New Details on Illinois Gun Ban Bill

According to ISRA:

Based on what we know about Cullerton’s bill, firearms that would be banned include all semiautomatic rifles, pistols, and shotguns.  Pump action shotguns would be banned as well.  This would be a very comprehensive ban that would include not only so-called “assault weapons” but also such classics as M1 Garands and 1911-based pistols.  There would be no exemptions and no grandfathering.  You would have a very short window to turn in your guns to the State Police to avoid prosecution.

They seem to be taking the tactic of “go big or go home,” and it’s incumbent on each and every one of us to ensure the latter is the result. This is their end game. Anyone who says they aren’t coming for your guns is a liar. They most certainly are where they think they can get away with it.

UPDATE: John Richardson, “You have to wonder just how committed to democracy and representative government are those politicians who would push for gun bans.” You also have to wonder what it says about the strength of their position, that they feel they have to spring this on us the day after a holiday so that there’s no time for debate. They know we can be a force once mobilized, so they are hoping to ram something through before the alarm is heard and responded to.

40 thoughts on “New Details on Illinois Gun Ban Bill”

  1. O.o

    What makes ANY of them think that such a complete and near-total ban with no grandfathering will survive judicial review, either?

    (Not that this shouldn’t be fought immediately – fight back twice as hard.)

    1. It needs to be fought vigorously, but I can’t think of a better case to get the federal courts to say something about semi-autos and pump action shotguns than this.

    2. Tyrants don’t let small things like The Constitution or the law hold ’em back. They hope people knuckle under and bow to their “wisdom” and “greatness”.

    3. another reason illinois pisses me off. one city controls the whole state. if this ban passes i will move.

  2. It’s like he never heard of Heller, like Mr. Argent said.

    Banning pump action shotguns? And all semi-automatics?

    How much more “common use” can one get than the pump-action shotgun and the self-loading pistol?

    1. Actually I am not all that surprised. Recall that almost immediately after the Newton shooting we had that buffoon Joe Scarborough talking up the action in Australia as a path the U.S. should follow! So is it really any wonder that a clone (minus the buyback) of the Australian gun-confiscation would be put up in Illinois?

      I don’t think that Australian reference by Scarborough came out of nowhere. I suspect some kind of sharing among the anti-gun types (including all the highest paid so-called “journalists” such as Scarborough) similar to what was going on with ‘JournoList’ is still going on.

      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/JournoList

  3. Diversionary tactic. Make your opponent expend their resources in small skirmishes to reduce their effectiveness in the main battle.

    Needs to be fought, but maybe matched with pushing the envelope on our side also.

    1. Diversionary tactics are one thing – this is “hey diddle diddle, straight up the middle!” or “Come on lads, over the top!” There’s no compromise here; they’re not just coming for the “ceramic pistols” and the EBRs, they’re coming for the Garands and 1911s and 10/22s and Remchester shotguns.

      Why piss off the “I’m a gun owner but…” crowd like this? The needle didn’t move that much on the polls, and isn’t this the same legislature that overrode the Governor’s veto on an ammo ban?

      1. Or did they buy in to the NRA’s “all in!” metaphor for the presidential election and think we’re out of resources?

  4. I think we need to keep there phone ringing off the hook to reject any such bill and do it now…………….

  5. I wonder if this is some kind of a feignt in advance of the coming CCW fight?

    1. The iron doesn’t fight the blacksmith, though. I mean, I guess this could be a non-serious effort to probe the limits of the political capital the NRA still has, but this gamble sure seems like either an act of supreme confidence or supreme overconfidence.
      The counterexample would be an ISRA-aligned politician introducing a constitutional carry bill stating “we need this to stop the next Newtown.”

  6. Come after anti-gun people, we’ll come back at you twice as hard. A brilliant move. THERE ARE MORE IMPORTANT THINGS IN LIFE THAN GUNS.

    1. We’d be happy to leave anti-gun people alone if they would leave us in peace. It’s a constitutionally guaranteed right. You don’t just get to ignore it because you disapprove. We’re in this fight because ultimately, we care about individual liberty, and believe there’s not much more important a right than the right to have effective tools for defending your own life.

    2. Are you so stupid as to think your anti-gun laws put guns in jail? Did you really think we would just roll over and submit to your attempt to strip us of our sacred rights and personal property? And you have the gall to act affronted when we try to protect ourselves from your tyranny?

    3. we’ll come back at you twice as hard.

      With what? Your anti-guns? Your impressive lack of support by the American people? You got nothing, except for a bunch of hypocritical over-payed buffoons who are more interested in power than in solving any real problems.

    4. You’re not to bright are you, the guns are only a small part of the issue. The bigger issue at hand is big government chipping away at our freedom and our constitutional rights and this is only the beginning. If we let them and idiots like you get away with this where will it stop. Maybe it will stop once all of us are living in concrete conn-ex buildings with identical square footage because some of us own too much land, or our homes are just to big for us, or maybe your patch of land you worked hard to buy is just to much for you, so the government will just take that away as well to make all thing “fair and balanced for all” but hey don’t worry it’s for the “greater good” we can just redistribute to those in need…

    5. “THERE ARE MORE IMPORTANT THINGS IN LIFE THAN GUNS.”

