Firearms Rights and the Political Candidate Conundrum

With each election cycle, as I fill out my ballot, all too often the choice between candidates comes down to a choice between completely unacceptable political risks, extreme risks that could invade every day life far beyond abstract politics.

At each election the major parties force me to choose between a candidate who has vowed to infringe upon my right to an abortion, or a candidate who has vowed to infringe upon my right to own a firearm. Until now, I've voted for the party that promises to protect: 

• freedom of abortion rights
• freedom of same sex marriage rights
• freedom of racial/ethnic civil rights

 wondering how and why the Democratic Party went so wrong that it doesn't see that: 

• freedom of firearm ownership rights

exists on an equal footing with the other rights the party evangelizes. Since the political topic of firearm rights infringement hadn't arisen last fall, or had been dismissed as a non-issue by candidates, I voted for Democrats. Then along came the recent moment for opportunistic gun ban zealot politicians to show their true colors. The gun ban zealot faction has spared no effort in their attempts to exploit a rare and isolated incident in every way they can imagine. The result has been an all out siege upon gun ownership rights in America, by gun grabbing politicians at both the state and national level. 

That the Democratic Party isn't the party standing tall for America's fundamentally foundational constitutional right to keep and bear arms, seems like proof that politics is irrational and politicians are completely illogical, unreliable, and incompetent. If Democrats would change their mind on this one most important of issues in American politics they would have a chance to lord over the Republicans indefinitely. But instead, the Democratic Party has chosen to attack one of America's founding principles, firearm rights, desecrating a right that was once held a sacrosanct status among American values.

That the Democrats have taken a stance that they intend to eviscerate the second amendment, politicians within the state of Washington’s constitutional firearm rights clause, and in other states including Colorado, all risk a repeat of the November 1994 political bloodletting in which most politicians across the U.S. who voted for the 1994 federal gun ban statute lost their seats to candidates who vowed to repeal it and who vowed to never allow such legislation to become law again. 

The Magpul Industries' Boulder Airlift

The esteemed Magpul Industries of Colorado, which makes a very popular line of components and accessories for AR-15 rifles and other firearms, such as the famous PMAG AR-15 ammunition magazine, has vowed to move its operations out of Colorado if that state passes its new gun ban and gun magazine ban statutes.

In an attempt to pander to Magpul, the Colorado legislature has amended its bills to allow Magpul and other companies to manufacture firearm components there that would be banned for sale in Colorado, so long as they were only sold to out of state buyers, and to military and law enforcement.

However, most firearms manufacturing companies are now boycotting law enforcement and military buyers in states that are enacting gun bans and gun magazine bans. If Colorado enacts its bans, Magpul has vowed to leave Colorado and vowed to refuse to sell its products to any Colorado law enforcement or state military organizations.

Magpul could always move to Washington State and join Washington State’s own Olympic Arms as a company that supports the second amendment.

Coloradan Magpul CEO Richard Fitzpatrick has instituted what he calls the:

The Boulder Airlift

and hopes to sell as many of their famous PMAG brand thirty (30) round standard capacity ammunition magazines as possible to Colorado residents, at prices just above cost, before any ban might be enacted there (with discount $5.00 air shipping), so that they will be grandfathered before the ban. Here is a link to information about the Boulder Airlift for Colorado residents.

Magpul Boulder Airlift Link

http://www.magpul.com/colorado

http://www.magpul.com/

https://www.facebook.com/magpul

A Brief History of Gun Ban Zealotry in America

Since gun ban zealotry took hold in America about eighty years ago, each set of increasingly onerous and draconian gun ban statutes enacted has been the product of an irrational, reactionary, political response to short lived or isolated and rare violence perpetrated with firearms. The underlying targets of each of these ban statutes have been: first, the “rum” runners of the alcohol prohibition era; then political assassinators of the 1960s; followed by certain violent anti-Vietnam-War protest groups of the 1960s and early 1970s; coupled with certain militant (1) black civil rights activist groups in the 1960s; and most recently a series of mass shooting massacres committed by extremely mentally disturbed people.

