Edited: Washington’s Ballot Initiative 1639 has passed. What now?

[rickyrick]

The NRA says that they are suing to change the title of the initiative do to it being misleading. I’m not sure what the actual title of the initiative is exactly.

I could be doom and gloom again, but I think if it makes it to the ballot, it will pass.

This is from the email I received from the nra

The proposed initiative, if passed, would do the following:

Require a 10 Day Waiting Period for Commonly Owned Rifles. All semi-automatic rifle purchases and transfers would be subjected to a waiting period of 10 business days.
Establish a Government Registry of Firearms. Current law states the Washington Department of Licensing (DOL) “may” keep copies of pistol purchase applications. The proposed initiative would instead require the DOL to keep copies of these purchase applications, and would expand this government registry to include semi-automatic rifle purchases.
Require Completion of a Training Course to Purchase Rifles. This initiative would also require all purchasers of semi-automatic rifles to show they have completed a firearm safety training course within the last five years in order to proceed with the sale.
Impose up to a $25 Purchase Fee (GUN TAX) for Semi-Automatic Rifles. The Washington Department of Licensing would be allowed to charge up to a $25 fee for each semi-automatic rifle purchase.
Require Gun Owners to Lock Up their Firearms or Face Criminal Charges. Individuals would be required to lock up their firearms or potentially face a criminal charge of “Community Endangerment Due to Unsafe Storage of a Firearm” if the firearm is accessed by a prohibited person or minor. This intrusive proposal invades people’s homes and forces them to render their firearms useless in a self-defense situation by locking them up.
Restricts Adults Aged 18-20 from Acquiring Modern Rifles. Adults aged 18-20 would be prohibited from purchasing semi-automatic rifles and would not be allowed to receive them through a transfer or loan. The proposed initiative would deny a segment of law-abiding adults from access to the most modern and effective firearms for self-defense, thus depriving them of their constitutional rights.
Require “Warnings” for Firearm Purchases. All firearm purchases would come with a notification about the “inherent risks” of firearm ownership as an attempt to further stigmatize firearms.

[rickyrick]

Found the rediculous title:

NEW SECTION. Sec. 2. SHORT TITLE. This act may be known and cited as the public safety and semiautomatic assault rifle act.

[rwilson452]

As per MLK "A right delayed is a right denied." As your in the grip of the 9th. They don't care.

[Spats McGee]

What are the chances that Washington’s ballot initiative 1639 of making it on the ballot?

I'm of the opinion that smart lawyers don't quote odds. The odds of an initiative making the ballot would be difficult to speculate, at best. You'd have to answer questions like:

1. What's the ballot title?
2. Will the ballot title be acceptable? (I don't know about WA, but in AR, our Attorney General can reject the initiative based on a misleading ballot title.)
3. Who's pushing it?
4. What kind of advertising are they doing?

That said, I will agree that it's a horrible bill, if it does what that NRA email claims.

[steve4102]

1639 will be placed on the WA ballot in November.

Lawsuits
Three lawsuits were filed against the initiative: one lawsuit filed by the National Rifle Association (NRA) challenged the ballot title and summary, which resulted in the title and summary being re-written. Another lawsuit that sought to keep the initiative from securing a place on the ballot was dismissed. A lawsuit was filed shortly after the initiative was certified on July 27, 2018 alleging that the ballot language and petition format did not meet statutory requirements and, therefore, that the obtained signatures were invalid and the measure should be stricken from the ballot. On August 17, Thurston County Superior Court Judge James Dixon ruled in favor of the NRA, removing the measure from the ballot. The Alliance for Gun Responsibility, proponents of the initiative, filed a notice of appeal with the Washington Supreme Court. On August 24, 2018, the Washington Supreme Court reversed the lower court's ruling, allowing the initiative to stay on the November 2018 ballot.

https://ballotpedia.org/Washington_I..._Measure_(2018)

If I had to guess and I do, I would guess that 1639 has a real good chance of passing in Nov. Good luck to the people of WA, you are going to need it.

[rickyrick]

If it’s anti-gun and gets on the ballot... it will pass. Guess it’s time to just get out of guns living in Washington.

[wichaka]

Time to stand up and say NO. We are not the problem. Stop punishing the honest person.

I'll do what I can to help the garbage...but in the end, I could care less what they pass, not going to acknowledge it.

One of those...move along, not much to see here type of things.