      Freedom for one but how do you propose to preserve that freedom? People use guns everyday to preserve that freedom for you, suppose someday someone descides to turn those same guns against you and take those freedoms? Don’t ever think it can’t happen, if you had paid attention in history class you’d know it has happened throughout the history of man and always will wherever people are denied the means to defend themselves. It is my responsibility to protect my family and property and no one else’s I will not be denied the tools to do that. If you don’t want to own a gun that’s your business, if I choose to own one that’s MY business. I am a responsible gun owner, my firearms are secure and cannot fall into the wrong hands.

  7. Wow. I’d like to hear what bullets the troll defines as “twice as hard” and what does that imply?

  8. Does this have even a prayer of a chance of passing? Last I heard, pro-gun forces had a near-supermajority in the IL legislature!

  9. So the new anti-gun bill in Illinois is a violation of gun rights, property rights and due process rights. I guess that NYT editorial advocating trashing the constitution was very timely, and shows just where these wannabe tyrants really want to move the nation.

  10. This is why I HATE Illinois & NEVER spend any money in that COMMUNIST state, I live in Wisconsin and when I have to drive south , I drive AROUND that commie state or take the ferry to Michigan…

  11. look at this forum the only hostility posted on here came from an anti gun troll…. idiot!!!!

    1. Brad, please CALL them today. Be nice, be short if they are busy, but definitely CALL as well.

      1. Called my representative office this morning. They stated they have been getting lots of calls on this subject

  12. So what’s YOUR plan? I mean, you talk about your neighbor moving a fence 100′, you complaining, and him calling 50′ a compromise. In politics, the 50′ IS a compromise, because you are only arguing to the original line. You need to define a line 100′ in HIS yard, and work from there. Why not have an open thread to propose ideas? If we come up with something worthwhile we can even start a form-copy campaign to send it to congressmen. I’ll even kick it off.

    Evidence has shown that mass-murderers pick identified gun free zones as a place to do their killings – less chance of armed response until they’ve achieved a death toll high enough to guarantee a spot on the evening news. Therefore, true gun free zones need to be either protected or eliminated. If the responsible party for a particular public property (school, mall, amusement park, courthouse, etc) wishes to continue to identify it as “gun-free”, require that they search all those that enter and post armed guards within the establishment. This listing can be administered by Homeland Security, and would be similar to what we currently have in airports. I would note that the courthouses in my area already do this to ensure that the lawyers and judges there are protected. The cost and inconvenience of such a situation may force more places to stop listing as gun-free.

    In most cases however, the mere suggestion that an area is not gun-free has also been shown to reduce the likelihood of an incident at that location. The Aurora shooting bypassed 9 theaters that didn’t require citizens to disarm and picked the 10th that did. Therefore, remove the stigma of being “gun-free” and enable willing staff and CCW holders to carry concealed on the property. I would go so far as to propose a special CCW permit just for school staff which requires extra training and qualification for these permit holders. Their requirements are different, right? They are not acting only to protect themselves and their loved ones, and they may be required to fire a weapon into a crowd to stop a threat and protect others. So they should require special instructions and have additional requirements. I imagine the NRA would be helpful in creating the program, and again Homeland Security or the local government could oversee the accreditation itself. But the point is, especially for schools, that there doesn’t NEED to be anyone there with a gun. The Aurora shooter didn’t know there would be a gun owner carrying in the 9 theaters he passed. He picked the one he knew a gun owner COULDN’T. We need to remove the places where there COULDN’T be a gun owner carrying.

    Next, the right to keep and bear arms is a constitutional right. I would push for this right to be taught as part of the civics lessons that all American students are required to learn in school. Many gun grabbers suggest that most accidental deaths by young children are because the guns are around and they are curious. Well, teach young children, perhaps as young as 1st grade, what guns are, why they are dangerous and how dangerous they are. Local NRA instructors, police officers or sheriffs can come to class for one day, show and discuss a variety of guns, discuss gun safety and what the appropriate actions around guns are (“if you find a gun unattended, establish a perimeter around it and find an adult”). The argument is to provide the children the experience they need to satisfy their curiosity in a safe and carefully monitored environment – and therefore it is a measure that is specifically “for the children”. Invite curious parents to attend as well. Then teach it again, perhaps in 6th grade. And again, in 12th grade as a prerequisite for high school graduation. Stress the importance of the lessons, which therefore stresses the importance of the right itself. Offer this to gun grabbers as the “license” they sometimes say should be required before gun ownership is “allowed”. It’s a right that belongs to all Americans, so all Americans should be required to earn it. Current gun owning adults would either be grandfathered in or be able to attend a local session. Again, NRA would develop the program, and work with local law enforcement and schools to provide the teaching.

