Category: RKBA

5th Circuit represent.

Fifth Circuit strikes down firearms prohibition under domestic violence restraining order.

The question presented in this case is not whether prohibiting the possession of firearms by someone subject to a domestic violence restraining order is a laudable policy goal.

The question is whether 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(8), a specific statute that does so, is constitutional under the Second Amendment of the United States Constitution.

In the light of N.Y. State Rifle & Pistol Ass’n, Inc. v. Bruen, 142 S. Ct. 2111 (2022), it is not.

 

When they write articles like this, they merely indicate the title of their site is incorrect. They are not ‘good men’. And it begs the question: Which right will be the next one they decide the people should not have?

Uttering the Unutterable: Repeal the Second Amendment Now I uttered the unutterable, the ultimate taboo in U.S. political discourse.

I love life, and I love the people of my country far far far more than I value the “freedom” to bear arms. I don’t know if any “reforms” will really solve the problems of gun violence in the United States. In all actuality, I believe, therefore, that we must repeal the Second Amendment now!

There! I uttered the unutterable, the ultimate taboo in U.S. political discourse. But I am not running for public office or reelection. I am not expecting large payouts from the National Rifle Association or from the firearms manufacturers through their lobbyists.

As the horse once served as a primary means of transportation in earlier times, it now grazes and prances peacefully on rich pastures. Possibly during former moments in our history, we may have had reason to enact and enforce the Second Amendment of our great Constitution, but those bygone days have long since passed. Now we must put the Second Amendment out to pasture.

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FACT CHECK: Gavin Newsom Says ‘Permitless Carry Does Not Make You Safer’

CLAIM: In the lead-up to his February 1 push for more gun control, California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) claimed, “Permitless carry does not make you safer.”

VERDICT: Partly False.

On June 7, 2017, Breitbart News relayed FBI data published by the NRA that showed two of the earliest permitless carry states, hereafter called constitutional carry states, were Alaska and Arizona. And both states saw their handgun murders decline when their concealed carry permit requirements were abolished.

The date showed Alaska’s handgun murder rate “declined after the state enacted [constitutional carry] in 2003.” Moreover, in the 14 years between the abolition of the permit requirement and 2017 “handgun murders…declined as a percentage of the total number of murders.”

A drop in handgun murders also took place in Arizona after that state abolished its concealed carry permit requirement in 2010.

More recently, the Maine Wire noted that crime fell in Maine after the state abolished its concealed carry permit requirement in 2015.

FBI data shows violent crime beginning a decline in 2016 that continued through 2020.

There are currently 25 states with constitutional carry. When there were only 13–Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas, Idaho, Kansas, Kentucky, Maine, Mississippi, Missouri, New Hampshire, North Dakota, West Virginia, and Wyoming–the Crime Prevention Research Center (CPRC) showed that data from the 13 states showed overall murder numbers fell from 4.49 to 4.31 post-constitutional carry enactment, and that violent crime fell from 331.5 to 318.2.

But murder levels can vary for a variety of reasons, and CPRC’s John Lott explains some of the numerous factors that are often at play:

Firearm homicide is not a good measure of the effect of Constitutional Carry laws because murders can be committed with other weapons as well as by hands and fists. Also, gun homicide data include justifiable homicides, including homicides by police in the line of duty. Justifiable homicides are benefits, not costs, and they might understandably increase when more citizens are allowed to defend themselves with guns. The FBI murder rate has neither of these problems and is a better test of the effect of constitutional carry laws. Nevertheless, my analysis finds that Constitutional Carry laws do not increase firearm homicide.

It should also be noted that Lott points out that constitutional carry helps to make the poor safer, by making self-defense affordable.

Lott adds:

Constitutional Carry will make it easier for poor people, who are the most likely victims of violent crime, to be able to defend themselves and their families. Costs matter; just compare the numbers in neighboring states, Illinois and Indiana. In Illinois, the total cost of getting a five-year permit is $450; there is no license fee in Indiana. While only 4% of Illinoisans have a concealed handgun permit, 22% of adults in Indiana already have one, the second-highest number of permits per capita.

Newsom’s claim is partly false.

Anti-gun groups press Biden to issue executive action on “assault weapons”

We already know that Joe Biden is going to repeat his call for Congress to ban modern sporting rifles during next week’s State of the Union address. The real question is whether he’ll trot out his stale talking points about deer in Kevlar vests and the falsehood that you couldn’t own cannons when the Second Amendment was ratified.

We also know that a divided Congress is unlikely to implement a legislative gun ban, which is why a coalition of anti-gun groups is demanding that Biden direct the ATF to pursue a gun ban via regulation instead.

In a new letter to Biden, the groups say its time for the ATF to take a look at imported firearms to see if they pass the “sporting purposes” test created by the Gun Control Act of 1998; a move they hope will lead to the ban on the importation of many modern sporting rifles produced overseas.

And though the president doesn’t appear to have the votes for an assault weapons ban in Congress, the groups argue that Biden has tools at his disposal to further limit the proliferation of these guns in the U.S., including by fully enforcing the importation ban of foreign-made assault weapons that do not have a “sporting purpose.”

As Giffords notes in its memo, the ATF, which oversees the importation of guns in the U.S., “has not conducted a comprehensive review of semi-automatic assault rifles and handguns under the sporting purposes test” since the Clinton administration.