[rickyrick]

If this ballot measure is approved, it would:

FORCE you to submit to mandatory government training every five years in order to keep your right to purchase or transfer semi-automatic rifles.
Turn YOU into a FELON if a criminal steals your guns and uses them to commit a crime.
IMPOSE statewide gun registration on law-abiding citizens who own semi-automatic firearms.
ENACT a new, expensive tax on the purchase and transfer of every semi-automatic rifle.
CREATE a massive state-level surveillance bureaucracy to keep tabs on law-abiding citizens who . choose to own handguns or semi-automatic rifles of any type whatsoever.

Hard to ignore, especially if someone steals and uses it. Seattle voters will pass this by themselves. Will just get rid of my rifles and keep a pistol. Maybe no guns at all. I can’t afford to keep a lawyer around lol.

[44 AMP]

We went through this a few years ago with I-369, the background check initiative. After being defeated in the legislature each time over 3 election cycles, they got it on the ballot as a voter initiative.

Thanks to a (largely out of state funded) ad campaign, deliberately LYING about the initiative, it was voted on, and passed in only 5 of the 39 counties state wide.

However, those 5 counties (in the Sea-Tac I-5 corridor) had enough votes in them to overwhelm all the votes in the rest of the state, and so that piece of crap initiative became law.

That law is so badly written that it could criminalize you handing a friend a gun to look at in your living room, unless you Both go to an FFL (and take the gun, too) and pay the "no more than $35" fee for a background check, BEFORE you hand him the gun.

AND, the same applies in order for him to hand you YOUR GUN, back!!!

and, while "transferring" the gun from you to him (without the background check) is a misdemeanor, and him handing it back is a misdemeanor, for him, you accepting your own property back, without ANOTHER background check is a felony!!!

To the best of my knowledge, every state law enforcement agency, from the game warden to the Sherriff, to the State Police have refused to enforce this law, until they get "further clarification on what is, and is not a covered "transfer". Been a few years now, and to date, said clarification has not been forthcoming..

So, yes, there is a very real risk that this assault on our rights, and our wallets could be passed by the numerical superiority of voters on the "left coast" of the state. This is a prime example of the flaws of democracy.

3 wolves and a sheep voting on what to have for dinner is democracy.

Don't forget that these things never STOP with just the law passing. The "safe storage" proposals are particularly frightening. Might take a few years, but expect "the state" to decide that they must conduct periodic searches of your house and property to "ensure" your gun(s) are stored in accordance with the law, and expect you and I to have to PAY THEM to do it.
(additional charges/fees) and expect the fee to increase over time, as well.

Also expect a ruling that they don't need a warrant to do so. And, also that they will be able to look at everything you own and any violation of law or regulation could be acted on.

Zum Befehl! Herr Obergruppenfuerher!! Alles in Ordnung hier!!

I really dislike the idea of facing fines or jail for doing what I've been legally doing for the past 40+ years. And having to do it not because of what I do or did, but because of what other people have done.

Welcome to the 21st century and their version of the new world order. it may technically be democracy, but it far, far from democracy at its finest.

[JN01]

Originally Posted by rickyrick

Hard to ignore, especially if someone steals and uses it. Seattle voters will pass this by themselves. Will just get rid of my rifles and keep a pistol. Maybe no guns at all. I can’t afford to keep a lawyer around lol.

That is probably the result the authors of the bill are looking for.

[rickyrick]

It’s scary because anything can be broken into with enough time.
I once had a burglary when I was on a three day trip. The house was completely gutted, took ten years to recover financially and otherwise. I can only imagine the hardships of adding a felony charge on top of being a victim.

[rickyrick]

That is probably the result the authors of the bill are looking for.

I was being a little sarcastic, but hey, at some point it becomes too much of a hassle to
Own a gun.

[44 AMP]

Require Completion of a Training Course to Purchase Rifles. This initiative would also require all purchasers of semi-automatic rifles to show they have completed a firearm safety training course within the last five years in order to proceed with the sale.

Yet another provision wide open to "clarification" which can be used to restrict our rights. What course(s) would be on their "approved" list? WHO makes the list and approves said training???

What requirements in time and direct cost are the trainers going to have to meet in order to be approved?? Expect, over time, requirements and costs to be approved trainers to be increased, incrementally, until there are only a handful of people in the state willing and being able to afford being "approved" trainers.

You can't even go humbly, cap in hand to beg permission to buy a semi auto if you don't have the approved training, and you can't get that training if there's only 8 guys in the whole state who are on the approved list.

