Missouri lawmakers made sure teen gunman faced minimal obstacles to arm himself

The more detail that emerges about the assailant in last week’s St. Louis school shooting, the more clear it becomes that his deadly violence was, in real ways, abetted by Missouri’s Legislature. Conservative lawmakers have spent more than a decade preventing or assertively tearing down every legal safeguard that might have stopped Orlando Harris from obtaining his weapon. Each step along the path that led to the deaths of two innocent people was cleared by pro-gun lawmakers in Jefferson City, who have worked hard to ensure their state has among the loosest gun laws in the country. And years’ ...