Giffords and the other gun control groups don’t want the ATF to merely conduct a review of currently imported firearms, but to “issue new criteria” to enforce the sporting purposes test. In doing so, however, they could be opening up a Pandora’s Box that leads to the demise of the “sporting purposes” test altogether.

In Heller, McDonald, and Bruen, the Supreme Court has made it clear that the fundamental purpose of the right to keep and bear arms is self-defense, not sport. Our ability to hunt, compete, or even recreate with a firearm is ancillary to our ability to use a gun to protect human life. Does the GCA’s “sporting purposes” test infringe on that right to keep and bear arms by prohibiting the importation of arms that are identical in nature to some of the most commonly-sold firearms in the United States, or does it merely impose a regulation on gun companies without directly impacting would-be gun owners?

Most of the litigation taking on the ATF’s rules banning bump stocks, re-labeling pistols with stabilizing braces “short-barreled rifles”, and declaring unfinished frames and receives to be “firearms” have avoided a direct challenge to the constitutionality of the Gun Control Act, primarily arguing instead that ATF’s rules violate the Administrative Procedures Act and create new law instead of merely interpreting existing regulations. However, if the Biden administration follows the demands of the gun control lobby and orders the ATF to review existing imports and establish new criteria for the “sporting purposes” test, that would provide a golden opportunity to challenge the legality of the test itself.

There are risks to that strategy for both sides, of course, and I’m not convinced that Biden will acquiesce to these demands. The gun control lobby has also been quietly advocating for the administration to re-classify large numbers of semi-automatic firearms (including many common handguns) as machine guns; an even broader proposal than what they’re publicly calling for in their demand letter to the White House. As I’ve said before, that would be the nuclear option for Biden, and could not only lead to the Supreme Court weighing in on bans on modern sporting rifles, but the underlying statutes being used to implement the unconstitutional actions.

For gun owners, the concern is that the Court might not be ready or willing to nuke the GCA, either in whole or in part, and could even end up upholding the gun grab on the flimsiest of legal theories.

It’s not up to Second Amendment advocates to chart Joe Biden’s course on gun control over the next two years, and frankly, given that the gun control lobby itself hasn’t had much luck convincing him on things like establishing a White House czar on “gun violence”, I don’t know that it’s up to groups like Everytown or Giffords either.

What I do know is that Biden’s anti-gun ideology isn’t just for show or a position he trots out for the press when circumstances dictate. He’s a true believer in banning our way to safety at the expense of fundamental civil rights, and as he sinks further into lame-duck status an administrative gun grab might start to look more attractive. White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said last week that the administration will “continue to pursue executive actions” in the future, and though she declined to offer any specifics I think we know that there are several options on the table… including the nuclear one

Move to restrict minors with guns gains traction in Missouri House

The legislation is House Bill 301.

JEFFERSON CITY — The gun-friendly Missouri House appears to be settling on one new firearm limit: restricting minors from possessing guns in public without adult supervision.

The limit was included in wide-ranging crime legislation by Rep. Lane Roberts, R-Joplin, following a recommendation by a bipartisan working group appointed by House Speaker Dean Plocher, R-Des Peres.

“Our state is pretty fanatical in our defense of the Second Amendment, and I certainly don’t want to diminish that, but this kind of conduct is not what the Second Amendment was meant to protect,” Roberts told the House Crime Prevention and Public Safety Committee on Thursday.

The working group, made up of three Republicans and three Democrats, unanimously recommended legislation to prevent minors from carrying guns in public, along with several other measures aimed at public safety.

Democrats on the panel included Reps. Marlon Anderson and Donna Baringer of St. Louis, and Robert Sauls of Independence. Republicans included Roberts, as well as Reps. Ron Copeland of Salem and John Black of Marshfield.

A recommendation allowing for a special prosecutor for high-crime areas such as St. Louis has generated the most attention.

But minors in possession of firearms became an issue following the state’s passage of “constitutional carry” legislation in 2016.

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So, those who want to ban guns from the citizenry are liars.
Yes, we know that.

Fact-Check: Mass Shootings Actually Increased During Federal ‘Assault Weapons’ Ban

A widely cited study used to push for more state ‘assault weapons’ bans is flawed and does not show that the 1994 federal ban saved lives.

“Assault weapons” ban proponents say that such bans will save lives. A recent opinion column published in the Chicago Sun-Times claims that the risk of dying in a mass shooting was 70 percent lower during the 1994-2004 federal assault weapons ban. The column was published while the Illinois state legislature was debating a state-wide assault weapons ban, which passed a few weeks ago.

The study on which that claim was based is flawed and its conclusions unreliable. Yet gun-control advocates such as the Giffords Law Center, Everytown for Gun Safety, and Sandy Hook Promise continue to use the study as they push for more assault weapons bans like the one in Illinois. Legislators, media reports, and opinion writers have cited the study, and the column published in the Chicago Sun-Times has appeared in several media outlets.

The study was produced by Charles DiMaggio, lead author; Michael Klein, the opinion column’s author; and seven other medical professionals. It examined data from three open-source mass shooting databases. The study identified 44 mass shootings from 1981 through 2017 in which four or more fatalities were reported (not including the shooter), resulting in 501 fatalities. It determined that 34 of these shootings were committed with so-called assault weapons, which accounted for 430 (86 percent) of the fatalities.

The study found that mass shooting deaths decreased during the years the federal ban was in effect. It claimed that had the federal ban been in effect for the entire period from 1981 through 2017, it might have prevented 314 of the 448 mass shooting deaths that occurred during the non-ban years.

