BRC's propsed gun control legislation

[BigRedChief]

I'm a known Obama supporter on here. I also have a long standing belief that gun control legislation usually doesn't work and besides...and this is not a small thing in the discussion..........the constitution is clear, the right to keep and bear arms should not be infringed. Thats why even though I don't own guns or hunt that I've been a strong supporter of the 2nd amendment. The constitution is clear.

I understand that the constitution is also very clear on free speech but we restrict free speech in some circumstances (libel, yelling fire etc.). Thats the test that I've always used in evaluating any gun control legislation. If we allow and support the real ugly and reprehensible parts of free speech such as the Nazi's marching in a Jewish neighborhood then the Democrats must do the same with allowing gun owners that freedom guaranteed under the Constitution.

The Republicans have to be open to some limitations on gun control along the same lines as the limits we put on free speech.

The compromise:

1. Forbid the mentally ill to own guns of any kind.
2. Forbid those who have been found guilty of violence against fellow citizens from owning guns.
3. Make illegal the purchase and ownership of armor piercing bullets.
4. Make illegal any ammunition clips greater than 10 rounds. (Exception could be in place for gun ranges)
5. Make laws that punish gun owners if their own registered guns are used to commit crimes.
6. Closing the gun show loophole.

#1 and #2 are easy. No one should be against those proposals.
#3 There is no need reason for an individual citizen to own armor piercing bullets.
#4 This is the key. The Ft. Hood, Va. tech, Gabby Giffords shooter were all stopped when their ammo clips ran out and they stop to reload. We can limit the body count if they have to stop to reload a clip even if it takes only 3-5 seconds.
#5 Gun owners should already be securing their firearms so that kids, mentally ill, suicidal people don't have access to their guns. This would have prevented Shady Hook.
#6 You buy a gun at your local shop they perform a background check but buy at a gun show they don't? Thats idiotic. If there is a background check, it applies to gun shows.



What got left off the table:

• Assault weapons ban. It was already in effect for 10 years. It didn't lower crime. It doesn't meet the first amendment Nazi's marching test. The constitution is about the rights to own guns, not how many bullets that gun can fire.
• Mental illness legislation. A different discussion.

[notorious]

Originally Posted by BigRedChief

1. Forbid the mentally ill to own guns of any kind.
   Yes
2. Forbid those who have been found guilty of violence against fellow citizens from owning guns.
   Yes
3. Make illegal the purchase and ownership of armor piercing bullets.
   This is a lot more complicated than a simple "Yes"
4. Make illegal any ammunition clips greater than 10 rounds. (Exception could be in place for gun ranges)
   Yes/No see below
5. Make laws that punish gun owners if their own registered guns are used to commit crimes.
   Only if gun owner doesn't report theft to authorities
6. Closing the gun show loophole.
   Yes

I am OK with 90% of what you want. The armor piercing bullets are a tough one. Many bullets penetrate strictly because of velocity.

How would you control magazine capacity? If they are going to be at the range, you can bet your ass they will end up in criminal hands.

The only idea I can think of is treat +10 mags similar to a Class 3 weapon, only without the tax. Everyone that owns high-cap mags can register them, but if you get caught without registering them you get treated like a illegal hunter. The authorities can take everything you have on you and in your vehicle, and you expose yourself to an ATF search at your home/business. The registration is held locally (county), not federally. Oh, you CAN NOT sell your existing high-cap mags.

All of this is only good for 5 years, and after that time it will need to be put up for renewal.

Now, with that said, nothing of what is proposed will stop was happened the last few months. It will simply hinder the law-abiding gun owners.

But, to help gun haters "feel" better, I am willing to compromise what I listed.

[stevieray]

Originally Posted by Fat Elvis

Horseshit.

that's not a rebuke.

[Direckshun]

Originally Posted by notorious

I am OK with 90% of what you want. The armor piercing bullets are a tough one. Many bullets penetrate strictly because of velocity.

How would you control magazine capacity? If they are going to be at the range, you can bet your ass they will end up in criminal hands.

The only idea I can think of is treat +10 mags similar to a Class 3 weapon, only without the tax. Everyone that owns high-cap mags can register them, but if you get caught without registering them you get treated like a illegal hunter. The authorities can take everything you have on you and in your vehicle, and you expose yourself to an ATF search at your home/business. The registration is held locally (county), not federally. Oh, you CAN NOT sell your existing high-cap mags.