Consider this, I can renew my driver's license online, don't have to take an exam, or an eye test, let alone a road test, but I have to take (and pay) for a course, from someone who might not even know the subject as well as I do, within 5 years prior to buying a semi auto? Even when I've got a closet full and have owned at least one for over half a century? Or the fact that I was given basic combat training by the US Army??? No, I'm just assumed to have forgotten all that in 5 years time, EVERY 5 years??? I just find that insulting.

Denying those same kids who get sent to 3rd world pestholes to risk injury and death "defending" us, the ability to buy a SEMI AUTO rifle when the US government puts a legal machinegun in their hands? how is that even remotely fair or ethical?? Isn't that some kind of reverse age discrimination??

[rickyrick]

What training will keep me from become a violent criminal or committing a mass shooting?

If they have magic training that can prevent gun crime, maybe they should give the class to inmates before released.

[44 AMP]

If I remember right, the guy who shot up the Pulse nightclub was a licensed, armed security guard who had passed psychological "screening" in order to be one.

This is the big flaw in the idea that background checks and mental evaluations will stop someone from doing mayhem. Like when you go to buy stock, they'll tell you "past performance is no guarantee of future results".

Sure, there are people who "stick to type" but not everyone does. And no mental evaluation can do an accurate assessment of someone who is lying.
One of the Columbine killers reportedly had a website full of peace, love, brotherhood, and lets all get alone stuff.

I've also heard that the only violent crime committed with a legally owned machinegun in nearly 80 years since the passage of the NFA 34 was done by a police officer!

Getting "training" and passing any or all kinds of "fitness evaluations" doesn't mean squat when it comes to actually knowing what an individual might do in the future.

It isn't just disturbed kids that have committed shooting rampages. The Vegas shooter was past middle age, and wealthy!! (totally outside the profile) And no one knows why he did it.

The mind of man can be as trackless as a bog at midnight, and anyone who tells you they can predict it with certainty is selling something.


Something I don't want to buy.

[DaleA]

What training will keep me from become a violent criminal or committing a mass shooting?

Well, none actually. (I suspect you already knew this.)

However the training might make you a more efficient, more confident, violent criminal or mass shooter should you ever decide to take that up.

[rickyrick]

I do appreciate the value of training, most people could benefit from training. I feel the government should facilitate safety training; make it accessible to all who wish to take it. But mandatory training to lower crime makes no sense. It seems to be just a ploy to make exercising individual rights inconvenient. Exercise other rights without being limited up front. I have freedom of speech, nothing is hindering me from saying anything at this moment, but there maybe consequences after the fact if my free speech is in violation of some standard somewhere.
I can type whatever I want and post it here on TFL, anyone can, but if it violates TFL rules it could be deleted or I could warned and so on.

[Dufus]

I feel the government should facilitate safety training

I think the government is in it deep enough without getting involved more than it is now.

After all, look how much government has screwed thing up already.

[rickyrick]

True that. One thing for sure is they will be involved somehow, especially in the coastal states. Government helped get into huge student loan debt, should be fairly easy to get safety training if I wanted... at least in my head.

[44 AMP]

I feel the government should facilitate safety training

I agree with the feeling. But, I also know the reality. And the reality is that there are people in government who will do their utmost to "facilitate" training into non-existence, by adding useless (and often stupid) requirements until the training is something that people cannot afford, or will not take.

Look at the crap they pulled with "arming pilots" after 9/11!!

Highly trained men and women, skilled and competent, licensed to fly commercial jet planes, taking their own, and the lives of hundreds of others in their hands, successfully, every day, were (essentially) told that they were NOT COMPENTENT enough to operate a handgun, without having to take a week (maybe two?) off from work, travel to ONE place in the country, to take an "approved" safety course, and pay for it all out of their own pocket. I'm not a pilot or anything close but it was insulting to ME, I can only imagine the insult to them!

And then, on top of all that, the pistol had to be in a "lock box" from which it had to be removed, checked and reinstalled before every flight, and the "approved" design of the box posed a serious risk of the gun having its trigger pulled.

They couldn't have come up with a more risk prone situation if they had deliberately tried, and some people think that is what they actually were trying to have happen.

Getting the government involved means that it will be as screwed up as they can make it, as difficult, time consuming and costly as they can make it, AND lets them reach into your wallet, AGAIN, while they do it.

Good idea in theory, HORRIBLE idea in practice.