Defining ‘Assault Weapons’

Measuring the effect of the federal assault weapons ban requires distinguishing mass shootings with assault weapons from mass shootings with non-banned weapons, such as handguns. After all, the point of an assault weapons ban is to reduce mass shootings with the banned firearms.

There is no consistent legal definition of “assault weapon,” so one must look to how each law banning such firearms defines them. An “assault weapon” under the 1994 federal ban included both specific firearms by name and any semiautomatic firearm capable of accepting a detachable magazine and having two or more features such as a folding or telescoping stock, pistol grip, barrel shroud, flash hider, or threaded barrel. Subsequently enacted state and local bans typically require only one such additional feature.

To identify whether a mass shooting occurred with an assault weapon, the DiMaggio study’s authors made no attempt to determine whether the weapons used actually met the 1994 ban’s definition of “assault weapon.” Instead, they simply searched the databases’ text for “AK,” “AR,” “MCX,” “assault,” and “semiautomatic.” (Klein claimed in his column that the authors “chose to use the strict federal definition of an assault weapon,” but this methodology belies that statement.)

Although all assault weapons are semiautomatic, not all semiautomatics are assault weapons. A semiautomatic firearm fires only one round with each pull of the trigger and automatically loads the next round after firing. The federal ban did not apply to all semiautomatic firearms, as the study’s authors assumed, but only to those with detachable magazines and two or more of the specified features. The vast majority of semiautomatic handguns do not have the additional features required by the federal ban.

Study Includes Non-Banned, Common Handguns in Statistics

Using “semiautomatic” as a search identifier vastly overstated the number of mass shootings committed with so-called assault weapons. The study’s weapon data set for the 34 incidents shows that in at least 20 (almost 60 percent) of the shootings, non-banned semiautomatic handguns — in 9mm, .45, and other popular calibers — were wrongly identified as assault weapons. This obviously skewed the study’s results.

Common semiautomatic handguns should never be confused with “assault weapons.” No federal or state assault weapons ban has ever included such handguns.

Perhaps the study’s authors were confused about what constituted an “assault weapon.” This is unsurprising. The term “assault weapon” was popularized in the late 1980s not to address a particular problem, but to enliven a waning gun-control movement by confusing and scaring the public about firearms. A report from gun-control advocacy group The Violence Policy Center explains:

Assault weapons—just like armor-piercing bullets, machine guns, and plastic firearms—are a new topic. The weapons’ menacing looks, coupled with the public’s confusion over fully automatic machine guns versus semi-automatic assault weapons—anything that looks like a machine gun is assumed to be a machine gun—can only increase the chance of public support for restrictions on these weapons.

The study’s misidentification error was pointed out in a public letter to column writer Klein and his study co-authors by University of Massachusetts Professor Louis Klarevas, a well-known academic expert on mass shootings and author of “Rampage Nation: Securing America from Mass Shootings.” After reviewing the study’s data set, Klarevas challenged the study’s conclusions based on this “large number of misclassifications.”

The authors responded: “We make no claim to have retroactively determined whether these guns would have been illegal under the original statutory language.” But both their study and Klein’s column are about the effectiveness of the 1994 federal assault weapons ban.

Ignoring the need for fidelity to what the statute actually banned in determining whether that statute was effective, they claimed that assault weapon definitions don’t really matter, but only the “main message” of the study, which is that “fewer people died in mass shooting incidents during the ban period.”

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I don’t know if this is a response to the previous sophistry, or just an opposite viewpoint, but I like it.

To the editor: As a proud Asian American veteran, I know that evil comes in many forms and in many languages. Evil does not understand reason, only violence.

California has some of the most restrictive gun laws in the nation. Maybe it’s time to empower the people to defend themselves against evil.

California already requires background checks, waiting periods, testing requirements and more. Repeating the same steps expecting a different outcome is the definition of insanity.

John Tor, Los Angeles

So, is it ignorance, stupidity, or simple mendacity?

Letter proves some just don’t get Second Amendment

The Second Amendment sure looks easy enough to understand. Some have tried to make an art out of misreading it, of course, by focusing on the militia clause at the beginning, rather than literally any other part of the text.

Still others don’t even get that far. They know roughly what the amendment is supposed to be about, but they don’t really get that it draws a hard line in the sand on guns.

Like the writer of this letter to the editor:

I understand that many citizens cling to their individual right to bear arms, as guaranteed by the 2nd Amendment. However, there have been many instances in which people have sacrificed their rights or been inconvenienced in order to save lives.

Many people were upset when laws were passed requiring seat belts and motorcycle helmets. After 9/11, there were many policies enacted that effectively restricted some of our freedoms. I remember years ago a man tried to board an airplane with a bomb in his shoe. Because of that, we must remove our shoes to be screened at airports.

The writer, unsurprisingly, goes on to call for gun control.

Look, there’s a big difference between seat belt and helmet laws and gun control. There’s also a huge difference between dealing with TSA and gun control.

None of those laws actually interfere with your rights, particularly with regard to one’s constitutionally protected rights. They might make you do a few things you’d rather not, but you can still generally go anywhere you want.

Gun control is nothing like that at all. This isn’t an inconvenience, it’s the state determining what we can and cannot do with regard to protecting ourselves and our families.

This letter writer starts by talking about the mass shootings in California, but he fails to note the very laws he’s demanding simply didn’t work. They didn’t stop either shooting.

What we can see here isn’t a cogent statement of reality, but someone who clearly doesn’t understand the Second Amendment at all.

