Supreme Court Side-Steps Second Amendment Again

Once again, the US Supreme Court has refused to hear an appeal in a case concerning the Second Amendment and bearing arms for self-defense outside the home.  On Monday May 5, without comment, the Court rejected the case of Drake, et al. v. Jerejian.  The case challenged New Jersey’s law regarding concealed carry.  Under that law, a person applying for a license to carry a concealed firearm must prove a “justifiable need” to even be considered, and can still be denied at the whim of local law enforcement.  The “justifiable need” provision requires that the person prove “specific threats or previous attacks demonstrating a special danger to applicant’s life that cannot be avoided by other means.”  The plaintiffs in the Drake case included a man who restocks ATM money machines, a Reserve Sheriff’s Deputy, a civilian employee of the FBI, and a person who was the victim in an interstate kidnapping.  All of them had been denied the right to carry by New Jersey’s system.

The Federal Appeals Court for the 3^rd Circuit (NJ, PA, DE, and PR) ruled that the law’s stringent requirements are not a violation of the Second Amendment right to bear arms.  By refusing to review that ruling, the Supreme Court allows that 3^rd Circuit ruling to stand.  In recent months, similar rulings in similar cases challenging carry restrictions in New York and Maryland were also ruled constitutional by the 2^nd and 4^th Circuit Courts (NY, VT, CT, and RI, and WV, VA, MD, NC, and SC respectively) and were refused review by the Supreme Court.

Continue reading Drake v. Jerejian →

Primary Responsibility
Choose now or have no choice later.

By Jeff Knox

(May 16, 2014) Primary season is in full swing and most of America hasn’t even noticed.  Primaries have already been conducted in some states and are imminent in many more.  Primaries are the single point in the electoral process where you have the most influence and your vote has the most leverage.  During the primaries, not only do relatively few voters participate, but because there are often several candidates for a given office, the votes are spread out, meaning that a very small number of votes can make the difference between winning and losing.  Some states run two-stage primaries, holding a runoff between the top vote-getters if no one receives better than 50% of the votes cast in the first ballot.

For some unfathomable reason, the National Rifle Association does not grade or endorse candidates in contested primaries.  This often contributes to really good, pro-Second Amendment candidates being narrowly defeated, leaving voters in the general election to pick between “bad” and “worse.”  Other national rights organizations, such as Gun Owners of America, get involved in primaries, but they have less reach and fewer resources than does the NRA.  Many local grassroots organizations that could have an impact are structured as 501(c) organizations and are forbidden by law from actively participating in electoral politics.

Continue reading Primary Responsibility →

Guns Are Dangerous

In all of the hype and hullabaloo between gun groups and anti-gun groups, one thing that should not ever be forgotten is that guns can be very dangerous if not handled properly.  For people like my family, gun safety is ingrained from birth – possibly passed down genetically – and then reinforced on a constant basis.  But even so, it’s easy to make a mistake, and one momentary slip with a gun can have devastating, permanent consequences.  That’s why it’s so important to maintain a constant state of healthy fear – not fear of the gun, but fear of letting yourself become complacent and failing to follow the very simple, but inviolable, Four Rules of gun safety:

1.      Always treat every gun as if it’s loaded – even when you think it’s not.

2.      Never ever allow a gun to point at anything you are not willing to kill or destroy.

3.      Never let your finger enter the trigger guard until you’re on target and ready to shoot.

4.      Always be sure of your target and what’s beyond it before you touch the trigger.

Being an activist, advocate, and writer in the field of firearms and firearms law, I pay close attention to news and research regarding guns and gun injuries, and it seems that I’ve been seeing more reports of people – especially children – injuring or killing themselves or someone else by mishandling a firearm.  I hope it’s just an increase in the way these things are reported, not an actual increase in incidents – as is the case with “mass shootings.”  Nonetheless, it is a matter of concern.  Unintentional firearm-related injuries and deaths have been going down steadily for decades and we don’t want to see any slowing of that trend; even one is too many.

Continue reading Train to Maintain Safety →

Everyone in Georgia is About to Die!

On Wednesday, the Governor of Georgia – the southern US state, not the Eastern European republic – signed a new law today which is tantamount to signing Death Warrants on thousands – if not tens of thousands – of his states citizens.  Or at least that’s what the anti-rights crowd and their friends in the lamestream media would have you believe based on the screeching headlines and breathless stories.

OK, maybe they weren’t quite that bad, but the headlines used terms like “Controversial,” “Unprecedented,” “Sweeping,” and “Guns Everywhere” to describe the new law which actually brings the Peach State’s gun carry regulations closer into line with the vast majority of other states.  In the stories themselves, there were almost always comments and quotes from professional anti-rights advocates like Mark (Mr. Gabby Giffords) Kelly, decrying the “irresponsible” nature of the law and insinuating that some dire consequences will inevitably result.  The Mike Bloomberg subsidiary, Moms Demand Action, called it “a very, very dangerous kill bill.”

