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Old October 22, 2017, 05:42 PM   #26
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The proposed legislation states "...prohibit the manufacture, possession, or transfer of any part or combination of parts that is designed and functions to increase the rate of fire of a semiautomatic rifle..."

By that definition, doing finger exercises could throw you in jail or get your trigger finger cut off.
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Old October 22, 2017, 05:47 PM   #27
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I sincerely doubt that finger exercises would constitute "manufacture, possession, or transfer of a part or combination of parts." Not to mention the A4, A5, A14 and A8 implications.
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Old October 22, 2017, 06:12 PM   #28
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Sorry Spats, I should have been more obvious in my sarcastic.
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Old October 22, 2017, 08:20 PM   #29
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Fair enough, TXAZ.
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Old October 23, 2017, 04:02 AM   #30
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I sincerely doubt that finger exercises would constitute "manufacture, possession, or transfer of a part or combination of parts." Not to mention the A4, A5, A14 and A8 implications.
No, but how about a guy like Jerry Miculek? It could be argued that the Bump-Stock does not give him an increase in "Rate-of-Fire". Would he or anyone with similar physical skills be exempt from a bill such as this?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ddPTyoV-Irc
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Old October 23, 2017, 12:20 PM   #31
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Would he or anyone with similar physical skills be exempt from a bill such as this?
Of course they would be.

The "rules committee" can decide you can't wear a particular shoe in the race, but they cannot decide or make a rule on how fast the runner can run.
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Old October 24, 2017, 09:25 AM   #32
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Originally Posted by carguychris
I dunno, Tom. It goes well beyond simply barring the shipment or receipt of mail-order ammunition.

It bars anyone without an FFL from selling OR shipping ammunition to anyone other than an FFL, whether or not this is done in the course of conducting business;
It requires FFL record-keeping of ammunition sales (not this again!); and
It requires FFL reporting of ammunition sales totaling 1,000 or more rounds to the same non-licensed individual within 5 consecutive business days.

IOW this legislation should be more honestly titled the "Substantially Reducing the Availability and Driving Up the Cost of Ammunition in General Act."

This legislation is likely DOA as written but I think it's important for us to understand what's in it.
It could also be titled the "Encouraging Americans to Reload Act."
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Old October 24, 2017, 09:43 AM   #33
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It could also be titled the "Encouraging Americans to Reload Act."
It could also be called:

The California Copycat Law

or something more general like:

This will do until we can pass more incremental anti-gun restrictions act
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Old October 24, 2017, 09:54 AM   #34
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Originally Posted by Aguila Blanca
It could also be titled the "Encouraging Americans to Reload Act."
Quote:
Originally Posted by ATN082268
...or something more general like:

This will do until we can pass more incremental anti-gun restrictions act
Yeah, they'll come after reloading supplies next.
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Old October 25, 2017, 01:14 AM   #35
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Yeah, they'll come after reloading supplies next
No, they won't. Not "next" anyway. Unless the "next" mass killing is done with reloaded ammo. And, IF that happens, then reloading supplies will be their "target of opportunity", but generally they don't give a snit about reloading, after all, if they can get rid of the guns, reloading goes away, as well.
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Old October 30, 2017, 03:28 AM   #36
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I'm not really sure where the "Business Insider" falls in the political spectrum but here is the headline:
Quote:
Every major gun control bill proposed since the Las Vegas massacre is losing ground in Congress
and here is the link to the story:
http://www.businessinsider.com/las-v...-in-congress-1

A couple things I though were noteworthy, 'smart gun' legislation was mentioned and a repeal of the 'Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act (PLCAA)' came up again. Both of which, IMhO are silly...we've discussed the technicalities of 'smart guns' before, no need to rehash that again. And as far as the PLCAA goes it is a sad testament to common sense that the PLCAA is needed but it IS needed to prevent frivolous lawsuits against gun companies.
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Old October 30, 2017, 07:37 AM   #37
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No, they won't. Not "next" anyway. Unless the "next" mass killing is done with reloaded ammo. And, IF that happens, then reloading supplies will be their "target of opportunity", but generally they don't give a snit about reloading, after all, if they can get rid of the guns, reloading goes away, as well.
You could also say that if they get rid of the ammo, guns will go away It would probably be easier for the antis to ban or heavily restrict ammo than trying to completely ban manufacturing guns and confiscate existing ones.
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Old October 30, 2017, 11:40 AM   #38
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They have tried various things to ban ammo, and to date, all they have been able to do is ban certain ammo based on bullet construction (AP, and some places ban JHP). They have not been able to ban ammo just because it is ammo.