Of course, this is a California resident, likely one who voted for Gavin “Suicide Pact” Newsom, so we shouldn’t expect much from him.

But the underlying problem is the same. This individual isn’t some raving exception who doesn’t comprehend what the masses get. He’s representative of a large number of people who really do think gun control is little more than an inconvenience.

For them, it’s easy to dismiss the bloody history of the 20th century with its genocides as something that simply couldn’t happen here. I’m sure Jews living in the Weimar Republic thought the same thing, or those living in Cambodia prior to the Khmer Rogue taking over, or the Armenians living under Turkish rule. They likely thought nothing would happen to them, and they were correct right up until the moment they weren’t.

Guns in this nation make damn sure we don’t have to be that trusting and hopeful.

Then we have the fact that most guns used on a day-to-day basis appear to be used defensively. Good people use these guns–the very guns the writer wants to see banned–to protect themselves.

Removing those guns? That’s not an inconvenience. Over a long enough time, it’s a death sentence for someone.

The Sky is falliiiinnnggg!!! Blood will flow in the streets! Aauugghh!
What else is new with these mental midgets?

FL ‘Constitutional Carry’ Bill Ignites Anti-Gun Hysteria

Florida anti-gunners moved quickly Monday to attack a proposal that would make the Sunshine State number 26 on the roster of states with so-called “constitutional carry” statutes, following the announcement that Republicans will introduce House Bill 543, which will allow lawful concealed carry without a license.

The measure is being introduced by State Rep. Chuck Brannan (R-Lake City) with a companion bill in the Senate coming from Sen. Jake Collins (R-Tampa). The announcement came Monday morning from House Speaker Paul Renner (R-Palm Coast), surrounded by other officials including several lawmen.

But the gun prohibition lobby almost immediately launched an effort to defeat the legislation. According to WFLA News, Giffords Florida called the measure “reckless” and claimed it will allow almost anyone to carry a gun in public, without any training or background check.”

However, there is nothing in the bill that allows a felon or anyone else disqualified from owning a firearm to carry it concealed. There is also nothing in the proposal about open carry. This is strictly a concealed carry measure.

 

The Daytona Beach News-Journal reported a group called Prevent Gun Violence Florida is claiming in a statement “Permitless carry laws endanger the public by removing vital safety measures designed to ensure that those carrying concealed weapons have been properly trained and vetted.”

But Alan Gottlieb, chairman of the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms called such rhetoric “nonsense.”

“The gun prohibition lobby will say anything to convince people permitless carry is an awful idea,” Gottlieb stated. “Remember, they also predicted blood flowing in the streets when they opposed shall-issue concealed carry laws from being passed a generation ago. All they could talk about was minor fender-benders and neighborhood disputes turning into gunfights.

“It’s the same rhetoric and the same nonsense all over again,” he observed.

According to the Tallahassee Democrat, Florida now has 2.6 million active concealed carry licenses. In its report, the newspaper noted, “The permitless carry approach backed by state Republican leaders doesn’t change current laws for buying a gun. But it would lift the need for a state permit with firearms training.”

Big win for gun owners as federal judge grants second TRO against New Jersey carry laws

U.S. District Judge Reneé Marie Bumb delivered a second win to New Jersey gun owners and Second Amendment activists challenging the state’s new carry restrictions on Monday, granting a temporary restraining order that halts enforcement of many of the state’s “sensitive places” where lawful concealed carry is considered a felony offense.

Bumb had already granted a TRO in Seigel v. Platkin, another challenge to several of the “gun-free zones” created by New Jersey lawmakers, but the federal court in Camden recently combined that case with Koons v. Platkin, giving Bumb the chance to take a look at some of the other “sensitive places” that were not a part of Seigel‘s initial complaint. On Monday, Bumb issued her ruling, finding mostly (but not entirely) in favor of the plaintiffs.

The judge concluded that the plaintiffs do not have standing at this time to challenge the “gun-free zones” in zoos, medical treatment facilities, movie sets, airports, and places covered by Fish and Game Department regulations, but are in a position to seek a restraining order against the following “sensitive places”:

  • public parks, beaches, recreational facilities, playgrounds
  • youth sports events
  • casinos
  • public libraries and museums
  • bars and restaurants where alcohol is served
  • entertainment facilities
  • private property unless indicated otherwise by owner
  • private vehicles

Of all those locations, the only ones that Bumb did not subject to the temporary restraining order are the prohibitions on concealed carry on playgrounds and at youth sporting events.

In Bruen and Heller, the Supreme Court expressly identified restrictions at certain sensitive places (such as schools) to be well-settled, even though the 18thand 19th-century evidence has revealed few categories in number. Bruen, 142 S.Ct. at 2133 (citing Heller, 554 U.S. at 626)). The inference, the Court suggested, is that some gun-free zones are simply obvious, undisputed, and uncontroversial. These are: (a) certain government buildings (such as legislative assemblies or courthouses or where the Government is acting within the heartland of its authority), (b) polling places, and (c) schools. Id.

Bruen further instructs courts to consider analogies to such sensitive places when considering whether the Government can meet its burden of showing that a given regulation is constitutionally permissible. Id. Here, Defendants subsume playgrounds within their discussion of historical statutes that regulate firearms where crowds gather and where the vulnerable or incapacitated are located. [See Defs.’ Opp’n at 34–35.] Unfortunately, Defendants neither point to a particular or analogous prohibition on carrying firearms at playgrounds nor provide a more meaningful analysis, despite this Court’s persistent invitation.

