The
NRA-ILA has an
article about the latest gub issues in California:
In 1976, the Brady Campaign, then known as the National Council to Control Handguns, said that the first part of its three-part plan to get handguns and handgun ammunition made "totally illegal" was to "slow down the increasing number of handguns being produced and sold in this country". This month, anti-gunners finally got that wish in California.
America's two largest handgun manufacturers— Smith & Wesson and Sturm, Ruger— have announced that they will stop selling new semi-automatic handguns in California, rather than comply with the state's "microstamping" law. The law applies not only to entirely new models of handguns, but also to any current-production handgun approved by the state's Roster Board, if such handgun is modified with any new feature or characteristic, however minor or superficial.
According to The Los Angeles Times, the law was "intended to help police investigators link shell casings found at crime scenes to a specific gun". That's pure spin, however. In reality, the law, signed in 2007 by then-Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, is intended to terminate semi-automatic handgun sales and, over time, semi-automatic handgun ownership in the state. Microstamping will solve few, if any crimes and it is only a matter of time before a proposal to expand the law to include other firearms will follow.
Meanwhile, the National Shooting Sports Foundation has announced that it and the Sporting Arms and Ammunition Manufacturers' Institute have filed suit against the law in Fresno Superior Court "seeking both declaratory and injunctive relief against this back-door attempt to prevent the sale of new semiautomatic handguns to law-abiding citizens in California."
Anti-gun activists often refer to California as the test bed for gun control laws they would like to have imposed throughout the country. Thus, it goes without saying that gun owners outside California should anticipate "microstamping" efforts in their states, and do what it takes to elect pro-Second Amendment governors and state legislators to deny the anti-gunners additional victories.
However, making sure that what has happened in California doesn't happen elsewhere is not the only reason to step up our election year efforts. California accounts for twelve percent of the nation's population and approximately eight percent of its handgun owners. We owe it to our fellow countrymen— our Second Amendment brothers and sisters— to elect a pro-Second Amendment president and senators who will approve that president's nominations to the Federal courts, where California's "microstamping" law might one day be challenged. What is true in football is also true in the effort to keep America's most popular type of handguns legal and affordable: the best defense is a good offense.
Rico says let's remember that the best way to control handgubs is to use both hands... The jury's still
out whether 'microstamping' will work anyway; any criminal worth arresting will probably be smart enough to pick up his brass, thus obviating the problem, but
Phil Willon has an article in
The Los Angeles Times about it:
Gun makers' objections to a California law that requires firearms to imprint a unique "microstamp" on bullet casings are "baloney" and "posturing," said Los Angeles City Attorney Mike Feuer, who introduced the legislation while serving in the state Assembly.
Feuer's comments come as gun maker Smith & Wesson announced that it would stop selling newly designed semiautomatic pistols in California because it will not comply with the law, implemented in May of 2013.
The law requires some firearms to imprint a unique "microstamp" to help identify bullet casings. It is intended to help police investigators link shell casings found at crime scenes to a specific gun.
Smith & Wesson joins gun maker Sturm, Ruger & Co. in halting the sales. Both companies criticized the microstamping requirement as costly, unreliable and ineffective, saying that there is no evidence that it will help solve crimes. Smith & Wesson President and Chief Executive James Debney, in a statement, said the law was poorly conceived and would make it impossible for Californians to have "access to the best products with the latest innovations."
Feuer called the gun lobby's objections "baloney". He said the new technology gives police crucial evidence in handgun-related killings, hundreds of which go unsolved every year, and that the legislation had wide support from law enforcement agencies. "This law is about solving gun crimes, and it's a law that would be effective in doing that if only the gun lobby would step aside," Feuer said. Feuer said microstamping technology has been reliable and available since before the 2007 law was passed, and costs only a few dollars per gun to install, although gun makers dispute this. "Their posturing doesn't surprise me," Feuer said of the manufacturers. "We all know that the gun lobby has no problem innovating when it comes to making guns more lethal."
The microstamping requirement is limited to newly designed semiautomatic handguns and older models that have been updated or modified by gun makers. Those semiautomatic pistols are required to have a microscopic etching identifying the make, model, and serial number in two places on the weapon, presumably the firing pin and barrel, allowing the information to be stamped on a bullet casing when the pistol is fired.
Chuck Michel, a Long Beach, California attorney who represents the NRA in California, said the law punishes gun makers who offer safer new handguns or who make safety improvements to older models. The restriction also could affect law enforcement agencies seeking to order newly designed firearms that are now banned, he said. "Hopefully, we can convince some of the regulators to take a look at their policy," Michel said. "Barring that, there's going to be legislation proposed to put these guns back on the roster."
Two organizations representing gun makers, the National Shooting Sports Foundation and the Sporting Arms and Ammunition Manufacturers Institute, filed a lawsuit in January of 2014 in Fresno County seeking to invalidate the law. The suit argues that studies have raised too many questions about the technology and cost to require its use on new guns.
Implementation of the law was delayed until last year, when the state attorney general's office could certify that the microstamping technology was not restricted by patent protections.
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