"One Gun A Month" laws are perhaps the dumbest pieces of anti-2nd Amendment legislation to come down the pike. Usually passed by knee-jerk reflex in the wake of some nutjob's rampage, they more or less ignore the fact that spree killers and mass murderers usually only use just the one gun to complete their grisly chores.
The Anti-Bill-Of-Rights crowd claims that they don't affect "normal law-abiding gun owners" (whatever that's supposed to mean,) in complete ignorance of the fact that the only group of gun owners they do impact is the one least likely to commit a crime: Collectors. Gun collectors are, on the whole, no more likely to go commit a violent crime than collectors of anything else, be it coins, stamps, or Beanie Babies. When they get a chance to buy two [Fill In The Blank: World War One Military Rifles, Spanish Pistols, Pre-1973 Ruger Revolvers] at a time from another collector or an estate sale, the last thing on their mind is a massacree at the local garden club meeting. Similarly, if some trenchcoat-wearing loser is going to act out his Marilyn Manson song fantasies, he's not going to be put off for a moment by a "One Gun A Month" law.
Admit it, these laws are what you politicians do instead of something.
Tam, Don't you think the one-gun-a-month idea is to prevent straw buyers from being able to buy more than one a month? You were talking about the motivation being to stop a nutjob from acting out. I don't get that.
ReplyDeleteThe straw buyer who can purchase five or ten handguns in one shot planning to resell them into the black market would be effectively stopped by this legislation, don't you think?
I agree the collectors may at times be inconvenienced, and anyone else who has a mind to buy more than one of something but a greater good is achieved.
I purchased my first two guns within a couple weeks of each other. I think I actually took receipt of Gun A on the first Friday of the month. Took Gun A to the range a week or two later, bought Gun B at range that day. (And then, immediately, set myself a budget that prevented me from buying another guy for six or eight months, lest I arm myself into destitution.)
ReplyDeleteStill own both, FWIW.
Here in MD you can fill out a form that classifies you as a collector and you become exempt from the restriction. I agree they're bad laws though.
ReplyDelete"these laws are what you politicians do instead of something."
ReplyDeleteyou could apply that little gem to pretty much everything in the big book o' gun laws.
and since almost all of them apply only to transfers through ffl's, they're about as potent as my wife's little fufu dog after he went under the knife to remove his doghood. your friendly local spree killer is unfettered by them since he can pick up his sks (or more likely his marlin model 60)from the classifieds or a yard sale.
fortunately, the collector you reference is similarly unimpeded as he picks up a few additions from another private collector or estate sale. as usual, it's the licensed dealer who does business by the book that pays the price for dumbass do-nothing laws.
jtc
"Tam, Don't you think the one-gun-a-month idea is to prevent straw buyers from being able to buy more than one a month?"
ReplyDeleteIn the era of NICS and the Form 3310, that's a bullshit reason.
The criminal buyer will just go buy his guns from some guy named "Mike" selling them on Craigslist or buying them out of the trunk of a car, and good citizens get screwed.
That "Straw Purchaser" crap is weak, too. Anybody behind a gun store counter with enough cerebral wattage to nudge an EEG knows a straw buyer when they see one. If they're knowingly funneling guns to criminals, we already have plenty of laws in place to nail them to the wall without resorting to goofy One Gun A Month laws.
Take your straw men elsewhere.
"...knows a straw buyer when they see one."
ReplyDeleteAnd as one dealer explained to me, that a FFL is the only merchant in the country that can look at your money, your ID, your paperwork, and shove it all back across the counter and decline to do business with you. And there's not a thing the buyer can do about it.
A New One On Me:
ReplyDeleteMost of the FFL's here in Indy won't even allow cell phones out on the sales floor, to keep Ice Dog & Ray-Ray from clicking a pic of the gat they want and sending it to their Babymomma.
"Most of the FFL's here in Indy"
ReplyDeleteReally? I thought it was just 500 Guns in Speedway? (BTW, we need to go back there and rummage sometime).
Shootin' Buddy
Popguns has the same policy, and I once saw some guy behind the glass at Bradis break bad over it...
ReplyDeleteCell phones bad juju here in the south as well. :)
ReplyDeleteWhen I moved to South Kackalacky I though you were required to buy one handgun a month. Luckily for the bank account, I was properly informed.
It's an idiotic bullshit law.
The local bank here in Hamilton County as a "no cell phones in the lobby" rule. They say it's for security, but the tellers say it's because they were sick of all the noise. :-)
ReplyDeleteOn a slightly more related topic, at this point I'd be happy if I had the scratch to buy one gun a month, whether I was allowed to or not. Yayyyyyy fat overtime cash ...