The first major gun ban statute to be enacted in the United States was the 1934 “National Firearms Act”. The 1934 National Firearms Act was a reactionary response to the violence perpetrated by gangs and the mafia who illegally trafficked in liquors during the alcohol prohibition era. Alcohol prohibition caused gangs and the mafia to flourish, as they smuggled liquor in from Canada, and used sub-machine-guns, such as the famous Thompson

1920s era Thompson Sub-Machine-Gun

sub-machine gun aka the “Tommy Gun”, as their lethal enforcement tool. The gun ban zealots of that era, dubbed them, “gangster weapons”. The consequences of the 1934 federal gun ban statute remain today as part of the foundation of federal gun restriction statutes, restriction of gun sales generally, and of federal registration and taxation of certain restricted firearms still owned by a few U.S. citizens willing to pay the required special excise taxes and undergo intensive FBI / ATF background checks. Until the 1934 federal Firearms Act, fully automatic machine guns, sawed off shotguns, and other short barreled rifles, were all legal to manufacture, sell, and own, in America.

Then along came the 1960s, during which at least three different but related political movements led to the 1968 federal “Gun Control Act”. The 1968 federal “Gun Control Act” was an angry, politically reactionary, response by the Democratic Party to a variety of militant 1960s political movements, an attempt to disarm them, most of which ironically were radical left ideologies, including : violent splinter factions from groups like Students for a Democratic Society and the Weather Underground,  who turned violent, began to use guns and explosives, and were labeled seditious terrorist organizations; and similarly with various black civil rights protest groups such as the Black Panthers, the Black Liberation Army, and others, which the government also deemed terrorists. In addition, as Sandy Hook has been exploited to stir up reactionary sentiment, in the 1960s, the string of rare political assassinations that included: John F. Kennedy, Robert F. Kennedy, Malcolm X, and Martin Luther King, Jr.; created an equally reactionary political environment then, but one which succeeded, with the result being the gun ban statute known as the federal “Gun Control Act of 1968”. Thus was born the 1968 gun ban and restriction act, and the euphemism known as “gun control”. That gun ban statute is the basis for much of what today is considered the status quo with regard to firearms restriction laws. Before 1968 however, few such restrictions existed.

The specious political notion of the civilian “assault weapon” was born out of various events of the late 1980s. It was California that enacted the first such major ban in 1989, as a reactionary political response to various shooting incidents there, most notably after Patrick Purdy killed five school children in Stockton, CA with a Kalashnikov variant rifle and a Beretta style pistol. In response, the still active California Gun Ban Act of 1989 was enacted. A series of temporally related events inspired a multi-year political campaign by California’s Dianne Feinstein to enact the failed 1994 federal “Assault Weapons Ban”. The political environment during the year that preceded its enactment was eerily similar to the current, very contentious, firearm rights climate. During 1993 and 1994 there was a panicked run on guns, with the same sort of price gouging and inventory depletion that exists today. After the ban became law however, firearms manufacturers found ways to produce guns that complied with the statute, while still maintaining the core functionality of the firearm. As is true even with Dianne Feinstein’s latest 2013 attempt to enact similar legislation, the ban is based primarily on cosmetic features of firearms that do not have any direct relation to its ability to fire projectiles. Due to extreme political pressures, the statute included a ten year expiration clause. The 1994 federal gun ban was signed into law on September 13, 2004. A little more than a month later, most U.S. Senators and Representatives who voted in Congress for the ban, were voted out of office by their constituents, creating a Congressional shift that still remains. There remains a significant caucus of the Congressional membership that was elected specifically because they promised constituents they would never allow another gun ban statute to be enacted.

Meanwhile, Dianne Feinstein and her cohorts have been quietly and repeatedly filing gun ban bills similar to her latest gun ban bill, since 2004, all without gaining much traction in the U.S. Congress. As is readily apparent, when Sandy Hook occurred, gun ban zealot politicians seized at the opportunity. With just a few edits to the same bill Dianne Feinstein has filed throughout the past decade, she has introduced her sweeping gun ban bill again. Other gun ban zealot politicians have introduced a variety of gun ban bills as well. Among them U.S. Senator Frank Lautenberg’s multiple gun ban bills are notable. Meanwhile, members of Congress from so called red states quietly but vigorously oppose all the proposed gun ban statutes. Members of Congress are doing everything possible to delay consideration of any of the gun ban bills, with the hope that the political climate will soften, and all the gun ban bills can be quietly defeated in committee. One of the ways they do this is by setting up negotiation groups who argue over the details and then walk away, able to tell the public they tried to reach compromise and failed, enabling both sides to save political face, while at the same time defeating the legislation.