In particular, Defendants have done no analysis to answer the question Bruen leaves open: is it “settled” that this is a location where firearms-carrying could be prohibited consistent with the Second Amendment? Where the right to self-defense and sensitive place designations could be read in harmony under the Second Amendment? For that matter, nor have Plaintiffs. This issue must be explored at the preliminary injunction stage. Despite these shortcomings, the Court concludes that schools and playgrounds intersect, that is, playgrounds fall within the sphere of schools. Therefore, under Bruen, the Court “can assume it settled” that playgrounds are a “sensitive place.” See Bruen, 142 S.Ct. at 2133. Accordingly, because Plaintiffs cannot meet their burden as to their challenge to playgrounds in Subpart 10, the Motion will be denied as to playgrounds.

It’s entirely possible that even this “sensitive place” could fall once the case proceeds further, though Bumb seems more convinced that the prohibition on carrying at “youth sporting events” overlaps enough with “schools” that its probably okay to ban firearms there. I disagree, particularly given that many youth sporting events are run by leagues that aren’t school-affiliated at all, but the plaintiffs still have a chance to make their argument at future hearings over an injunction. But in the meantime Bumb has delivered a solid opinion in favor of the Second Amendment rights of all New Jersey residents by telling the state it can’t enforce its carry prohibitions in most of their “sensitive places”, at least in the near term.

This doesn’t mean, by the way, that all entertainment venues, casinos, and diners are going to be welcoming concealed carry holders. Private property owners can still ban concealed carry if they choose to do so, but under Bumb’s TRO the state’s presumption that all private property is off-limits unless otherwise noted is a non-starter. All in all this is very good news for New Jersey gun owners, and likely the first of many disappointments to come for civil rights abusers like Gov. Phil Murphy and his anti-2A ilk in the legislature.

One of the first ‘shall issue’ states, that still hasn’t gone permitless. Amazing when compared to Missouri, Kansas and a few other states who went from no carry, to shall carry, to permitless in relatively short order

‘Constitutional Carry’ Bill Introduced in Florida

U.S.A. –-(AmmoLand.com)- Florida House Speaker Paul Renner, R-Palm Court, along with sponsors from the House and Senate, introduced HB 543 Monday morning, a “Constitutional Carry” bill that Renner said gets “rid of the need for a government permission slip” to carry a concealed handgun.

The lawmakers were accompanied by Hernando County Sheriff Al Nienhuis, president of the Florida Sheriff’s Association, and other Florida Sheriff’s.

“We don’t operate in a vacuum. What’s happening in our society now is Defund the Police 2.0,” Renner said. “I don’t think there’s ever been a time in my history on earth that we’ve needed the right to keep and bear arms more than now.”

Brevard County Sheriff Wayne Ivey thanked Renner and the bill’s sponsors for the legislation.

“This bill is an important piece of legislation for our citizens to have the ability to protect themselves. Criminals don’t go get a permit,” Ivey said. “Florida Sheriffs stand solidly behind this.”

Bill sponsor Senator Jay Collins, R-Tampa, an Army Special Forces veteran, described the legislation as a “monumental moment” and a “major breakthrough for our freedom.”

“My very first lesson as a Green Beret was that it is incumbent on each of us to leave things better than we found them,” Collins said. “We will take a monumental step to ensure that government does not interfere with a law-abiding citizen’s ability to protect their family.”

Bill sponsor Rep. Chuck Brannan, R-Macclenny, said the bill won’t change “who can and cannot carry a gun.”

CWFLs, he said, will still be available for Floridians who travel out-of-state and want reciprocity.

“People don’t have to carry if they don’t want to. This is a constitutional right people have,” Brannan said. “Criminals are getting guns anyway. They don’t care what the law says. We’re only giving law-abiding citizens a simple way to get a firearm. It’s only fitting that citizens of the freest state in the nation be given the right to constitutional carry.”

America’s Rifle
What the gun-control crowd doesn’t want you to know about AR-type rifles

A lifetime of work led me to write the book America’s Rifle: The Case for the AR-15. I began challenging “assault-weapon” bans when California passed the first state ban in American history, the Roberti-Roos law of 1989. At the time, the Ninth Circuit ruled that the right to keep and bear arms didn’t apply in California, a denial that the U.S. Supreme Court overruled when it held the Second Amendment also restricts state and local government, in McDonald v. Chicago (2010)

In District of Columbia v. Heller (2008), the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the Second Amendment protects the individual right to possess firearms, including handguns, that are in common use by law-abiding persons for lawful purposes. It should have been a no-brainer when we challenged D.C.’s semi-automatic rifle ban in Heller II, but the D.C. Circuit held that, while rifles like the AR-15 are in common use, the ban was valid under a then-novel “two-part test,” which allowed courts to balance away rights at the second step. In a dissent, then-Judge Brett Kavanaugh argued that the ban violated the Second Amendment.

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Amy Klobuchar Cites Two Pistol Attacks to Push ‘Assault Weapons’ Ban

Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D) posted a video to Twitter on Saturday in which she pushed an “assault weapons” ban in response to two shootings carried out with pistols.

Klobuchar cited the January 21, 2023 Monterey Park shooting (11 killed) and the January 23, 2023 Half Moon Bay shooting (seven killed).

She did not mention that both shootings occurred in stringently gun-controlled California, which has had an “assault weapons” ban since the 1990s. Nor did she mention that both shootings were carried out with pistols.

