Category: Gun Rights

Eugene Volokh has a great post up on the Nassau County District Attorney’s office policy that forbids employees from owning handguns at home.

While he does first address the Second Amendment constitutional rights, I found the second part of the post the most compelling. There’s actually a law in New York that forbids employers from discriminating against employees or candidates for employment based on their lawful hobbies that in no way impacts their work (no compensation, no use of work equipment, not done on premises, etc.). I had no idea that such a statute was on the books in their Labor Code, but it seems like one that gun owners in New York might want to keep in mind.

Volokh only makes the case that this protects handgun collecting, but I don’t see why it wouldn’t also protect a competitive shooter. Sports are listed as a protected leisure time activity. Regardless, this was a very interesting tidbit that could come in handy should an anti-gun boss decide to take an extreme action against a New York gun owner – like the DA’s office has apparently decided to do in Nassau County.

I used to be accepted in the Democratic Party that gun control cost them Congress in 1994, and cost Al Gore the election in 2000. Them somehow, Obama and the media convinced candidates it was cool again. Our opponents are saying this poll shows growing interest in gun policy, but a closer look at the crosstabs show this is actually very bad news for them. That’s probably why Martin O’Malley thought it was a good idea to introduce a gun control plan that makes Al Gore’s look mild. Let me briefly summarize what Obama’s Chosen One to take out Hillary proposes:

• Universal gun registration.
• Licensing and fingerprinting of gun owners.
• Ban on so-called “assault weapons” like he did in Maryland.
• Ban possession of any firearm by people under 21. No more teaching your kids.
• Reject federally mandated concealed carry.
• Require microstamping federally.
• Extend domestic situations to people dating.
• Mandated “lost & stolen” reporting.
• Allow unlimited surprise inspection of dealers.
• Revoke the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act.
• Make people subject to TROs prohibited persons.
• Require guns in the home be locked up and made unavailable for self-defense. Remember, the Supreme Court is retreating from Heller and McDonald.
• Force manufacturers who do business with the federal government to install “safety features” like magazine disconnects.

This isn’t much of a sage prediction, but O’Malley is not even going to give Hillary a run for her money. He’s a loser, as Donald Trump would say. Stick a fork in him, he’s done. He’ll be a glaring example that gun control won’t save you, even in a Democratic Primary.

The Trace spins so fast you could enrich uranium over the Cornyn bill, because supposedly it pushes the debate onto friendlier ground for them. They aren’t happy, however, about all the veterans that will get yanked out of NICS under the bill because there was insufficient due process given to them. I have a very small violin to play for them.

We’ve seen this before, because history has repeated itself. We trade more incentives for the states to report records to the federal system, and get something in return: this time gutting the Administration’s program to strip veterans of Second Amendment rights, and a halt to any plan to do the same for some Social Security recipients. This has been done several times now. The first time Congress did this, if you recall, the Brady Campaign declared outright victory over the NICS Improvement Amendments Act (NIAA), even though the bill created a relief from disability program for the first time since the Gun Control Act passed. Prior to 2008, mental health disabilities were irrevocable lifetime prohibitions. You might recall that back in 2007, VPC were the only anti-gun group willing to call bullshit on the deal, but VPC has always had the luxury of being able to rely on a few big foundations for its existence.

That bill had weaknesses, however, as the Administration is currently exploiting, because it only provided for relief after the fact, and did not do enough to define criteria for placement in the system in the first place. This latest improvement should remove those veterans that have been screwed out of their rights, and put the onus on the VA to show they’ve been legally adjudicated, meaning that they were judged to be a danger to themselves or others by “court, board, commission or other lawful authority,” which presumably will not be some bureaucrat at the VA making a determination based solely on financial considerations. We still need to see language to know exactly what the bill does and how it does it, but I’m pleased to see the long tradition of spinning this by the control movement continuing.

Looks like this will be the vehicle to thwart their plans to put 4 million plus Social Security recipients who have designated a “representative payee” into NICS, and put a stop to the VA’s habit of putting veterans in there who aren’t managing their own affairs. From NRA a few minutes ago:

FAIRFAX, Va. — The National Rifle Association’s Institute for Legislative Action (NRA-ILA) today announced its support for legislation that would protect the constitutional rights of millions of veterans and social security recipients. The Mental Health and Safe Communities Act, sponsored by U.S. Senator John Cornyn, contains provisions that would stop the Obama administration’s efforts to deny millions of veterans and social security recipients their Second Amendment rights without due process. 