As should be apparent from this brief history, gun ban zealotry in America is and has been the product of irrational, reactionary, political opportunism. One of the ironies for so called left wing Democratic Party politics is that gun ban zealotry has been, in part, a racist people control tool enacted in the 1960s with the hope of disarming militant left wing Black Protest Groups, and Anti-Vietnam-War protestors. Throughout the eighty year history of American gun ban zealotry it has also been sold to the public as a way to disarm violent gangs, first against the prohibition era alcohol trafficking gangs, and then the illegal substance trafficking gangs of the last forty or fifty years. None of the gun bans has ever decreased the type or quantity of guns in the possession of and used by such gangs as lethal enforcement and territory control tools. The gangs are just as willing to traffic in illegal guns as they are to traffic in illegal substances. All three major unconstitutional attempts to disarm feared groups have failed, with the unacceptable side effect that law abiding U.S. citizens have been hamstrung in the process by the gun ban statutes and onerous licensing and permitting schemes that exist in many states, such as New Jersey, New York, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Hawaii, Illinois, and California, and which the gun ban zealots would like to see enacted federally. Thankfully, it appears that by summer 2013, some of the hysteria over Sandy Hook will have subsided, and the current disarmament siege will have failed, at least this time, while having left firearm rights supporters forever with a permanently heightened sense of vigilance against the ever present threat of gun ban zealot politics, not just from Americans, but imported from other countries as well.

(sources)

http://www.saf.org/LawReviews/Tartaro1.htm

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

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_Control_Act_of_1968

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

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

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

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

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

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

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/District_of_Columbia_v._Heller

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McDonald_v._Chicago

(1) militance / militant - a great word that is rarely used these days.

U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee Approves Increased Illegal Gun Trafficking Penalties

Provided below, is the full text of the bill filed in the U.S. Senate by Democratic Senator Patrick Leahy of Vermont, which would increase the penalties against Straw Purchasers of Firearms, and related illegal gun trafficking crimes. However, the existing penalties for such federal crimes are already steep.

On Thursday March 7, 2013, the Senate Judiciary Committee, of which Patrick Leahy is the chairperson, voted 11 to 7, along party lines, to approve an amended version of the bill, enabling it to be voted upon by the full U.S. Senate. Republican Senator Richard Grassley voted to approve the bill after the committee accepted his amendment that adds language to the bill that prevents the U.S. government from acting as a de facto gun purchaser as it did in the infamous "Fast and Furious" debacle, which put American firearms into the possession of murderous Mexican drug cartels.

Most importantly, the text of the bill below adds a lot of vague language to the existing federal statute, about which some serious questions need to be asked regarding its intent . At its core though, this bill increases the federal penalty for straw purchase gun buying from ten (10) years to twenty (20) years, and adds property forfeiture provisions as well. However, some news reports also indicate that after review by the Senate Judiciary Committee, they increased the maximum penalty to twenty-five (25) years. The amended version of this bill has not yet been made available on the U.S. Senate web sites for verification of such changes and details. 

What is important though, is that these misguided legislators seem to believe that  increasing the maximum penalty from ten years in federal prison and a $250,000.00 fine  to twenty-five years is somehow going to deter a criminal straw purchaser who wasn't already deterred by the potential ten year prison term. It seems absurd to believe that a drug addict straw purchaser willing to buy a gun for a criminal in return for money or drugs is going to pay any attention to either the existing statute or an even more onerous one. This sort of legislation is just political grandstanding designed to enable those who propose and support it, to later tell their constituents they accomplished something, even though what they accomplished isn't going to reduce violence in America, whether committed with a firearm or any other kind  of weapon, isn't going to stop the sorts of people who make straw purchases of firearms from doing so, and isn't going to prevent the sort of mass shooting massacres that inspired the bill in the first place.

