prohibited she can claim sufficient ownership interest to carry it without having it considered a transfer.
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Aguila- you are correct wrt community property states. NM, for example, is one such state. Any property acquired during the marriage is community property.

So it doesn't matter if I buy the gun or my wife does, it is technically owned by both of us.

There is no such thing as registration here so we can both carry and transport any weapon we own. FTF transactions with no paperwork required is perfectly legal as well.

The only scenario I know of that would change this, here, is if one spouse is prohibited. In that case the other spouse would have to keep everything under lock and key and the prohibited spouse would not be able to have access to anything.
 
In NYS you may borrow or loan long guns without any problem. Not so with handguns. Be in possession of your spouse's handgun and you may be arrested. Some ranges won't even permit you to test fire a handgun not listed on your license. Also, there is no co-ownership in NYS. The gun may only be registered to one person.

So, if you and your spouse both own Glock 19s, for example, you must take failsafe precautions to insure that you never get your handguns mixed up. A sympathetic judge might believe your story of a mix-up and toss the case but your license would have been revoked and all your handguns confiscated. You must then apply for a license all over again, a process as nerve-wracking and time consuming as attempting to buy the Brooklyn Bridge.
 
Wonder when this happened....?

Also, there is no co-ownership in NYS. The gun may only be registered to one person
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Grew up in NYS and left for good in the 70s. In those days, while each gun was listed on your permit by ser#, caliber, maker, & barrel length, more than one person could have the same gun on their permits.

We learned this in the late 60s, due to a car wreck. My Dad had several pistols, and was the only permit holder in the household. Due to the car wreck, we got to thinking, what would have happened if Dad hadn't survivied?

We checked, and the answer was, the guns would have to be turned in. Turned in to the State Patrol, they would be held for a set time (90days, I think), then destroyed. Turned in to the Sherriff, guns would be held while Mom applied for her permit, and returned when granted, destroyed if denied.

So, Mom got her permit, and so did each of us boys when we turned 18 (the law allowed for that then). All Dad's pistols were listed on all our permits.

In 2003, my father passed, and my brother legally owned his pistols, because they were already on his permit. He took 3 of them to a dealer and had them shipped to a dealer where I live. So they are still in the family, and those 3 are safe from the clutches of NYS bureacrats!

Chicago, get your spouse an FOID card. She may not care, may never use it, but of something should happen to you, without her own FOID, she couldn't legally keep your guns, even to sell them. Do it today!
 
but they may very well haul her off for not retreating far enough, or however the heck it works in this state.
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Illinois doesn't have any kind of duty to retreat. IL laws for defending your home are actually pretty good.
 
stopped after post 6 to add this and then gonna read on

I would also get an FOID card for your wife and have her buy a seperate weapon. example: when you are away on a conference, on shift work, etc, your wife has her HD weapon readily available.

It has always been my practice to cover more than less bases when dealing with this stuff(and Illinois raises that bar). Heck, I bought my wife a CCW she has never used, but I still plan on renewing it every 5yrs and I usually consider myself better at saving my cash.

At least each get an FOID card(I would have to read again as it got confusing), but it doesn't hurt to have her get her "own" gun. 2 guns is better than one in my opinion, so that is what I would do. good luck.
 
I am not an expert

Another thing, I was curious after seeing something happen on COPS(I know laugh at me) a few times. When a LEO runs the serial number of a gun in your possession to see if it is stolen, is the 'list" a list of "all" guns or a list of just"stolen" guns? If it is a list of "all" guns , I am assuming it has the name of the R/0, then what happens if the person in possession (for example a spouse) is not the technical "registered" owner.
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but I think they are just making sure it is 'clear' like when they run a license plate. If nothing comes back on the serial# than it is a done deal unless you verbally say something wrong. There may be more advanced systems though nowadays. A funny "Alaska State Troopers" episode circa 2010 had a man detained and almost arrested for a stolen gun. It turned out the gun had been reported stolen by him(or at least a very close family member) years before, and they never removed it from 'stolen status'.
 
That's not correct, either. What the BATFE FAQ says (and it references the underlying sections of the US Code if you want to check it -- I have) is that you can lend a firearm to another non-prohibited person for "temporary" use for legitimate sporting purposes.

"Temporary" is not "indefinite." In fact, "temporary" is probably not even overnight. I think it means you're at the range, your friend's pistol breaks down, and you lend him your spare to finish the event.

But wait! WHAT event? The BATFE has a limited view of what constitutes a legitimate sporting purpose. Trap and skeet? Aye. Traditional bullseye? Aye. IDPA? IPSC? CAS? NOPE

Don't get trapped into thinking it's legal to let anyone borrow a gun from you for as long as they want/need it, for any old purpose. It isn't that easy (naturally).
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The federal statute only applies to state to state borrowing and lending, does not apply to (well at least in most cases) spouse to spouse lending where state law would prevail as both typically are residents of the same state. Lending for sporting purposes can certainly be for more than short periods, I have never done this but I would assume people rent rifles and the like for multi-day out of state hunts. But clearly it is not meant for long term borrowing for just any old reason.
 
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