Linda Jamerson was in danger. She knew it, and so did her friends and family. Her ex-boyfriend, Jaraun Render, the father of two of her three children, had threatened her, punched her in the face and dragged her around by her hair.

“He was going to kill me,” she wrote to the court this year. Ms. Jamerson said Mr. Render “keeps threatening that he is going to break my neck.” She said he had beaten and stalked her and threatened her daily, in unrelenting phone and Facebook messages. “He walks around with a gun on him at all times.” A judge issued a seven-month restraining order against Mr. Render on Aug. 1.

Yet federal and state law allowed Mr. Render to have his gun. Laws meant to prevent domestic abusers from owning or buying guns did not apply because of a loophole that now results in several hundred deaths a year: The temporary restraining order wasn’t permanent.

“Even as a strong supporter

of the Second Amendment,

I have a red line.” Chief David Todd Fargo, N.D., Police Department Watch Chief Todd's explanation.

On Nov. 14, Mr. Render allegedly took his 9-millimeter handgun and shot Ms. Jamerson 12 times at close range and wounded her friend as they sat parked at a convenience store in Muskegon, Mich. He absconded with Ms. Jamerson’s children but was captured after a 43-hour manhunt. He’s now in jail awaiting trial, and Ms. Jamerson is recovering from her wounds.

Temporary orders like the one granted to Ms. Jamerson are the first line of defense offered to victims of family violence. They are meant to be a stopgap between the time a complaint is first made and when a full hearing can take place with the subject of the protective order present. The Department of Justice says it issues at least 1.2 million orders annually, but only a small fraction are made permanent. In Michigan, where Ms. Jamerson lives, 14,318 temporary orders were issued in 2015, the last year for which there is data; of them, 159 were made permanent.

A victim under a protective order is left to hope that her predator is a good rule follower. About half of the time, the order is violated.

Since family violence is almost always rooted in an abuser’s need to exert control, issuing a protective order can be like pulling the pin from a grenade. One-third of homicides related to intimate-partner violence occur within one month of a restraining order being issued, and one-fifth within two days, according to a 2008 study. Fifty-five percent of those homicides involve a firearm.

“Victims of domestic abuse don’t always have time on their side — they need immediate protection beyond a court-issued piece of paper,” a spokeswoman for the National Rifle Association, Catherine Mortensen, told the Huffington Post in July. Ms. Mortensen is right, but her solution, arming women, wouldn’t end the killing. In fact, it would lead to more deaths, according to researchers.

A better solution? Extend to temporary restraining orders the federal prohibitions on having or buying firearms that already apply to people under permanent restraining orders. There are few more consequential actions for Congress and the courts than removing a citizen’s constitutional rights, especially without a criminal conviction. When safety is involved, however, courts have approved certain temporary restrictions of a person’s rights — to see one’s family, to return to one’s home. Limiting gun rights under temporary restraining orders is a sensible extension of those checks.

Conditions would apply: A judge or magistrate would have to review a victim’s testimony or an affidavit, or other evidence. Eleven states — including Texas, North Carolina and New York — already bar people under temporary restraining orders from having or buying guns. Ten more states empower a judge to take that step. There is no reason Congress couldn’t pass a similar law.

A Michigan State University study released in November found a 12 percent reduction in intimate-partner homicides when emergency restraining orders included gun restrictions.

Is it really too much to ask Congress to save lives by passing a gun safety law that even Texas has embraced?