All of this is only good for 5 years, and after that time it will need to be put up for renewal.

Now, with that said, nothing of what is proposed will stop was happened the last few months. It will simply hinder the law-abiding gun owners.

But, to help gun haters "feel" better, I am willing to compromise what I listed.

Two comments:

First of all, I agree on point 5. If a gun owner has made a reasonable effort to prevent his gun from theft, and reports it, she/he should be fine legally.

But I disagree with you that this kind of legislation won't help. The idea is to slow down mass shooters. Forcing them to replace their clip is how several mass shooters have been stopped.

[HonestChieffan]

Originally Posted by Direckshun

Two comments:

First of all, I agree on point 5. If a gun owner has made a reasonable effort to prevent his gun from theft, and reports it, she/he should be fine legally.

But I disagree with you that this kind of legislation won't help. The idea is to slow down mass shooters. Forcing them to replace their clip is how several mass shooters have been stopped.

Like making rapists use a rubber

[Fish]

Originally Posted by Direckshun

That's why it's called an estimation.

https://www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles/165476.pdf

Labeling it as such doesn't make it more convincing.

And let's take a look at the study you provided. Pages 5-6. To start, this study consisted of 2,568 participants. They asked them where they got their guns. From those participants, roughly 60% of them said from "Stores". On top of that, they are estimating the total number of guns sold. Which they would still have no data on guns sold privately, other than what was answered from the 2500 participants. So the total number of sales is questionable. And they extrapolate the 60% results from the 2,500 participants, and applied that to the roughly 300 million total gun owners in the country. They admit in several places that their participants might be "misremembering" or they assumed that the place they bought it from was a FFL. Yeah.

Here's a few highlights of their study:

Acquisitions. To date, little information has been available about gun flows in the United States. The potential importance of this information is its use in evaluating regulation of firearms commerce. For example, the Gun Control Act of 1968 restricts interstate shipments to federally licensed firearm dealers (FFLs), who in turn are required to follow laws regulating retail transfers. Transactions not involving FFLs, known as the "secondary market," typically do not require recordkeeping and are exempt from the Federal requirement (for handguns) of a waiting period and criminal record check.

Moreover, secondary market transactions are not subject to regulatory oversight. Thus, knowing the volume of informal transfers that do or do not involve FFLs would be useful.

The predominant sources of guns, unsurprisingly, were stores (60 percent). Other important sources included family members and acquaintances. The 3 percent of respondents who indicated that they obtained guns "through the mail" (which is illegal for all but FFLs) may have misremembered or may have referred to a mail-order purchase arranged through an FFL.

The average gun obtained in 1993 and 1994 was worth $392 at the time of transfer, with little difference between handguns and long guns. Fewer than 1 in 20 guns acquired during those 2 years were valued at less than $100. Fifty-seven percent of firearms were obtained from stores, pawnshops, or other sources that the respondents were certain to have been federally licensed firearm dealers. Some respondents were not sure about whether the source was an FFL. Others indicated that the source was an FFL but then reported that the transaction was a trade rather than a cash sale or that the source was an acquaintance or family member. If those cases are included, the proportion increases to 64 percent.

We conclude that approximately 60 percent of gun acquisitions involved
an FFL and hence were subject to Federal regulations on such matters as
out-of-State sales, criminal history checks, and recordkeeping.

[Fish]

Originally Posted by Direckshun

Only sometimes, in some places, with some guns:





Nonsense.

Rights can be regulated.

No. That's talking about "Universal" background checks. Meaning it's required by both gun dealers and private owners. That doesn't mean at other places FFL dealers are exempt from doing background checks. This is saying those states take it a step further and require background checks for private transactions as well. So like, pretty much what you're arguing for.

[JonesCrusher]

Originally Posted by Direckshun

No background checks at gun shows?

You're saying no background checks for something like 40% of gun purchases?

How many of the 40% already own guns and have had a background check for previous purchases?

[A Salt Weapon]

"I understand that the constitution is also very clear on free speech but we restrict free speech in some circumstances (libel, yelling fire etc.)"

Actually we don't, we have consequences in place for those actions. If you commit one of those actions you are punished for it, you are not physically unable to say them. Same goes for gun ownership, guns are available, if you commit a crime with one, you are punished, to place restrictions on firearms is no different than to surgically modify every American's voice box to be unable to yell fire in a theater.

1. Forbid the mentally ill to own guns of any kind.
   Already in place, however if they cannot be trusted with a firearm they should not be walking free in society.
   
