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Notes -
There's some interesting philosophical questions about the proper role for federalism in regards to specific rights, but in addition to arguments of past performance that others have already mentioned, there's actually still a pretty sizable number of things that are currently happening.
Hawaii and California have both recently enacted laws enabling the sort of interstate lawfare against gun industry members that I predicted two years ago due to the SCOTUS punt on Remington v Soto, with HB 426 and AB1594, respectively, and they're not exactly alone (I'm familiar with at least New Jersey, New York, and Delaware). Even places without legislative changes to allow such liability have had courts retroactively discover them in long-extent laws, such as Gustafson in Pennsylvania.
Or see the recent legislative efforts which have mandated more and more restriction, including near-complete bans on purchase by under-21s. Or the regulatory action to leave hobbyist gunsmithing and private manufacturing, or to make operating as a firearms merchant more difficult. Or the lawsuits that have (generally successfully) sought to enjoin any attempts at Second Amendment Sanctuary laws.
I bring these not as examples of 'oh, they did it first', or even to highlight what the progressives would need to give up for a return to federalism to have a chance, but because that's a large part of the "why conservatives gun owners must force". They have a model that many of these states have anti-gun populations not out of the natural evolution of positions, or normal distributions of normal beliefs, but because law and policy have been trying to smother the development of any interests in the disliked fields, and to Curley out those who cared about those matters -- and that the progressive movements are both willing and eager to do the same to other states.
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