“The NRA is fighting to stop the Obama administration from denying millions of veterans and social security recipients their Second Amendment rights for no other reason than they want assistance in managing their financial affairs,” said Chris W. Cox, NRA-ILA executive director. “We thank Senator Cornyn for his leadership in standing up to the Obama administration and introducing legislation that will take meaningful steps toward fixing America’s broken mental health system.” 

President Obama’s Department of Veterans Affairs has denied more than 100,000 veterans and dependents their Second Amendment rights because they use a “fiduciary” to manage their benefits. Veterans who the agency determines need help administering their compensation are then labeled “mental defectives” and reported to the National Instant background Check System (NICS), which prohibits them from purchasing or possessing firearms.  The process of assigning a fiduciary does not require the VA to consider whether a veteran poses a danger to himself or others. 

In addition, the Social Security Administration announced that it is moving forward with a proposal that would strip the Second Amendment rights of more than 4.2 million people, by reporting social security recipients who use a “representative payee” to help them manage their benefits to the NICS.

Details of the legislation include:

• The bill will stop the Obama administration’s Social Security Administration and other agencies from defining as “prohibited persons” those who meet arbitrary criteria such as having a representative payee assigned to their account.
• The bill will stop the Obama administration’s Veterans Administration (VA) from throwing veterans into NICS simply for having a fiduciary assigned to their account.
• Veterans who have been swept into NICS under previous VA rules will be given the opportunity to have their case reviewed in a full hearing. Requires a specific finding that the veteran is a danger to self or others. Veterans who are not found to be a danger will have their rights restored and will be removed from NICS.
• Requires that real adjudications take place before an individual can be determined a prohibited person under federal law. Full notice, hearing, the right to participate, and the right to counsel are required.
• Provides funding for the states to forward records of mental health adjudications which meet the new due process requirements outlined in the bill.
• Recognizes state orders restoring the firearms rights of individuals under state law.
• Requires AG to remove individuals from NICS in cases where rights have been restored or procedures failed to provide adequate due process protections, as with the VA program.

UPDATE: A later release had more bullet points. I have updated this post to reflect the later bullet points.

A watered down gun bill is headed to the North Carolina Governor, but the Jim Crow era pistol permitting scheme will remain in place. The opposition in this case were the Sheriffs themselves, who are responsible for issuing the purchase permits. It’s always hard to overcome law-enforcement opposition to something when dealing with “law and order” Republicans. I don’t know the politics of North Carolina all that well, but I suspect if North Carolinians really want to be rid of this remaining vestige of Jim Crow, it may be necessary to buy off the Sheriffs. Remember that Clinton got his Assault Weapons Ban by buying FOP support in the form of federal money to hire 100,000 new police officers. Perhaps it’s possible to buy the support of the Sheriffs by throwing them a bone on another issue that’s important to them, or buying their support with cash to their departments from the state coffers. Without the sheriffs railing against the bill, a lot of those “law and order” Republicans will likely drop their opposition as well.

The 11th Circuit has lifted the injunction on enforcement starting Tuesday. When this idea was originally proposed, I was against it, believing it would be a slam dunk First Amendment case. But as the medical establishment becomes more and more in cahoots with the ruling elite, to push gun control on the peasantry,  screw ’em. This is how the peasants punch back twice as hard. There’s one way doctors can prevent the proliferation of these laws, and that’s by getting the medical establishment out of political issues that have nothing to do with the practice of medicine, and have everything to do with using the stature and prestige of their profession to shame their patients into the adopting the progressive-left orthodoxy on how to live the good life. To the extent that these bills threaten the autonomy and speech rights of doctors, they have invited this on themselves.

So say Americans. We are winning this culture war, slowly but surely. My primary worry is increasingly becoming that we’re going to lose the White House in 2016, and thus lose the Supreme Court, in which case Heller and McDonald, if not outright overturned, will go the way of the Lopez and Morrison federalism cases. But other than that, I think things look pretty good for for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms. Unfortunately, I think everything else in this country is going to hell in a hand basket, so perhaps we are indeed to become a European style social democracy with guns. Well, at least until we run out of other people’s money. Then it will get…. interesting.