Even the most ...interpretive.. courts recognize that the ammo for our guns is also covered under the same rights as the gun are.

Which, of course, doesn't mean the anti's won't try, and keep trying...
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Old October 30, 2017, 12:16 PM   #39
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44, I mostly agree. My earlier post was made in a fit of rhetorical grumpiness.

I agree that outright ammo bans—or administrative near-bans—are seriously unlikely to pass Constitutional muster. Furthermore, IMHO the mere idea that gun bans are off-limits but ammo bans are A-OK is an obviously puerile sham, and I suspect that most gun-control advocates beyond the Politico-commentator level are intelligent enough to realize this even if they don't say it openly.

I am concerned, however, with the creeping incrementalism we see with certain types of ammo (i.e. the Sporting Purposes test, and attempts to classify ammo as AP when it clearly fails to meet the legal definition). Our main focus should be to make sure that additional types of ammo do not fall under similar legal umbrellas.
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Old October 31, 2017, 11:41 AM   #40
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They have tried various things to ban ammo, and to date, all they have been able to do is ban certain ammo based on bullet construction (AP, and some places ban JHP). They have not been able to ban ammo just because it is ammo.

Even the most ...interpretive.. courts recognize that the ammo for our guns is also covered under the same rights as the gun are.

Which, of course, doesn't mean the anti's won't try, and keep trying...

I agree that a complete ban on ammunition is unlikely. If the courts treat ammo/reloading supplies like they treat guns, then almost anything short of a complete ban will be seen as "reasonable," and upheld. There could be bans on just online sales of ammunition/reloading supplies. After that they could put the screws to the local retailers with onerous regulations like daily inventory requirements, special cases/storage for ammo/reloading supplies, etc. For the buyer, things like limits on amount of ammunition/reloading purchases, retailer reporting to the ATF on certain ammunition purchases, etc.
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Old October 31, 2017, 02:23 PM   #41
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ATN082268: Your post reads like the California ammo laws about to take affect.

Background checks required to purchase ammo; no mail order ammo (all sales must be face to face); ammo cannot be out on display in the gun store but must be behind the counter and not accessible to customers. All ammo sellers for more than 50 rounds require an ammunition seller's license.

They also wanted to require a video of every transaction but I don't think that made it in to the law.
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Old November 4, 2017, 03:34 PM   #42
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I just received an email from Firearms policy coalition stating there is a new bill being introduced related to bump fire stocks HR-4168
https://www.congress.gov/bill/115th-...bill/4168/text

Quote:
Originally Posted by HR-4168
To amend the Internal Revenue Code of 1986 to treat in the same manner as a machine gun any bump fire stock, or any other devices designed to accelerate substantially the rate of fire of a semiautomatic weapon.
So does that wording change anyone's mind ? It does to me a little bit but The Firearms policy coalition are treating it as if it's the same as Feinstein's bill which was more vague IMO
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Old November 5, 2017, 12:59 AM   #43
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It works fine, until some unelected "agent" decides that a 10 round per minute (or even ONE round per minute) is "substantial".

Same problem as the other bill(s), it leaves the definition in the hands of the people who do the enforcement.

That is neither good policy, nor good law, though it is done all too often.

What is a fully automatic firearm is clearly defined. More than one shot from a single trigger pull. Very clear, a gun either does that, or it does not.

Now, putting in such vague language as "a substantial increase" is asking for a judgment call. Legislators can make such a judgment, and put it into law, but they are answerable to the public at the next election.