How about they pass a one cell phone per family law instead? In the last 2 weeks I've come closer to getting killed by stupid freakin' twits driving cars with cell phones glued to their heads than my whole life of being around guns.
ReplyDeleteMy biggest pet peeve is dangerous and rude cell phone users....
On the plus side, it ensures that in the wackier states, when we see a run on gun sales like we did last election, there will be plenty left for first-time buyers.
ReplyDeleteSurely you agree with making sure we have more gun owners, right? For the children?
(wv: baries. Why yes, the big rush to buy was his fault!)
Most of the FFL's here in Indy won't even allow cell phones out on the sales floor
ReplyDeleteOkay, I don't get this. Enlighten this knuckle-dragging Hoosier? I didn't notice any, erm, notice when I was in Bradis earlier this week...but then again, I didn't get any calls when I was there (thankfully, apparently...)
Anybody behind a gun store counter with enough cerebral wattage to nudge an EEG knows a straw buyer when they see one.
I always wondered about that. I figured there would be some sort of tells, but I've declined to ask as I don't really need to know. Then again, as I was sighing over the 'Are you on the lam?' question (again, at Bradis), the guy behind the counter said that he's had people answer 'yes' to that one. Talk about low wattage...
Welcome to Kalifornia where we not only have a 1 handgun per month limit. But we have a state that is 26 billion dollars in debt. We are spending way more money than we are taking in. Our budget was due last week, the governator is preparing to issue IOUs for state spending because we have no money. So what is our legislature working on?
ReplyDelete1)create a commission to serve the marketing interests of the blueberry industry.
2)defining "honey" to mean the natural food product resulting from the harvest of nectar by honey bees,
3)adopting regulations establishing definitions and standards for 100-percent pomegranate juice.
4)limit personal transfer of ammunition to less than 50 per month and eliminate all online and mail order sales of ammo in the state.
Oh, and when the legislature does decide to work on the budget the only thing they can do is try and invent new ways to raise our taxes and fees. They threaten to close our parks, schools and prisons. But heaven forbid they consider eliminating or cutting back on the 9 billion per year we spend educating, providing health care and welfare for illegals or the billions each year spent on green initiatives, and global climate change.
Any time the rest of you decide you want to invade this lousy state and overthrow our government just let me know, you can stay at our place.
"The straw buyer who can purchase five or ten handguns in one shot planning to resell them into the black market would be effectively stopped by this legislation, don't you think?"
ReplyDeleteEXTREMELY weak argument. In fact, guns on the street usually costs orders of magnitude less than legally purchased guns. As in, easily obtainable for $50, for a gun you'd pay $250-750 for legally.
You think people are buying large stocks of guns legally to sell them on the street for a LOSS?
In Germany we have a 'two guns in six months' limit. I could buy two today but would have to wait until Jan 10 2010 to buy the next one.
ReplyDeleteIt's supposed to prevent sport shooters from buying many guns over a short time to arm a whole bunch of non-shooters. You know, this 'he's-got-a-whole-arsenal' paranoia. *sigh*
Also it KILLS new shooters looking to get good at the skill.
ReplyDeleteI mean don't we all warm up and cure a flinch with a .22 of similar design to the gun we're trying to shoot better?
So New-Guy gets to make that wonderful choice: "Do I pick a gun that will effectively stop an attacker, or a gun that is cheap and easy to shoot?"
Goes even deeper if they desire a conceal carry gun. Some prefer full-weight full-size carry guns, but I prefer smaller lighter pieces. A day training with my S&W642 carry gun is usually started with a warm-up with my S&W617 .22, then I either dive right in to the 642, or I can trade off between the 617, and a Colt Trooper as an intermediate.
All guns have similar mechanics and manual of operation (yeah the colt runs backwards) but only one will make my hands cramp up (OK too if I load hot magnums in the Colt).
When taking new shooters to the range I often bring many guns so they can better find out what they like, and if a certain gun turns them off (some people LOVE wheelies, others HATE them...some like 1911s, some like Glocks, others just prefer long guns) we don't have to shoot that.
Why would I need to set aside half my year to buy this...especially when when Ice Dog just flashes his Pimp-Roll at Ray-Ray and buys the whole car-trunk full!
Tam, I hear you and the others, it's weak and it's crap. I got it. But my point was, as weak and as crappy as it may be, isn't this the motivation behind the laws? However ineffectual you think they are, isn't the purpose of these laws to stop the gun flow rather than to eliminate the "spree killers and mass murderers?"
ReplyDeleteI will note, for the record, that the "one gun a month" law as it exists in Virginia did not stop the Virginia Tech shooter from arming himself. He bought two guns, the transactions occurred 30 days apart.
ReplyDelete(The application of laws about reporting mental-health issues to the authorities that oversee NICS was what should have stopped him, but apparently didn't.)