[unclejack37]

The right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed. If Wa. state doesn't understand that then the people of Wa. state need to take it to a level that their local government understands. Right now looks like a good time test those waters. The Supreme Court is primed and waiting. It's a shame you can't hold individuals responsible for the cost of this effort. Because when you hit someone in their wallet they tend to remember the lesson and it serves as an example to others.

[44 AMP]

I've just finished the text of I-1639, as given in the WA voter pamphlet, and there is more "devil" in the details that what we have already been warned about.

For example, say goodbye to picking out any pistol and going home with it that day. Forget worrying about Fed instant system, the proposed law will forbid delivery of a pistol until you produce to the dealer, a valid concealed pistol license, he records the data on it, and then receives IN WRITING a statement from the local chief of police or sheriff in the country the purchaser resides, that you are still eligible to possess a firearm under RCW 9.41.040 and that the application to purchase is approved by the chief of police or sheriff.

Got that? In addition to all current laws, in order for a dealer to deliver a pistol, you HAVE to have a concealed pistol license, the dealer has to sent your application to your chief of police or sheriff, and get approval from them IN WRITING before they can deliver to you the pistol.

Another section provides that the state will "verify on a annual or more frequent bases" that everyone who bought a pistol or semiauto assault rifle under the act remain eligible to possess a firearm under state and federal laws.."

What I get from that is that the state DOL would have to run a background check, annually, or more often, on EVERY PERSON who buys a pistol or semi auto rifle, from the date of the act, on, forever...Who do you think is going to have to pay for that?? Not to mention the ever increasing scope of resources needed. What do you think it will cost in terms of resources if a bit down the road, some "well intentioned" bureaucrat bumps the frequency of the required "verification" to semi annual, or quarterly? or even monthly? For the children!!!

every time someone new buys a pistol or semi auto rifle, a new person is added to the list of people who have to be checked, at what ever interval is set, for the rest of their natural lives. (one would assume that if they ever became prohibited persons the check requirement would end, but I found no language in the initiative stating that.

There are a number of other detestable things in the text, its a bit worse than initially reported.

Don't overlook the sections where all govt "actors" are legally blameless for both wrongful denial and failing to deny to a prohibited person. And the section describing the fact that the monetary cost of the measure cannot be calculated.

[rickyrick]

Well, that’s very bleak.

The people want more than this. It’s a good first step.
I rarely see traffic laws being enforced anymore, with rising crime and population levels... I don’t see where the manpower is coming from.

[JN01]

Originally Posted by 44 AMP

I've just finished the text of I-1639, as given in the WA voter pamphlet, and there is more "devil" in the details that what we have already been warned about.

For example, say goodbye to picking out any pistol and going home with it that day. Forget worrying about Fed instant system, the proposed law will forbid delivery of a pistol until you produce to the dealer, a valid concealed pistol license, he records the data on it, and then receives IN WRITING a statement from the local chief of police or sheriff in the country the purchaser resides, that you are still eligible to possess a firearm under RCW 9.41.040 and that the application to purchase is approved by the chief of police or sheriff.

Got that? In addition to all current laws, in order for a dealer to deliver a pistol, you HAVE to have a concealed pistol license, the dealer has to sent your application to your chief of police or sheriff, and get approval from them IN WRITING before they can deliver to you the pistol.

Another section provides that the state will "verify on a annual or more frequent bases" that everyone who bought a pistol or semiauto assault rifle under the act remain eligible to possess a firearm under state and federal laws.."

What I get from that is that the state DOL would have to run a background check, annually, or more often, on EVERY PERSON who buys a pistol or semi auto rifle, from the date of the act, on, forever...Who do you think is going to have to pay for that?? Not to mention the ever increasing scope of resources needed. What do you think it will cost in terms of resources if a bit down the road, some "well intentioned" bureaucrat bumps the frequency of the required "verification" to semi annual, or quarterly? or even monthly? For the children!!!

every time someone new buys a pistol or semi auto rifle, a new person is added to the list of people who have to be checked, at what ever interval is set, for the rest of their natural lives. (one would assume that if they ever became prohibited persons the check requirement would end, but I found no language in the initiative stating that.

There are a number of other detestable things in the text, its a bit worse than initially reported.

Don't overlook the sections where all govt "actors" are legally blameless for both wrongful denial and failing to deny to a prohibited person. And the section describing the fact that the monetary cost of the measure cannot be calculated.

Sounds like reasonable, common sense measures.

[JohnKSa]

I think the government is in it deep enough without getting involved more than it is now.

After all, look how much government has screwed thing up already.

The government creates some really awful problems, but the 'solutions' they implement are often far worse.