This is part of their function and their responsibility. When they pass that to an enforcement agency, they are avoiding their responsibility, and avoiding having to face the consequences of their actions. Public ire will be directed at the agency, (who gets to duck it, because they are "only doing their job as defined in law"), not the politician(s) who are actually responsible, and who should be held accountable.

It's an old dodge, and its not just limited to firearms law.

Consider this, Congress didn't define what could and couldn't be imported under the "sporting use" clause they wrote into law, they gave that task to the Sec of the Treasury (or their designee).

Too much for their busy selves to bother with, I suppose...on the other hand, we can't vote the SecTreas out of office, if he bans something we like, just because he can.
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Old November 5, 2017, 06:01 AM   #44
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No, doesn't change my mind. It still leaves the problem of the gov't deciding what rate of fire is acceptable. None of the business about "accelerates the rate of fire"or "substantially accelerates the rate of fire" makes a whit of difference until someone decides how many rounds per minute/second/day is acceptable.
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Old November 5, 2017, 05:26 PM   #45
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I see your guys points but how often do we see "reasonable" in the wording of legislation or rulings . I don't know about you guys but reasonable sure seems a lot more vague and up to interpretation then substantially is in the text of this bill ????
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Old November 6, 2017, 09:18 AM   #46
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Originally Posted by Metal god
I just received an email from Firearms policy coalition stating there is a new bill being introduced related to bump fire stocks HR-4168
https://www.congress.gov/bill/115th-...bill/4168/text

Quote:
Originally Posted by HR-4168
To amend the Internal Revenue Code of 1986 to treat in the same manner as a machine gun any bump fire stock, or any other devices designed to accelerate substantially the rate of fire of a semiautomatic weapon.
So does that wording change anyone's mind ? It does to me a little bit but The Firearms policy coalition are treating it as if it's the same as Feinstein's bill which was more vague IMO
This is still unacceptably vague, unless "substantially" is defined in the law itself, as it applies to this law. Otherwise, to you and me "substantially" might mean a 300 percent increase, but to Officer Friendly it may mean a 10 percent increase.
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Old November 6, 2017, 11:20 AM   #47
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^^^ +1.

As I've said in other threads about recent bump-stock bills, if legislators are solely and truly concerned with outlawing add-ons like bump-fire devices and GatCranks, it would be fairly easy to write narrow language that talks only about the device and not the gun itself.

However, as long as they're talking about rate of fire in the broad and general sense, I'm going to be seriously concerned about the future interpretation of the bill, regardless of how many weasel words they qualify it with.
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Old November 6, 2017, 12:38 PM   #48
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After the Texas press conference this morning . My guess is background checks are going to be a high priority . As well as what constitutes a prohibited person and how that info is shared to the NICS system . It's sounding like he should have been a prohibited person but still "legally" bought 4 firearms in 4 years .

If there is anything that may help us in the new/continuing debate is that a good guy with a gun stopped a bad guy with one . With an "assault" weapon to boot . Although I already heard one reporter bring that up and add that was just this one incident . What about all the others ? Which the logical response is to say most of those others were conducted in "gun free zones" making it unlawful to have a firearm in that area making it impossible to legally be that good guy with a gun .

Because of Vegas not being very long ago . This gun control debate may have just got some refreshed legs that may make it to the finish line .
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Old November 6, 2017, 12:58 PM   #49
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I would be interested in where the Texas shooter got his gun. I read where he got kicked out of the Air Force with a Bad Conduct Discharge. I haven't filled out a 4473 for some time. It seems to me that getting something other than an honorable discharge was a dis qualifier. A BCD is definitely not honorable.
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Old November 6, 2017, 01:18 PM   #50
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rwilson452, as discussed at length in this TFL thread, there are several classes of military discharge that are below a honorable discharge but do not make someone a prohibited person. A Bad Conduct Discharge (BCD) is one of these; it is proverbially one step on the ladder above a dishonorable discharge, analogous to a serious non-domestic misdemeanor conviction, not to a felony.

As this topic doesn't directly concern legislative proposals, I suggest that we start another thread if you wish to discuss it further.
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