What the bill actually does is ease blanket bans on carry of firearms in houses of worship (allowing each church, synagogue, etc. to make their own decisions on the matter) in certain government buildings that don’t have controlled entry with metal detectors, etc. to enforce a gun ban, and in bars and taverns.  It also gives school districts the option of authorizing some staff members to legally carry on school grounds, and provides a specific mechanism for someone who inadvertently carries a gun into the security area of an airport to legally backpedal and leave the area prior to going through the checkpoint.  In addition, it makes some adjustments to who can and can’t receive a license to carry.

Continue reading GA Weapons License →

Justice Stevens’ Dishonest Diatribe

In a recently released book, retired Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens calls for fundamental changes to the founding document of the United States.  As a way of ginning up buzz about the book, the judge’s publicists gave a particularly controversial excerpt to the Washington Post for publication.  That section deals with the former Justice’s opinions on “reforming” the Second Amendment.  Justice Stevens thinks we should add the words “when serving in the militia” to the Second Amendment so that it would read: “A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms when serving in the militia shall not be infringed.”

Obviously Stevens’ proposal would gut the meaning and protections of the Second Amendment.  Equally obvious, such a change would be impossible to pass through the process of amending the Constitution – at least any time in the foreseeable future. 

The learned justice’s diatribe is a mish-mash of emotional rhetoric based on invalid assumptions arriving at claims based on twisted logic and falsehoods.  I noted dozens of specific examples of such distortions in the short essay, but only have room to touch on a few here.

Continue reading Reforming the Second Amendment →

ATF Bans More Ammo

The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives has declared that Russian 7N6, 5.45×39 rifle ammunition is “armor piercing handgun ammunition,” and therefore illegal for importation into the US.  The ammunition has been widely available in the US for decades and was originally designed for the AK74 service rifle, a smaller, lighter adaptation of the AK47.  The “handgun ammunition” label arises from an obscure Polish company importing a short-barreled, removable-stock model of the AK74 that is technically labeled as a pistol.  Since this “pistol” is chambered in 5.45×39, that cartridge has been ruled to be included under the definition “may be used in a handgun,” resulting in the 7N6 ammo, with its steel core, being forbidden for importation, sale, or manufacture in the US under provisions added to the Gun Control Act in 1986.

This ruling is particularly significant to us because the law it is based on was at the heart of the creation of our organization, The Firearms Coalition.  Back in 1982, a report on NBC News Magazine stirred up a huge controversy over a steel, Teflon-coated, pistol bullet called the KTW.  The bullet was designed primarily for police use in special circumstances such as dealing with assailants wearing body armor or hiding behind barricades, and had been on the market since the 1960s.  Though the ammunition was expensive, typically sold only to law enforcement, and had never been used to kill a police officer by penetrating his vest, it was nonetheless labeled as “Cop Killer Bullets.”  The hype grew and was even incorporated into popular movies like the absurd “Lethal Weapon 3.”

Continue reading Cop Killer Bullets →

More People “Prohibited” by SCOTUS

The Supreme Court of the US came down with a decision in March that effectively expands the base of people prohibited from purchasing or possessing firearms in this country.  In a unanimous decision in the case US v. Castleman, the Court ruled that the law banning possession of firearms by anyone ever convicted of any crime of violence against a spouse or significant other – often referred to as the Lautenberg law – applies not only to crimes labeled as “Domestic Violence” or to such crimes that involve what an average person would consider actual violence, but also to things like pushing, shoving, or grabbing, even when no harm was intended and no injury sustained.

Many states have intentionally drawn a distinction between minor contact among family members during an argument, and violence intended to harm, intimidate, or control.  Those states’ common sense approach to the matter has now been overruled by the Court, and convictions for charges like simple assault in cases like a woman slapping a cheating spouse, or a man pushing his way out the door to get away from an argument, will now include the mandatory loss of firearm rights for life – even if the incident occurred decades ago.

What the Court did not rule on, is whether it is a violation of the Second Amendment to have a lifetime loss of firearm rights based on a misdemeanor crime.  The Court noted that this case did not adequately address that point and that this decision does not attempt to answer that question.  They said the Second Amendment question will have to be decided in some future case.

Continue reading Overturn Lautenberg →

Would You Stand Up for Rights?

Have you ever participated in a rally at your state capitol?  Have you marched into your elected servant’s office and demanded a clear answer on where exactly they stand on issues that are important to you?  Have you ever stood with thousands of like-minded individuals demanding that your voices be heard and your rights protected?

Sadly, the majority of Americans never have.

You’ll have opportunities to stand up for your rights all over the country in the coming months, and I hope you’ll make it a priority. We’ve posted a listing on our website of some upcoming rights rallies that you can – and should – be involved in.  We’re working to keep this list updated and complete, so if you know of a rally not on our list, please let us know.

To get noticed, rallies need bodies.  If it’s a “gun violence prevention” or anti-voter ID rally, it needs 10 or 20 people to get media attention.  If it’s a gun rights or anti-tax rally, it needs 10 or 20 thousand to garner the same attention.  An April 1 rally in Albany, New York offers an excellent example of that.  News reports talked about activists from both sides holding simultaneous rallies.  They referred to “thousands” in attendance for the two rallies, but didn’t make it clear that the thousands were there in support of rights, and that only a handful were gun control supporters.  Later in one news report they referred to the anti-rights rally and said that “dozens” were in attendance – and even that was an exaggeration.

Continue reading Defend the 2nd Amendment →