2. Forbid those who have been found guilty of violence against fellow citizens from owning guns.
   
   If they are not safe to be around firearms, then they are not safe to be in society. Longer prison sentences for violent crimes.
   
3. Make illegal the purchase and ownership of armor piercing bullets.
   
   This would not accomplish anything, they are already unavailable for civilian sales, what is available is old and running out fast. However if they are not appropriate for civilians then they are not appropriate for military/government use, civilians are not second class citizens to .gov employees.
   
4. Make illegal any ammunition clips greater than 10 rounds. (Exception could be in place for gun ranges)
   
   As soon as speech is limited to 10 words or less, print limited to 10 words or less, and computers limited to 10 words or less. (Exception could be in place for conservative talk radio)
   
5. Make laws that punish gun owners if their own registered guns are used to commit crimes.
   
   First off, guns are not registered. I have absolutely no problem with drastically increasing sentences on crimes committed with firearms, not to include justifiable self-defense situations and the insane stuff( ex: I get caught speeding but since I have a legal firearm in possession, I get a 20yr sentence or something. While not likely I'm just drawing the line.)
   
6. Closing the gun show loophole.
   
   They don't exist, as been stated before, just because it's located at a "gun show" all laws are the same as anywhere else. A FFL holder still performs background checks, and 2 private individuals do the same thing they could do in a wal-mart parking lot.

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[Direckshun]

Originally Posted by Fish

And let's take a look at the study you provided. Pages 5-6. To start, this study consisted of 2,568 participants. They asked them where they got their guns. From those participants, roughly 60% of them said from "Stores". On top of that, they are estimating the total number of guns sold. Which they would still have no data on guns sold privately, other than what was answered from the 2500 participants. So the total number of sales is questionable. And they extrapolate the 60% results from the 2,500 participants, and applied that to the roughly 300 million total gun owners in the country. They admit in several places that their participants might be "misremembering" or they assumed that the place they bought it from was a FFL. Yeah.

Yup, it's a study. That's how studies are conducted.

You can add that as an effective caveat to the information of the study, or discount it altogether because it only involved a few thousand people and information gathering, though professionally conducted, was imperfect.

You're welcome to the former point of view, but the latter point of view discounts essentially all studies on human behavior.

[Direckshun]

Originally Posted by Fish

No. That's talking about "Universal" background checks. Meaning it's required by both gun dealers and private owners. That doesn't mean at other places FFL dealers are exempt from doing background checks. This is saying those states take it a step further and require background checks for private transactions as well. So like, pretty much what you're arguing for.

Licensed dealers aren't exempt, no. But what about private owners? Are they not exempt in the vast majority of states?

[nstygma]

maybe a proposal like this could help prevent something in the future, where a person has to buy all new items. but what do you do about all the high capacity mags currently in circulation? confiscate them?
even under the assault weapons ban, it only banned the production of certain items, not the sale. you could still buy a "banned" item online or wherever.

still, evil in people is the problem, wouldn't everyone agree?
blaming inanimate objects is a mistake, especially when the vast majority of all gun owners are good citizens.

[SAUTO]

Originally Posted by kcpasco

Number 1 is a no brainer
Number 2 you would have to define more.
Numbers 3 4 5 and 6 is a definite no from me.

This
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[notorious]

Originally Posted by nstygma

still, evil in people is the problem, wouldn't everyone agree?
blaming inanimate objects is a mistake, especially when the vast majority of all gun owners are good citizens.

Yep.

[Fish]

Originally Posted by Direckshun

Licensed dealers aren't exempt, no. But what about private owners? Are they not exempt in the vast majority of states?

Private owners are not required to do background checks in most states. And as I've previously said, I wouldn't necessarily be against examining whether changing that would be a benefit. But since the background check costs money, it's going to be a hard sell for the private gun seller to submit themselves to it willingly and make less money on the gun sale. And there are so many guns already in private hands, that it wouldn't be hard to find somebody willing to overlook the background check and make money on it.

[BigRedChief]

Originally Posted by Fat Elvis

Number 1 is completely insane.

What exactly is "mental illness" or "mentally ill?"

My feelings is that we let the Doctors and the courts decide. Forbidding someone from owning a gun because of mental illness would take a court order or conviction in a court of law that the person is a threat to society if they owned a gun due to their mental illness.

It's the bar we set for many other things in our society. Seems reasonable to me.