U.S. Senate Bill S. 54

http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c113:S.54:

the existing federal firearms restriction statute

http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/922

S.54 -- Stop Illegal Trafficking in Firearms Act of 2013 (Introduced in Senate - IS)
S 54 IS

113th CONGRESS
1st Session
S. 54 To increase public safety by punishing and deterring firearms trafficking.

IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES

January 22 (legislative day, January 3), 2013

Mr. LEAHY (for himself and Mr. DURBIN) introduced the following bill; which was read twice and referred to the Committee on the Judiciary

---

A BILL To increase public safety by punishing and deterring firearms trafficking.

Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled,

SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

This Act may be cited as the `Stop Illegal Trafficking in Firearms Act of 2013'.

SEC. 2. TABLE OF CONTENTS.

The table of contents for this Act is as follows:

Sec. 1. Short title.

Sec. 2. Table of contents.

Sec. 3. Punishing and deterring straw purchasing of firearms.

Sec. 4. Amendments to section 922(a)(6).

Sec. 5. Amendments to section 922(d).

Sec. 6. Amendments to section 924(h).

Sec. 7. Amendments to section 924(k).

SEC. 3. PUNISHING AND DETERRING STRAW PURCHASING OF FIREARMS.

(a) In General- Chapter 44 of title 18, United States Code, is amended by adding at the end the following:

`Sec. 932. Straw purchasing of firearms

`(a) Any person (other than a licensed importer, licensed manufacturer, or licensed dealer) who knowingly purchases any firearm for, on behalf of, or with intent to transfer it to, any other person, if that firearm has moved in or otherwise affected interstate or foreign commerce, or attempts or conspires to do so, shall be fined under this title, imprisoned not more than 20 years or both. For purposes of this section, the term `purchases' includes the receipt of any firearm from pawn or on consignment by a person who does not own the firearm.

`(b) Subsection (a) shall not apply to any firearm that is lawfully purchased by a person--

`(1) to be given as a bona fide gift to a recipient who provided no service or tangible thing of value to acquire the firearm, unless the person knows or has reason to believe such recipient is prohibited by Federal, State, or local law from possessing, receiving, selling, shipping, transporting, transferring, or otherwise disposing of the firearm; or

`(2) to be given to a bona fide winner of an organized raffle, contest, or auction conducted in accordance with law and sponsored by a national, State, or local organization or association, unless the person knows or has reason to believe such recipient is prohibited by Federal, State, or local law from possessing, purchasing, receiving, selling, shipping, transporting, transferring, or otherwise disposing of the firearm.

`(c) If any violation of subsection (a) is committed knowing or with reasonable cause to believe that any firearm involved will be used to commit a crime of violence, the person shall be sentenced to a term of imprisonment of not more than 30 years.

`Sec. 933. Forfeiture and fines

`(a)(1) Any person convicted of a violation of this chapter shall forfeit to the United States, irrespective of any provision of State law--

`(A) any property constituting, or derived from, any proceeds the person obtained, directly or indirectly, as the result of such violation; and

`(B) any of the person's property used, or intended to be used, in any manner or part, to commit, or to facilitate the commission of, such violation.

`(2) The court, in imposing sentence on a person convicted of a violation of this chapter, shall order, in addition to any other sentence imposed pursuant to this chapter, that the person forfeit to the United States all property described in paragraph (1).

`(b) A defendant who derives profits or other proceeds from an offense under this chapter may be fined not more than the greater of--

`(1) the fine otherwise authorized by this part; and

`(2) the amount equal to twice the gross profits or other proceeds of the offense under this chapter.'.

(b) Title III Authorization- Section 2516(1)(n) of title 18, United States Code, is amended by striking `and 924(n)' and inserting `, 924, and 932'.

(c) Racketeering Amendment- Section 1961(1)(B) of title 18, United States Code, is amended by adding at the end the following: `section 932 (relating to trafficking in firearms),'.