Klobuchar did, however, push for more gun control.

Breitbart News reported that California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) blasted “weapons of war” after the suspected Half Moon Bay shooter used a handgun in his attack.

CBS News noted that the suspected shooter “drove himself to the substation located between the two businesses and surrendered to deputies.” They pointed out that the weapon used was “a [semiautomatic] handgun.”

At least it makes his intentions clear.

Eric Burlison files his first legislation in Congress, attempting to repeal 1930s gun law

U.S. Rep. Eric Burlison filed his first legislation as a freshman member of Congress this week, aimed at stripping out gun regulations approved in the 1930s.

The southwest Missouri Republican’s “Repeal the NFA Act” would remove requirements under federal law to pay a $200 tax, register and undergo an application process to own certain firearms and accessories, including shotguns, rifles with certain length barrels, machine guns, and mufflers and silencers.

“The federal government has used the National Firearms Act for almost a century to violate law-abiding citizens’ Second Amendment rights,” Burlison said in a statement announcing the bill. “The recent ATF pistol brace rule is just another example of these blatant attacks on the constitutional rights of Americans. The ATF-NFA sham needs to end.”

Burlison’s bill comes a month after the U.S. Department of Justice submitted a new federal rule requiring stabilizing braces and other accessories, used to convert pistols into short-barreled rifles, to follow federal laws that govern those types of weapons, including the 1934 law. He has also co-sponsored legislation that would abolish the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, or ATF.

His legislation is unlikely to see final passage, with Democrats remaining in control of the Senate and some members advocating for more strict gun safety laws in the wake of a string of mass shootings in California. It has been referred to the House Ways and Means Committee, which is chaired by fellow Missouri Republican U.S. Rep. Jason Smith.

Burlison, when he was a member of the Missouri legislature prior to his election to Congress, was a vocal supporter of several measures loosening the state’s gun laws.

He was one of the lead sponsors for the Second Amendment Preservation Act, a 2021 bill that nullifies a number of federal gun laws and came under criticism by members of law enforcement who said it interfered with violent crime prevention and investigation efforts. Burlison has touted the bill as a nation-leading Second Amendment law.

Get Ready for Another Cynical, Useless, Gun-Control Push by Democrats

The first question any reasonable person asks after a horrible crime is, “What could have been done to stop it?” Yet after every mass shooting, gun controllers suggest unworkable, unconstitutional, completely ineffectual ideas that target people who will never commit a crime.

After the twin mass shootings in California last week, Gov. Gavin Newsom (flanked by armed guards) told CBS News more federal gun-control laws were needed because the Second Amendment is “becoming a suicide pact.” What he didn’t mention was that California has passed not only every law Senate Democrats are proposing in Washington but a slew of others. Anti-gun group Giffords gives California an “A” rating for having the “strongest gun safety laws in the nation and has been a trailblazer for gun safety reform for the past 30 years.”

California already has “universal” background checks. It has a 10-day waiting period limit for handgun purchases, a microstamping system, a personal safety test, the ability to sue gun manufacturers even if they haven’t broken any law, an age hike on the purchase of certain firearms including rifles from 18 to 21, “red flag” laws that allow police to confiscate guns without due process, a ban on magazines that hold more than 10 rounds, among many other restrictions. Short of letting cops smash down the doors of peaceful gun owners, California has a law for it. And all it’s done is leave its citizens defenseless.

The day of the Monterey Park shooting, President Joe Biden again called on Congress to pass a federal “assault weapons” ban. So-called assault weapons have been banned in California since 1989. Last year, the state passed another bill making them super-duper illegal: SB 1327. From 1989 until today, gun trends in California mirror those of the nation at large. Which is unsurprising. The Assault Weapons Ban of 1994, despite Biden constantly claiming otherwise, did nothing to alter gun violence trends. Homicide rates began to ebb nationally before the ban was instituted. When the ban expired in 2004, and the AR-15 became the most popular rifle in the country, gun violence continued to precipitously fall — by 2014, gun homicides were the same as they were in 1963 — until the appearance of COVID.

Then again, the shooter at Monterey Park didn’t use an assault weapon. He used a Cobray M11 9mm semi-automatic gun — “one of the most useless handguns in existence” — which some reporters referred to as an “assault pistol.” It’s a scary looking, if antiquated gun (out of production since 1990) that, in this iteration, fires one cartridge with a single trigger squeeze like almost every other gun owned by civilians — including AR-15s.
The gun was already illegal in California.
As is carrying any gun into a no-gun zone.
As is murder.

After the killers of Monterey Park (72 years old) and Half Moon Bay (66) struck, Biden, naturally, called on Congress to pass legislation to raise the minimum purchase age for “assault weapons” to 21. Many mass shooters are young men, but the average age of mass shooters is 32. The number of ARs used in the commission of murder in the hands of a person under 21 is a fraction of 1%.

All mass shooters obtain guns illegally, or legally before having any criminal record (or because of a mistake by the police, as was the case in Charleston and elsewhere). Most incidents are perpetrated by young men who have exhibited serious antisocial behavior. In many, if not most, cases, the shooter is already on the cops’ radar because he has threatened others, as was the case from the Parkland shooter to the Highland Park shooter to the Half Moon Bay shooter and many, many others. In a study of mass shootings from 2008 to 2017, the Secret Service found that “100 percent of perpetrators showed concerning behaviors, and in 77 percent of shootings, at least one person — most often a peer — knew about their plan.” The best thing we can do is uphold laws that already exist.

