Opinion
New York – -(AmmoLand.com)- With a lot of the focus being on modern multi-purpose semiautomatic long-guns like the AR-15 rifle, we forget that anti-Second Amendment extremists have other targets as well. Perhaps the most notable, despite the landmark Heller and McDonald cases, are handguns. When you think about it, targeting handguns make for a more practical (even if they are protected under the Second Amendment) target, especially when looking at the Justice Department’s crime stats.
We should not forget that Sarah Brady long ago called for a “needs-based licensing” scheme. Well, the first step to getting there is to actually get any kind of licensing scheme passed, and the two who are trying to make that infringement on our Second Amendment rights happen are Representative Jamie Raskin & Senator Chris Van Hollen via the Handgun Purchaser Licensing Act. In the House, this bill is known as HR 3285, while the Senate version is S 1844.
In a release by Raskin’s office, he is surprisingly open about what he wants. Not only is the National Instant Check System not enough – he wants those who wish to exercise their Second Amendment rights to have to go to the police station, provide a photo, and be fingerprinted like some common criminal. All of this because of crimes and acts of madness they did NOT commit.
We see comments from anti-Second Amendment extremists about straw purchases (there are better options to deal with those, if only the laws on the books are enforced). The fact is, though, the failure to enforce laws that lead to crimes being committed is something that must be addressed.
Raskin also put out a statement with the usual nonsense in the wake of the El Paso and Dayton mass shootings, and he failed to mention his proposed legislation. But the press release was full of platitudes. We must look at the text of both the House and Senate versions, and we can see what they have in mind.
Mother May I Please
Raskin and Van Hollen have taken a much more indirect approach to wrongfully attacking our rights: They are going to bribe states to enact their own licensing schemes via grants. Thankfully, only nine states have such systems in place, per a release from Van Hollen. Just how bad can licensing be you might say?
Well, keep this in mind: New Jersey’s permit-to-purchase system and its delays has cost at least one woman who was trying to escape an abusive ex her life.
The fact is, with the National Instant Check System, especially with the protections of the Tiahrt Amendments (which anti-Second Amendment extremists want to dismantle), there is really no rational basis for a permit-to-purchase system. The only reason to back such legislation is to begin the process of turning America into England, Australia, or New Zealand.
Second Amendment supporters need to contact their Representative and Senators to politely urge them to oppose this anti-Second Amendment legislation. When there is a way to instantly determine whether someone is a prohibited person, there is no way a permit-to-purchase system should be allowed to stand where it exists, much less be expanded across the country.
About Harold Hutchison
Writer Harold Hutchison has more than a dozen years of experience covering military affairs, international events, U.S. politics and Second Amendment issues. Harold was consulting senior editor at Soldier of Fortune magazine and is the author of the novel Strike Group Reagan. He has also written for the Daily Caller, National Review, Patriot Post, Strategypage.com, and other national websites.
Little law that if pressed might make some heads explode
IN PA you need permission from a Sheriff to Conceal & Carry. And it cost you a fee. That should make ones head explode.
@Arny, a Sherif that does not follow the Constitution should not be re-elected.
I don’t think you have a problem getting one as long as your record is clean. I just don’t think I need their permission. And it’s just another list. My sales receipt should be all that’s needed to prove ownership. And I shouldn’t need that.
Pa is a must issue state.
Once you pass a background check the concealed carry permit is given.
Pa also has free open carry.
Yea . . . and then they throw you in jail . . . for “engaging in the right with impunity”!
Yup. That’s the way it is here in MI.
@kk, You can’t sue the city out of existence, pursuant to 18 USC 1983, unless you let them arrest you!
In the above article Harold says “there is really no rational basis for a permit-to-purchase system.” On the surface I would agree, so the reasoning must be that those in power want more control over those non elected citizens, who obviously need to be protected from themselves. Train a dog (citizens) to obey commands (laws) and soon he’ll be laying at your feet waiting to be told what to do next (Communism). Bow-wow.
We who live in communist controlled states are used to this – and, in fact, have been photographed, fingerprinted, charged a fee to be “licensed”, and have had restricted carry rights by occupation, ALL OUR LIVES!
States such as Michigan.
@KK, So … what are you doing about it?
https://www.ammoland.com/2019/05/what-unsigning-the-arms-trade-treaty-means-for-american-gun-owners-video/
Look at that beautiful lady’s DEAD face you sorry DICKS, you are responsible for her DEATH.YOU should be HUNG.
We must stop this insanity SOON, or we deserve what we get.
I think it’s past time for an ULTIMATUM,to the GOP, if you do not get your shite together and PUSH our RIGHTS as a priority we will form a NEW PARTY(get the Tea party in also with us), and form “The Constitutional Party.”
Live and Die by it.
We should already have a Constitutional Party. Enough with the Rhinos. We should not even have to waste one second with these BS laws. I for one did NOT vote for any of these LAWS so I’ll be damned if I’ll abide by them. If they don’t like the Constitution as written then they need to move to their socialist utopia. And they definitely shouldn’t be running for office & swearing a oath to uphold. If they go against their oath there needs to be serious consequences.