(d) Money Laundering Amendment- Section 1956(c)(7)(D) of title 18, United States Code, is amended by striking `section 924(n)' and inserting `sections 924(n) and 932'.

(e) Directive to Sentencing Commission- Pursuant to its authority under section 994 of title 28, United States Code, and in accordance with this section, the United States Sentencing Commission shall review and amend its guidelines and policy statements to ensure that persons convicted of an offense under section 932 of title 18, United States Code and other offenses applicable to the straw purchases of firearms are subject to increased penalties in comparison to those currently provided by the guidelines and policy statements for such straw purchasing offenses. In carrying out this subsection, the Commission shall ensure that the sentencing guidelines and policy statements reflect Congress' intent that the applicable guideline penalties be increased and the guidelines and policy statements reflect the extremely serious nature of the offenses described in the amendment made by subsection (a), the incidence of such offenses, and the need for an effective deterrent and appropriate punishment to prevent such offenses.

(f) Technical and Conforming Amendment- The table of sections of chapter 44 of title 18, United States Code, is amended by adding at the end the following:

`932. Straw purchasing of firearms.

`933. Forfeiture and fines.'.

SEC. 4. AMENDMENTS TO SECTION 922(a)(6).

Section 922(a) of title 18, United States Code, is amended by adding at the end the following:

`For purposes of paragraph (6), in addition to the eligibility of a person to ship, transport, receive, or possess any firearm or ammunition, information concerning the identity, age, place of residence (to include address), and citizenship or immigration status of a person shall be considered material to the lawfulness of the sale or other disposition of a firearm or ammunition'.

SEC. 5. AMENDMENTS TO SECTION 922(d).

Section 922(d) of title 18, United States Code, is amended--

(1) in paragraph (8), by striking `or' at the end;

(2) in paragraph (9), by striking the period at the end and inserting `;'; and

(3) by striking the matter following paragraph (9) and inserting the following:

`(10) is prohibited by State or local law from possessing, receiving, selling, shipping, transporting, transferring, or otherwise disposing of the firearm or ammunition;

`(11) intends to sell or otherwise dispose of the firearm or ammunition to a person described in any of paragraphs (1) through (10); or

`(12) intends to sell or otherwise dispose of the firearm or ammunition in furtherance of a crime of violence or drug trafficking offense or to export the firearm or ammunition in violation of law.

This subsection shall not apply with respect to the sale or disposition of a firearm or ammunition to a licensed importer, licensed manufacturer, licensed dealer, or licensed collector who pursuant to subsection (b) of section 925 is not precluded from dealing in firearms or ammunition, or to a person who has been granted relief from disabilities pursuant to subsection (c) of section 925.'.

SEC. 6. AMENDMENTS TO SECTION 924(h).

Section 924 of title 18, United States Code, is amended by striking subsection (h) and inserting the following:

`(h)(1) Whoever knowingly receives or transfers a firearm or ammunition, or attempts or conspires to do so, knowing or having reasonable cause to believe that such firearm or ammunition will be used to commit a crime of violence (as defined in subsection (c)(3)), a drug trafficking crime (as defined in subsection (c)(2)), or a crime under the Arms Export Control Act (22 U.S.C. 2751 et seq.), the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (50 U.S.C. 1701 et seq.), the Foreign Narcotics Kingpin Designation Act (21 U.S.C. 1901 et seq.), or section 212(a)(2)(C) of the Immigration and Nationality Act (8 U.S.C. 1182(a)(2)(C)) shall be imprisoned not more than 30 years, fined in accordance with this title, or both.

`(2) No term of imprisonment imposed on a person under this subsection shall run concurrently with any term of imprisonment imposed on the person under section 932.'.

SEC. 7. AMENDMENTS TO SECTION 924(k).

Section 924 of title 18, United States Code, is amended by striking subsection (k) and inserting the following:

`(k)(1) A person who, with intent to engage in or to promote conduct that--

`(A) is punishable under the Controlled Substances Act (21 U.S.C. 801 et seq.), the Controlled Substances Import and Export Act (21 U.S.C. 951 et seq.), or chapter 705 of title 46;

`(B) violates any law of a State relating to any controlled substance (as defined in section 102 of the Controlled Substances Act, 21 U.S.C. 802); or

`(C) constitutes a crime of violence (as defined in subsection (c)(3)),

smuggles or knowingly brings into the United States, a firearm or ammunition, or attempts or conspires to do so, shall be imprisoned not more than 10 years, fined under this title, or both.

