Category: Guns

Earlier this week I posted something I’ve been mulling over:

Now, some of you aren’t going to like this, but the public rhetoric needs to be that we support the National Firearms Act. The only way, you’re ever going to convince the public and the politicians to repeal the 1986 Hughes Amendment is to convince them that the NFA was just fine, and that the 1986 ban went too far, and is too restrictive. Even this is going to be a hard sell, I’m sorry to say. But if you just say “repeal it all” the public and politicians are just going to say “no” and dismiss you.

I think I chose my words poorly here, and didn’t really get the point across that I wanted to make.  I shouldn’t say that we ought to proclaim our faithful support of the National Firearms Act.  I don’t believe that, and I know most of you don’t either.

But I’m not going to take on the National Firearms Act any time soon, and I don’t think it’s realistic to expect our public interest groups on the issue to do so either.  If there’s anything I think might be possible on machine guns, my shorter term goal is the 1986 ban on new registrations.   I would like to either eliminate or weaken that.  If I have to tell a politician, media person, or other person of influence “It’s not that big a deal.  We still have the NFA, and all its requirements, and I’m not asking you to get rid of those.  But this ban is a problem for reasons x, y, and z.”, I’ll do it.

Once that happens, and the sky doesn’t fall, we might be able to ease more restrictions.  Get people comfortable taking baby steps, and it all adds up.  It certainly has with concealed carry.  This will take a long time.  It’s hard to get bad laws repealed, even when most people agree they are bad laws.  It’s even tougher to get bad laws repealed that most people actively support.   We can’t even get the Veterans Heritage Firearms Act passed, which is only a minor period of amnesty from the ban on new registrations.

So just to clarify I’m not suggest anyone switch their position and embrace the NFA with heart and soul.  But we might need to stand on it to convince people to take that baby step forward.

Scott Bach has composed a very well written response to Bryan Miller’s earlier post attacking him, which seems to have been toned down from the original version.

Bryan should be aware that you lose credibility in the blogosphere if you alter posts because you regretted something you said. Editing for grammar or style is fine, but making statements go down the memory hole is something you don’t do; you man up to it and say as much in another post, or in an update. I’m about to do that later today, in fact.

… in Illinois.

I came across this sad story on Pennsylvania Firearms Owners Association forum. A guy seeking advise about renewing an expired PA License to Carry Firearms. Seems he got into a bit of hot water with the law, under this Pennsylvania law:

Title 18, Section 1.4(a) of the unconsolidated statutes.

§ 1.4. Altered or illegally obtained property; penalty.

(a) Alteration or destruction of vehicle identification number.–Any person who alters, counterfeits, defaces, destroys, disguises, falsifies, forges, obliterates or removes a vehicle identification number with the intent to conceal or misrepresent the identity or prevent the identification of a motor vehicle or motor vehicle part commits a felony of the third degree and, upon conviction, shall be sentenced to imprisonment for not more than seven years or a fine of not more than $50,000, or both.

That’s a felony. Clearly this individual must have been involved in some sort of criminal ring. Right? Well, here’s his story:

I bought 2 cars, one from maryland the other from new york. the person i got the maryland car from got it from an auction in deleware. He never transfered it to maryland and kept it for 3 years. I bought it brought it home and could not get the title transfered. tried contacting the auction house in deleware but out of buisness. so i could not get the title transfered. the newyork car was wrecked but had a good motor and interior. the maryland car did not. the vin was attached to the dash, not to the car it’s self. so when I replaced the maryland cars riped upi dash with the nice shiney newyork car dash the vin went with it cause it was rivited to the dash. you get the picture. I called everywhere to find out what to do and every dmv or berriks I called told me to call the other guy. so basicly I am screwed because state employees of pa,maryland and delaware don’t know the jobs. A victim of circomstance (i know my spelling is bad haha) that my luck.

So he installed the dash from one car into another, and forgot the transfer the VIN number. He got caught, and apparently some turd of a District Attorney decided to throw the book at him, either for the safety of society, or to bolster his legal career, I’m sure you can guess which one. The poor guy runs out of money to pay attorneys, and ends up getting pressured to cop a guilty plea in exchange for a year of probation. Only problem; no one advised him he was surrendering his firearms rights.

I am not opposed to the idea that people convicted of certain crimes of violence can have their right to own a firearm removed. But this whole incident illustrates why this idea has become a mockery of justice. This man was wrongly charged, was pressured to plead guilty by an ambitious DA who was more concerned with his conviction record than justice, and now has been screwed out of an important constitutional right.

Fortunately, he says he currently doesn’t own any firearms, which is good. I’d hate for him to twice be a victim of the justice system. If organizations like the Brady Campaign want to be serious about keeping guns out of the hands of dangerous people, and want us to stand with them, they have to condemn applications like this. Otherwise it’s just another means of harassment, and it’s wrong.