None of this is to argue that simply because some people ignore laws, they are unnecessary or useless. It’s to argue that laws that almost exclusively target innocent people from practicing a constitutional right, and do nothing to stop criminals, are unnecessary and useless. The central problem in this debate is that Democrats believe civilian gun ownership itself is a plague on the nation, so it doesn’t really matter to them what gun is being banned or what law is being passed, as long as something is being “done.”

The other side believes that being able to protect themselves, their families, their property and their community from criminality — and, should it descend into tyranny, the government — is a societal good. They see gun bans as autocratic and unconstitutional, and, also, largely unfeasible. And they’re right.

No Second Amendment Would Render Us Powerless

America is on a razor’s edge. Three mass shootings within 48 hours have the usual liberal suspects exploiting the carnage to push gun control.

President Biden and his acolytes keep babbling the same platitude that is as smug as it is irrelevant. After a tragic shooting, Democrats keep bleating about how no hunter needs a semi-automatic weapon to kill deer.

This snide commentary shows a complete ignorance of the Second Amendment to the United States Constitution. The Second Amendment right of individuals to own guns has absolutely nothing to do with hunting. The right to own guns “shall not be infringed” by the government because that very government is why individuals own such guns.

The Second Amendment is part of the Bill of Rights, a charter of negative liberties that protects Americans from their own government. If the government were to ever turn inward and try to commit genocide, they would face resistance from armed citizens.

The issue is not whether America’s government would ever turn inward. What matters is that without the Second Amendment, they easily could. With the Second Amendment, their task is much more difficult.

The dark reality is that the American government only exists under a threat of death to that government. This is a collective truth, not a call to rebellion. Every one of our legal 325 million citizens can remember that they individually say and do matters. If not liberty, then death.

Our First Amendment allowing us to challenge ideas and people exists only because of our Second Amendment. As Yale law professor Akhil Reed Amar stated, “The framers recognized that self-government requires the people’s access to bullets as well as ballots.”

This is no antiquated concept in modern America. We have approximately 77.49 million adult gun owners. 2020 reflected the highest number of firearm sales in history, with 39,695,315 background checks for the sale of firearms and explosives. Americans own over 436.4M million guns . These are comforting facts.

Your individual conversations, vote and money matter as much as anyone else’s, all backed by the threat of the government’s demise. That is part of America’s shadow, never to be forgotten.

The United States, Mexico and Guatemala are the only three countries in the world that currently have a constitutional right to own a gun. Six other countries had a constitutional right to bear arms but repealed those laws.

America is the only country with a right to keep and bear arms without constitutional restrictions. Our Second Amendment is rare and exceptionally good.

This is why leftists remain set on trying to limit guns. Only then can Americans be fully controlled. That is not our way nor our agreement.

Every regime of death began by removing guns. The philosophy of the power of owning guns and knowing why we have them is at its essence as important as the guns themselves.

Our Second Amendment backing our First Amendment right to call out hypocrisies and lies is America’s own nuclear balance. Our government points its warheads at us. We in an act of detente point back ours collectively.

There is an inherent understanding, even in places led by tyrants: that those who go too far and try to implement tyranny in America, will one day see their power usurped, and their reign ended. This is detente for our people, not a darker position of violence. We must never forget the shadow side of our Second Amendment and its darker threat of death as a real tool for maintaining the balance of power in America.

God forbid we ever need to even think about using our arms, as citizens, against government. The Second Amendment thus still remains as a a useful reminder to those who lead us, why the Amendment was crafted in the first place – by our Founders.

Guns Don’t Kill People . . . People Kill People

Three recent mass shooting incidents in California have “gun violence” in the news again.  And most assuredly loud calls for banning guns will also be heard.

Tragedies like these three incidents make me think about a line from the 1953 film “Shane.” In the movie the lead character Shane famously remarks to Marian Starrett, ‘A gun is just a tool, Marian.  It’s no better or worse than the man using it.’

While this is true, it’s only true up to a point.  Guns are tools but they are not ordinary tools.  They were invented as weapons of war.  But they do  serve necessary and useful purposes as well.  Guns are used for hunting and other sport. They are also used for self-defense.

Guns

A number of television shows depict the reliance people here in the U.S.  have on hunting as a means of providing food.   The biathlon, in the Winter Olympics, and target and skeet shooting (clay pigeon shooting), are also  popular sports among gun enthusiasts.  And as the Heritage Foundation points out:

“According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, almost every major study on defensive gun use has found that Americans use their firearms defensively between 500,000 and 3 million times each year.”

Case in point: On July 17, 2022 a man lawfully carrying a firearm shot and killed an “an assailant suspected of fatally shooting three people and injuring two others in an Indiana mall on Sunday evening.”  The incident took place at the Greenwood Park Mall just outside Indianapolis.  Greenwood Police Chief Jim Ison called the man a “hero.”

And this brings us back to Shane’s point – a gun is no better or worse than the man (or woman) using it.  So let’s not get emotional or delusional about guns.  As the adage says, “Guns don’t kill people.  People kill people.”

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Another problem with Gun Violence Archive’s numbers

Supporters of gun control love to use Gun Violence Archive as an authoritative source on the number of shootings we have in this country. The number of mass shootings as compiled by the site–a number that doesn’t reflect what most people think of as a mass shooting, it should be remembered–is presented uncritically by the media.