`(2) A person who, with intent to engage in or to promote conduct that--

`(A) would be punishable under the Controlled Substances Act (21 U.S.C. 801 et seq.), the Controlled Substances Import and Export Act (21 U.S.C. 951 et seq.), or chapter 705 of title 46, if the conduct had occurred within the United States; or

`(B) would constitute a crime of violence (as defined in subsection (c)(3)) for which the person may be prosecuted in a court of the United States, if the conduct had occurred within the United States,

smuggles or knowingly takes out of the United States, a firearm or ammunition, or attempts or conspires to do so, shall be imprisoned not more than 10 years, fined under this title, or both.'.

A Woman New York Gun Owner Vows Resistance

Women gun owners in New York State are vowing to resist New York State's draconian 2013 gun ban and gun confiscation statute. The women in the video below said they would rather move out of the state of New York rather than comply with New York State's new gun ban statute. When one woman was asked if she pictured herself turning in any banned firearms or ammunition magazines she might own, her answer was, "No".

U.S. Senator Patrick Leahy's Lack of Insight

As legislation like U.S. Senate Bill S. 54, a bill that purports to help prevent, and increase the penalties for, illegal firearms trafficking, are considered by the U.S. Congress, it seems like the Senators wrangling over them don’t demonstrate much cognizance of the history of gun ban legislation in America, or the events and politics that have inspired it. Gun ban zealotry in America is, and has consistently been, the product of irrational, reactionary, political opportunism.

Anti-Firearm-Rights Democratic U.S. Senator Patrick Leahy

One of the ironies for so called left wing Democratic Party politics is that gun ban zealotry was, in part, intended to be a racist people control tool when it was enacted during the 1960s with the hope of disarming militant left wing Black Protest Groups like the Black Liberation Army, and violent Anti-Vietnam-War protesters like the Weather Underground. Throughout the eighty year history of American gun ban zealotry it has also been sold to the public as a way to disarm violent gangs, first against the 1930s prohibition era alcohol trafficking gangs, and more recently with the vain hope of disarming the illegal substance trafficking gangs of the last forty or fifty years.

None of the gun bans has ever decreased the type or quantity of guns in the possession of and used by such gangs as lethal enforcement and territory control tools. The gangs are just as willing to traffic in illegal guns as they are to traffic in illegal substances. They are no more likely to care at all about the statute Senator Leahy proposes than they are about the anti murder statutes they violate when they shoot their drug trafficking enemies and rivals.

All three major unconstitutional attempts to disarm feared groups have failed, in 1930s, the 1960s, and the 1990s, with the unacceptable side effect that law abiding U.S. citizens have become hamstrung in the process by the gun ban statutes and onerous licensing and permitting schemes that exist in many states, such as New Jersey, New York, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Hawaii, Illinois, and California, and which the gun ban zealots would like to see enacted federally. Thankfully, it appears that by summer 2013, some of the hysteria over Sandy Hook will have subsided, and the current disarmament siege will hopefully have failed, at least this time. It will however have left firearm rights supporters forever with a permanently heightened sense of vigilance against the ever present threats to constitutional rights that gun ban zealot politics impose.

full text of U.S. Senate Bill S. 54

http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c113:S.54:

existing firearms restriction statute 18 USC 992 et seq

http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/922

Attorney Colion Noir, Firearms Rights Activist

In the video below an African American attorney and firearm rights activist who lives and practices in Texas, expresses his views about contemporary gun politics controversies in America. He is a man who shatters the conventional stereotypes about the demographics of people who oppose the various gun ban bills currently under consideration in the U.S. Congress.

Oppose the Washington State Legislature's Background Checks Bill

Washington State’s law abiding gun owners, and the law abiding citizenry of the state in general, are better off without the onerous WA HB 1588.

