The nation's mayors -- including St. Paul's Chris Coleman and Minneapolis' R.T. Rybak  -- are taking dead aim at the illegal firearms that fuel the carnage visited upon so many of their neighborhoods. With Democrats now controlling Congress, they stand a good chance of taking down the barriers to effective law enforcement erected by the National Rifle Association and its congressional allies.

The mayors met Tuesday in Washington, with Rybak in attendance, in their first national summit as Mayors Against Illegal Guns. It is a bipartisan group determined to get from Congress the tools they need to take illegal guns off the street.

Their first target is the Tiahrt amendment, named for Rep. Todd Tiahrt, R-Kan., which prohibits the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives from releasing trace data on illegal firearms to cities and their law enforcement agencies except in narrowly defined cases. Every year since 2003, the Tiahrt amendment has been attached to Justice Department appropriations bills, and each year the restrictions have gotten tighter. This year, several bills in the House would further tighten the language and make it permanent. As a consequence of Tiahrt, for example, cities are unable to use BATFE data to pursue action against a gun dealer who is the source of illegal weapons used to commit crimes.

...

The mayors' cause is righteous, and we're delighted that Coleman and Rybak are taking an active role. Getting illegal guns off the streets of their two cities is a goal their constituents will wholeheartedly support.