NC still has a holdover “Jim Crow” Law in that you must ask your County Sheriff for a “permit to purchase” a handgun. Which costs $5. The Sheriff can reject it for any or no reason.
UNFRICKING Constitutional, a lawsuit should have been filed LONG ago.
I think it’s $10 in Michigan. For each gun. Or, you can pay $115, jump though hoops, get photographed, fingerprinted, go thru training and get a carry permit. Then you don’t have to pay the $10 for a license to purchase a handgun. You have to pay the $115 every five years to renew the license to carry.
Below the radar: Moms Demand Action are trying to pack local school boards with the intent they can influence young minds.
@Vince, School boards are key in restoring the republic or destroying the republic.
Bill, they have already destroyed it for three decades at least.
The parents are to blame. I have NO kids at 52. But yet get nailed for school taxes. And I went to a private school which wasn’t easy for my parents (tuition). But yet I’m excluded from what goes on in the school. Taxation w/out representation for sure.
They are SUCKERS being used as pawns for COMMIES.
Harold, stop insulting readers by shouting from your title that these things are escaping our attention. They don’t. Only the low-information gun owners who don’t read Ammoland, whose 2A activism is nothing more than an NRA annual membership and some chewing the rag down at the hunting club, are missing this news. You’re not telling us anything we don’t already know, and the courses of action you mention we are very familiar with. They cannot license a basic right UNLESS WE LET THEM, and we WON’T. You might, but not us! The politicians are likely to ignore us no matter… Read more »
Most people have never heard of AMMOLAND,this site needs to get OUT THERE.
Then wouldn’t a drivers license also fall under the same ?
I think that the government should get out of the licensing business, and leave matters of road safety to the insurance companies. But the DMV has morphed from a driver-licensing scheme into a mandatory state ID system.
And I’ll leave that right there.
@wjd – I don’t have it on mine. I have no reason to fly, I won’t submit myself to the molestation of TSA goons or their radiation chambers. In fact, I wouldn’t use ANY common carrier as you are not in control. I’ll drive where I need to go, and I’ll use secondary highways or less-traveled roads to avoid heavy traffic and urban centers. Cities to me are no-go zones, for a multitude of reasons: road pirates, gangs, common criminals, leftist control freaks, ad nauseam. Most airlines/trains take you right into the center of these no-go zones. At any time… Read more »
@WF, Whether it is disease exposure or break down of law and order, this is good tactical advice.
@WF, Interesting theory.
Road safety to insurance companies ???
Are you crazy ??
That’s worse then government as they will gut fun stuff.
No motorcycle’s or sports cars.
No large vehicle or small economy cars.
No thanks
Privatize EVERYTHING. Restore liberty!! And stop licking government leather; you’ve removed all the kiwi already.
Insurance companies do not possess the power to ban stuff like the government – you have it backwards. You can have whatever you want and you just pay how much you want according to free market trends.
But if you like your government-issued ID, you can keep your big brother-issued ID.
@Arny, No. Way back when automobiles first appeared. A corrupt judge decided that , in spite of a Constitutional Right to travel, driving on roads requires state government permission.
The Constitutional Right to travel has also been reduced by quarantine and curfew.
Corrupt judiciary view people as those that need to be controlled. We are seeing this view diminish our Speech Rights, Arms Rights, and every other area of our lives.
Currently, the Right to Travel has been pretty much reduced to walking on your own property.
And passports! I nearly forgot passports. Passports are government permission to come back to your own country.
Get a rope! Jamie Raskin & Senator Chris Van Hollen are on the list.
@G, patience.
“They are going to bribe states to enact their own licensing schemes via grants. ” Also known as….”Quid Pro Quo”…..aka “This for That”. Isn’t almost every interaction with government a Quid Pro Quo. Pay your real estate tax, you get to keep your property. Pay your personal property tax, you can keep your car. Pay your income taxes, you can keep a little bit for yourself….and keep some of your freedom. Seems it is past time for states to retain all tax revenues generated within the states Give a small amount to the federal government….starve the beast…..with stipulations and controls… Read more »
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Harold Hutchison article. . . . . Didn’t read.
Too bad. It was on point.
Mr Hutchison, thank you for the article.
One correction is that you cannot blame the delay in licensing in part for the death of Ms Bowne.
We cannot allow ourselves to point at anything other than the person that caused her death.
If you do, then that allows others to blame the firearm.
@GR: The “po” refused to process her communistic controlled “gun permit” request. So, YES – – the “po” can be held as a complicit actor in her death by her demented “ex”.
and the murdering ex most likely KNEW that she’d not be able to get her Mother May I Card before HE could sign her death warrant with lead. Though it is true she COULD have taken steps to break the law, nullifying them, and arm herself anyway. Maybe she’d have been able to sigh HIS death warrant with HER lead, then have to face a jury to defend her right to have been armed against a certain deadly threat. But at least she’d still be breathing and HE would not. I don’t know that state’s lws, but I’ll lay high… Read more »
I disagree, she should have bought one OFF the street if she was in that much danger. YOU are responsible for your own LIFE.
Not some worthless BUREAUCRAT.