Thoughts on NFA challenges
From Joe Huffman. I think suppressors are the easier target for a few reasons. We do, for instance, use mufflers on heavy equipment and cars. And, of course, every so often we hear of a firing range being targeted by a nearby neighborhood because when people moved into the neighborhood, they didn’t realize guns were loud.
September 27th, 2010 at 9:24 am
Suppressors are an obvious target, especially given the recent concerns over sound pollution and hearing damage caused by everything from ear buds to traffic noise. I have argued for over two decades now that a “health and safety” attack would make headway.
Federal preemption needs to be included. In the model legislation that I submitted to the NRA back in the mid-90s, I moved suppressors to Title I with federal preemption.
September 27th, 2010 at 9:54 am
I figure very few, if any, of the NFA provisions will ever be repealed. Suppressors might go, but you can expect the chorus of descriptions like “assasins tool” an such nonsense to be loud and continual.
I think everything else is very unlikely for two reasons. First, they are very easy to portray as evil. Look at what has been done with semi-auto “assault weapons” and multiply that by a hundred. The second reason is that the people who own these weapons have no incentive to change things. If you remove the NFA provisions from a several thousand dollar Mac 10, it becomes worth $300 at best. And most will choose their pocketbook over what is in the best intrest of everyone just about every time.
September 27th, 2010 at 10:08 am
And they go right to machine guns. Always machine guns as if the NFA covered nothing but machine guns.
Twenty years ago everyone thought that very few states would allow their citizens to carry guns. We’ve been down the “all is hopeless” road before.
Those that said “it is pointless” regarding NFA reform are just as wrong as the “it is pointless” crowd was on CCW reform.
The NFA has been modified before (in the 1950s). No reason it cannot be modified again.
Suppressors are the door. Let’s open it.
September 27th, 2010 at 10:24 am
Suppressors are indeed the obvious target, for the reasons mentioned above and because they are by far the least expensive (on the low end) NFA item. Some .22-caliber suppressors go (used) for less than the tax stamp! So you could make an undue burden argument there. It will be a slow process on everything NFA, but suppressors are the easiest. SBRs would be next, but look at decades for that–until enough people know enough to recognize that a concealable rifle or shotgun is no more dangerous (in the hands of a law-abiding citizen) than a concealable handgun, which is to say, not dangerous at all. Machine guns are a pipe dream for now, but there are small, incremental changes that might be possible, like extending the year of the registry closing to, say, 1990 or 1996, allowing transfer of dealer samples, LE trade-ins, etc. to citizens. Not likely, but possible if handled correctly. That means slowly and without bluster about rights, which though correct in every way, won’t sell politically probably ever. Sell it as a cost-saving measure for local law enforcement or something.
September 27th, 2010 at 10:37 am
NFA reform is possible but its silly to believe that it will occur via court challenges. We’ll have to push for legislation.
September 27th, 2010 at 10:47 am
“The NFA has been modified before (in the 1950s).”
It was amended in the ’30s, ’40s, ’50s, re-written in ’68, and amended again in ’86. Most of the reluctance to address it comes from the fear that once you get legislators playing in that sandbox again, there’s no limit to the havoc they can wreak (’86 was a trainwreck for the NFA, and I’m not just talking about Hughes, which isn’t even part of the NFA anyway).
As far as the “current owners would never let their inventment take a hit” horseshit, bitch please.
September 27th, 2010 at 12:05 pm
Perhaps Instead of calling them “silencers” or “suppressors” which sound all black ops assassin ninja CIA movie scary, we should call them mufflers.
Cause everyone knows what a muffler does and that cars aren’t silent.
September 27th, 2010 at 4:06 pm
There should probably be a unique name for gun mufflers like “guffler”. Sounds stupid and won’t raise any alarms of assassin tools like the others. 🙂
September 27th, 2010 at 6:03 pm
How about this; relief on the heavy taxes and restrictions on SBRs, AOWs, suppressors, and machine guns are all proposed. They scream bloody murder. We then insist they compromise and we only get half of what we asked for–this year.
If that worked I would even let them chose which half gets delayed each year. The Brady Campaign could even claim victory because we didn’t get everything we wanted. It’s a win-win situation, right?
September 27th, 2010 at 8:24 pm
Hmm… sounds like the strategery of a political party, what was it called? Oh, I’ve heard of something like that…