    I would require that the Federal and local governments overhaul all it’s existing gun laws, and either repeal them or provide a public explanation for why they should remain. And it would be required to add an “intent” clause to the majority of those that remain. Call it the David Gregory rule. He committed a felony but got away with it because he didn’t have the intent to harm. However, us little people wouldn’t get away with that, and unless the government means to publicly establish a different set of rules for the “elites” vocally demand equal protection for those of us that do not have the money or the status. Draw parallels to other activities. Police don’t arrest someone who is drunk in a bar for drunk driving until they actually get in the car. Police don’t arrest someone for vehicular manslaughter because they sped in a school zone. And police don’t arrest someone for rape because he bought the hot girl at the bar a drink. Why do they arrest a legal (non-elite) gun owner and charge them with a felony because they possessed a magazine?

    Push for a rule disallowing publicly identifying the murderer. No national news allowed to identify by name or image the murderer. Create pity for the murdered. Do not lionize the murderer. Mock him, ridicule him, but do not identify him. Tell of his impotence, his patheticness, his worthlessness, but do not make his name a household name. If you create an incentive to do something, you’ll get more of it. Just like our current employment situation – you pay people not to work, suddenly you have more people not working. You make a killer famous, some other deranged, suicidal jackass is going to think that shooting up a bunch of kids is a better idea than a knife and a warm bath.

    And as a general note, I would approach the argument differently. If someone argues that the intent of the authors of the constitution intended the right to bear arms to apply only to muskets (the technology of the day), inform them that the same standard can be applied to the first amendment. If we can only have muskets and therefore government can deny all newer armament designs, then freedom of speech only applies to newspapers and spoken word and the government is free to regulate what is said on the internet, in email, on twitter and on TV. The freedom of religion only applies to the religions of the day, and we are free to discriminate against Mormons and Scientologists. And so on.

    Demand that those who create the laws are familiar with what they are proposing to legislate. The NRA should be hosting info sessions for lawmakers, similar to a basic firearms course, with classroom and shooting range parts. I have more respect for someone proposing laws if I can have an intelligent discussion with them on the subject, even if I disagree with them, than I do for someone who refers to “the shoulder thing that goes up”. Allow the knowledgeable to partake in the discussion, while ridiculing the ignorant off the stage. If someone wants to have a conversation, make them answer questions (“what is your definition of an assault weapon and how does it differ from the already-prohibited assault rifle”, “how do arbitrary limitations on magazine capacity affect the damage potential of a murderer”, “if a murderer is intent on killing as many people as possible, then killing themselves at the first sign of resistance, why do you want to wait 20 minutes for police to arrive rather than confront them with responsible adults that are already on site”, “if someone is going to kill someone else, how are they affected by laws governing cosmetic features of a rifle”, and my personal favorite “explain to me, as precisely as possible, how the laws you are proposing/endorsing would have any effect on crime” with the follow up “how are those more effective than what I am proposing as it comes to reducing gun violence?”). If they cannot provide acceptable answers to these (most can’t), ridicule them publicly and refuse to debate them further until they educate themselves on the subject.

    Stress the data showing that a mass murderer kills on average 13 innocent people when they are stopped by police, while only 3 if they are confronted by a citizen with a gun. Make note of the fact that 26 innocents died in Connecticut, twice the average when stopped by police. If an armed citizen was there, hypothetically, even figuring for twice the national average he should’ve only killed 6. How many children were killed? 20. Having an armed teacher on site could have, hypothetically, saved the lives of every one of those children. Remember our opponents are resorting to emotional hyperbole, we can too.

    I would continue to state that the first amendment guarantees our rights to arms (with no technology limitations), and that the supreme court has expanded that right to cover self defense. Stress that while armed defense from the government has rarely been needed, self defense is something that is required on a daily basis. When they say that every mass-murder committed with a gun is on our heads, tell them that every rape and murder of a defenseless woman is on theirs. When they tell of a gunman in a theater, tell them how thankful you are that he didn’t chain the doors and light a gasoline bomb off inside. When they talk of a gunman in a school, tell them how lucky we are that he didn’t drive a car into the playground at recess and detonate an IED. Tell them that “the gun” didn’t cause the murders. The killer decided on what to do, then decided when and how to do it. If no guns were around he would’ve chosen something else. And sometimes that something else is much worse than a gun.

    We build our argument on facts, but we have to defend it with emotion.

    1. Scotty no offense but if your gonna write a blog, write a blog. I read blogs for the comments but yours was so long I just scanned it. In comments, power is in the precision of the argument not the volume.

  13. There will be a floor vote on these issues as early as tomorrow. HB1263 (assault weapons ban) and HB 815 (magazine ban) have been passed out of committee and will be brought to the floor for a general vote by tomorrow morning. As written, the ban will outlaw not only most rifles and shotguns used for hunting and sporting purposes, but also most handguns used for home and self defense. There is very little time to contact your legislators and express your outrage at this blatant gun grab.

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