Under current Washington State statutory law, the essence of what WA HB1588 purports to accomplish already exists, rendering HB 1588 unnecessary and burdensome upon law abiding citizens. If a private firearm sale without a background check occurs to a prohibited buyer under existing Washington State statutory law (and federal statute), both parties to the sale have committed a crime pursuant to this state’s existing statutes, as the following explains.

First, pursuant to state statute RCW 9.41.080 and federal statute 18 USC § 922(d), it is already the responsibility of a firearm seller to check the buyer's eligibility to own a firearm while conducting a private firearm sale. A private Washington State gun seller can do that easily under existing state law, by requiring the buyer to have a concealed pistol license, which is easy for legal gun owners to obtain (pursuant to RCW 9.41.070). It is the seller who would be criminally liable for selling a firearm to a prohibited person under the existing RCW 9.41.080 in Washington State.

That already existing responsibility upon a seller in a private firearm sale would continue to exist if WA HB 1588 were to be enacted, and that portion of the statute would remain the same.

Second, an ineligible buyer is already committing a separate felony crime under existing Washington State law pursuant to RCW 9.41.040 by even attempting to purchase a firearm. In other words, the existing Washington State firearms statutes already achieve what some legislators misguidedly believe needs to be made additionally restrictive to private firearm sales, for it to accomplish such goals.

What the amended statute would do is place an additional burden and expense on law abiding Washington State residents, to affirmatively prove that they fulfilled their already existing duty with government intrusion and expense, and under penalty of criminal liability for failure to obtain that government sanctioned proof.

Meanwhile, criminals will continue to conduct illegal firearms transactions without consideration for existing law, or any future, potentially amended, law.

Instead of the nonsensical HB 1588, Washington State law enforcement organizations and courts, should enforce the existing statutes, by arresting and prosecuting felons and other prohibited people in possession of them, and the person who sold/transferred/delivered the gun to the prohibited person, as provided in the existing Washington State firearms statutes.

RCW 9.41.080

Delivery to ineligible persons.

No person may deliver a firearm to any person whom he or she has reasonable cause to believe is ineligible under RCW 9.41.040 to possess a firearm. Any person violating this section is guilty of a class C felony, punishable under chapter 9A.20 RCW.[/i]

RCW 9.41.040

Unlawful possession of firearms 

— Ownership, possession by certain persons 

— Restoration of right to possess — Penalties.

(1)(a) A person, whether an adult or juvenile, is guilty of the crime of unlawful possession of a firearm in the first degree, if the person owns, has in his or her possession, or has in his or her control any firearm after having previously been convicted or found not guilty by reason of insanity in this state or elsewhere of any serious offense as defined in this chapter.

     (b) Unlawful possession of a firearm in the first degree is a class B felony punishable according to chapter 9A.20 RCW.

[ ... ]

"Mr. and Mrs. America, Turn 'Em All In ..."

No reasonable person can have any doubt that what U.S. Senator Dianne Feinstein really wants is a complete repeal of the federal second amendment and government confiscation of every single firearm held in law abiding American civilian hands. She has said it herself many times throughout that past couple decades, as she did in the video below, with her chilling statement about modern firearms, which she fallaciously deems "assault weapons". In the 1994 video below, she stated, “if could have gotten fifty-one votes in the Senate of the United States for an outright ban, picking up every one of them, Mr. and Mrs. America, turn ‘em all in, I would have done it”.

Politicians like California's U.S. Senator Dianne Feinstein have become a scourge on America's constitutional right to keep and bear arms. It doesn't seem likely that her California constituency is going to vote her out of office any time soon though. However, she isn't alone in her quest to disarm law abiding U.S. citizens. There is an entire gun ban zealot hit squad in the U.S. Senate. Their disarmament hit squad includes Chuck Schumer of New York, Frank Lautenberg of New Jersey, Patrick Leahy of Vermont, and others, all of whom have introduced gun ban bills at the 2013 U.S. Senate. Only concerted efforts, continuous grassroots lobbying, by emailing and telephoning members of the U.S. Senate and the U.S. House can insure that the tyrannically unconstitutional gun ban zealot bills are defeated.