Admittedly, we don't know which events were stopped by the a "One-gun-a-month" law. But we do know one that wasn't stopped.
mikeb, we have to remember that the motivation for the law is vastly different from the effect of the law.
Imagine a tax designed to raise money from the extremely wealthy, by doing things like taxing luxury purchases. Say...yachts that cost over $100,000. Then imagine that the yacht-building industry, including lots of small-time operators and blue-collar workers, vanish in its wake. (If you don't see it right away, go to the last 5 paragraphs at that link).
The intent of the law was to raise money from the wealthy, the effect of the law was to destroy businesses and ruin the lives of ordinary folk who built those luxury items for a living.
So the quesiton is not only the intention of the law, but how well it enforces that intention.
mikeb: And that was Tam's point, that these laws don't stop the flow of firearms. They just frustrate legitimate buyers. Prohibition was motivated by the temperance movement, but all it did was drive drinking underground.
ReplyDeleteOut here in a still-mostly-free part of America we don't have one-gun crap. For several years I used the one gun a month concept as a goal. I was almost on schedule for a few years. I would not have thought up the idea myself, I got it from the anti-rights bigots.
ReplyDelete"...the purpose of these laws to stop the gun flow..."
ReplyDeleteSo, Mike, there are just too many guns, is that what you are positing?
'Cuz if it is, that whole reasoning is kinda like the little Dutch boy realizing he's only got ten fingers while watching the holes open up in the dike.
It's pissing into the wind, and that should be obvious to anyone with a triple digit IQ. We can't stuff that genie back in the bottle. The gun can not be uninvented. Get it?
Politicians could definitely benefit from taking the short course on this, but then again, they almost invariably don't meet that IQ standard I previously mentioned.
there are just too many guns, is that what you are positing
ReplyDeleteThat is exactly what he is positing, and furthermore, he posits elsewhere that it's more or less all the fault of people like us for opposing "reasonable, common-sense gun laws."
Pistolero summed up my position perfectly.
ReplyDeleteMike,
ReplyDeletepistolero is also poking you with a stick with his comment.
You do realize that, doncha?
The stupid just can't be reasoned with, I suppose.
@mikeb
ReplyDelete"But my point was, as weak and as crappy as it may be, isn't this the motivation behind the laws? However ineffectual you think they are, isn't the purpose of these laws to stop the gun flow rather than to eliminate the 'spree killers and mass murderers?'"
No, the purpose of these laws is to disarm and hassle ordinary citizens. The pretext is to "stop the gun flow." How can you tell? Because the laws accomplish (1) while failing to have any effect on (2).
It's past time we stopped giving the people who advocate this stuff the benefit of the doubt. While there may be some naive fellow travelers among them, most are progressive statists who are out to institute a controlled society (with them in control), and who use arguments of "reasonableness" to divide their opponents.
When you let the argument shift to "How many guns can you buy a month?", you have already conceded that it is legitimate for the state to regulate how many guns the average, law-abiding citizen can buy or own. From there on, it's just a matter of degree, with a lower and lower number being portrayed as an outlier.
Like this: Who can argue with "one gun per month"? Why, that's twelve guns per year! Every year! Ms. Average_MSNBC_Watcher, would you buy a gun every month? (You would?!? Shut up, you're weird.) And besides, who needs to own more than 12 guns? Only those crazy militiaists! So what's wrong with a 12-gun lifetime limit? And if you can only have 12 guns, one a month seems like too many. So how about one purchase per year?
When liberty is at stake, it's dangerous to allow its opponents to frame the issues.
A valiant argument, Old Grouch, but mikeb and and his ilk don't give a damn about liberty. It's all about the safety of teh childrenses...
ReplyDeleteWhat utter bullshit. Did y'all go to his site, or to any of his links? This guy is a first-water hoplophobe doing the worlds very worst job of hiding is bullshit agenda.
ReplyDeleteI might go out on a limb here, Og, and point out that I think you are missing the point - MikeB is proud of his agenda... why would he hide it? He is one of those rare people who is right simply because he believes he is right, and if the facts, reality, statistics, and numbers disagree with him, well, they must simply be wrong.
ReplyDelete[/snark]
Attempting to argue with him is worse than useless... he only comments out side of his weblog for the attention, and to try and generate traffic. The best we can do is to simply point out how idiotic his arguments are, and let third parties see the facts.
Linoge: Prezactly. But this is the kind of shit that attracts the gun-curious who then get sucked into the bullshit, when a real gunny would have shown them the way to hoplophilia.
ReplyDeleteOg - MikeB is far beyond help, but it's fun to knock around his inane arguments every once in a while.
ReplyDeleteRight now his claim is that "Guns are bad news for women."
Somehow I think Tam might disagree with that.