It happens all the time, and in the wake of two shootings in California, it’s happening yet again. While we know plenty about those two shootings and will likely learn more as we go forward, proponents of gun control site Gun Violence Archive’s total number of mass shootings to show it’s more than those two incidents.

Take this editorial as just one example.

History is full of horrific events in which we shake our heads and ask, “How did that happen? What were they thinking?”

The Holocaust and slavery are two prime examples.

It begs the question of what is transpiring today that will be regarded by future generations as deplorable. That historians will record with the hope that they will never be repeated.

Climate change, yes. And then there is gun violence.

California has had three mass shootings in the last four days. Seven people were killed and one injured in Half Moon Bay on Monday. One person was killed and six injured at an East Oakland gas station later that evening. Eleven people were killed and nine injured in Monterey Park on Saturday.

We are not even at the end of the first month of 2023. Yet the Monterey Park and Half Moon Bay shootings bring the number of mass shootings (in which four or more people were killed or injured) to 39 this year, according to the Gun Violence Archive. That follows the 647 mass shootings recorded in 2022 and 690 mass shootings in 2021.

Of course, what follows is the true-to-form call for gun control we typically see from many editorial boards.

Now, in the wake of two deadly mass shootings, I sort of get it. However, they’re not just holding those two incidents up as why we somehow need gun control. They’re holding Gun Violence Archive’s numbers up as well.

And yet, what do we know about any of those shootings?

Well, we know three or more people were injured at those shootings–the low standard the site uses to categorize something as a mass shooting in the first place, which includes gang warfare, drivebys, and so on–but little else.

If we’re going to have a conversation about how we need gun control, about how certain guns shouldn’t be allowed in private hands, or how certain people should be legally barred from buying guns, shouldn’t we also need to know about any of those hundreds upon hundreds of so-called mass shootings?

I ask because I know statistically where most of those weapons came from, and it’s not from lawful gun sales.

How can you say that the gun laws are insufficient when so few of these hundreds of “mass shootings” were carried out with a lawfully-obtained firearm in the first place?

See, Gun Violence Archive is a favorite among the media and anti-gun set (but I repeat myself), yet it only shows part of the picture. To cite their numbers without important context on where those guns were obtained amounts to little more than trying to view a masterpiece by only looking at one single bit with a microscope.

It’s not a full picture by any stretch.

And it matters because while actual mass shootings make headlines, the real violence problem in our country happens in our inner cities. They get counted by Gun Violence Archive to try and push gun control when all the gun laws in the world aren’t going to help.

Lawyers who helped win US Supreme Court case train sights on Illinois assault weapon ban

CHICAGO — Two Second Amendment lawyers who helped win a landmark U.S. Supreme Court case that struck down a New York concealed carry gun law are now challenging the constitutionality of Illinois’ assault weapons ban – with help from the National Rifle Association.

Paul Clement, who successfully argued the New York case, is one of the attorneys for the plaintiffs in the latest federal lawsuit seeking to overturn Illinois’ two-week old ban.

Clement is a former partner in Kirkland & Ellis’ Washington, D.C., office who served as solicitor general of the United States, representing the government in cases before the nation’s top court from 2004 to 2008, during the George W. Bush Administration.

Clement and attorney Erin Murphy began their own firm after Chicago-based Kirkland & Ellis decided it would no longer handle Second Amendment-related litigation. Murphy, who was part of the New York case, is also working on the challenge to Illinois’ assault weapons ban, filed Tuesday in the Southern District of Illinois.

Plaintiffs in the new federal lawsuit are Sparta resident Caleb Barnett, Marion resident Brian Norman, Benton-based Hood’s Guns & More, Benton-based Pro Gun and Indoor Range and the National Sports Shooting Foundation, Inc.

Although the NRA is not listed as a plaintiff, a spokesperson for the organization told the Sun-Times it joined the National Sports Shooting Foundation to bring forth the suit, similar to what it did in the case of New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen, which was ultimately taken up to the U.S. Supreme Court.

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Demand for ‘Commonsense Gun Laws’ is the Road to Citizen Disarmament

U.S.A. – -(Ammoland.com)- “Polls show that a majority of Americans want Congress to pass commonsense gun laws,” Dave Saldana asserts for Reader’s Digest in an opinionated hit piece on the right to keep and bear arms posted (under “news,” naturally) on MSN. “These laws would not ban gun ownership or repeal the Second Amendment.”

Reader’s Digest…how disappointing. I guess with all the other woke “capitalist rope-sellers,” seeing them turn was to be expected.

What the “majority of Americans want” depends not only on where the polls lead them with calculated questions but also on what they actually know about the “laws” they are being queried on, which in this case, is mostly what the media tells them. That, and rights aren’t contingent on majority rule—otherwise, two of us could do whatever we wanted to one of you.

Funny how when you test them on it, protecting minorities isn’t really what the left wants to do at all. Unless by “minority,” you mean the global elites…

As for the assurance that 2A and guns are safe if you give the grabbers what they want, the rest of Saldana’s regurgitation of tired talking points and goals they’ve let slip for decades show that to be a lie. And since the right it recognizes was not created by the government, something that has been recognized in the Cruikshank and Heller cases by the Supreme Court, repealing the Second Amendment would not eliminate what it was worded to protect, the ravings of retired dotard “justices” notwithstanding.

In any case, saying they won’t take all guns when they have no legitimate authority to take any is more than a bit like saying “We don’t want to rape you, just molest you a bit.”

The only rational response to that is “No. Your move.” Besides, they really do want to rape you.

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