Emily's Cat
Rarely prone to hissy-fits
The fun part is that the No Minors with Weapons part also covers non-firearms weapons, like brass knuckles and nunchucks. If the judge's reading is correct, kids can carry those, too. So why have the statutory prohibition if it is globally negated by the add-ons? Seems to me the qualifiers should be subservient to the statute. In a Spirit of the Law state, they would.
My kid (freshly Esq-ed) agrees that wiggle room is often intentionally left, so as not to be so restrictive that it can be evaded with ease. But her reading of these Wisconsin laws is that it was quite literally the result of stupidity. No one bothered to proofread to see if they made sense when cutting and pasting amendments.
It's all speculation, none of us have ESP. That said, I would guess that the "kids can't have weapons" law is intended for two things. First, to be preventive. If it's clearly stated that it's illegal for minors to have weapons, then you're less likely to have kids wandering around with weapons because they think it looks cool or makes them tough. It' acts as a deterrent to stupidity that could hurt people by accident. Second, it would also act as a justification for arresting an aggressive minor who seems intent on causing problems, even if they haven't actually harmed anyone yet. The possession itself is illegal, thus grounds for arrest prior to any harm being done. I'd give good odds that if a kid between the ages of 15 and 18 goes out and intentionally hurts someone else with a weapon, they would be charged as an adult (assuming mental competence).
On the other hand, however, it's Wisconsin. And a lot of people hunt. And hunting with one's parents is a pretty common thing. It would cause a lot of very angry residents, and be generally viewed as a problem if they made it illegal for teens to hunt.
I would guess that 99% of the time, this combination works just fine - by design. This situation fell into the 1% where the two statutes came into play together and caused a challenge.