Category: NRA Convention

While I was driving all the way from Louisville to Philadelphia-area yesterday, Sebastian handled the reporting of what so many always want to know – how many freedom lovers came out to hang out with fellow NRA members.

Beyond the fact that it’s the 2nd largest convention, how does it really compare? Fortunately for you all, I like data that no one else seems to keep.

I’ve been keeping track of the attendance ever since my first meeting in 2004, or as I call it, Pittsburgh #1. Since that first meeting I attended out of college, this year’s meeting was about 1/3 bigger (31.2%). Over last year, the growth was nearly 2,000 people, but only about 2%.

In that time, we’ve had 4 repeat cities – Louisville, Houston, St. Louis, and Pittsburgh. Aside from Houston which is kind of an anomaly, Louisville actually saw the greatest same city increase in attendance (21.5% compared to Pittsburgh at 16% and St. Louis at 14.3%).

Most of the dips you see in the early columns are simply location issues. That has become less of an issue since I started attending, as more people are willing to make this an annual or nearly annual tradition regardless of how far it is. In this article on Indianapolis securing two more years, they note that Houston’s last convention saw 43% of attendees coming from 200 miles away or more. You can see this reflected around the floor and in the member meeting where this year’s family of the youngest life member was from Chicago and the oldest life member traveled from Ft. Smith, Arkansas.

And while I don’t have firm numbers since the other side is against such measures, I can tell you that you can largely flip this chart around and chop off many zeros on the numbers to represent the anti-gun side presence at each event. There were actually a good number of protesters at Pittsburgh #1. They were pretty good spirited folks, too. There was a chanting contest and someone who shipped a Million Moms banner up from their Atlanta chapter. The biggest downers at the event were the ACLU volunteers who were trying to convince NRA members that they had no right to photograph protestors on the street, presumably in an effort to keep us from highlighting how few there were compared to the 61,319 NRA members. There was an uptick for Pittsburgh again in 2011, but otherwise, the protests just keep getting smaller.

It will be interesting to see the future. The event is getting large enough now that many cities simply cannot handle it. Even though Louisville has some of the largest event space in the country, the logistics just don’t work well. The Expo Center didn’t open enough gates for getting people into the parking lot, and there parking attendants weren’t on top of making sure spaces were filled in an orderly manner on their busiest days. They also apparently did nothing to try and direct traffic on the main roads to under-utilized gates. The gate we used (6) had very little wait on Friday based on the Google traffic report and very little on Saturday, too. That’s on the city hosts, and not on NRA. However, since NRA has to look at the bottom line of member experience, Louisville could lose future business by their unwillingness to manage traffic in a reasonable manner for an event they knew to be huge. Interestingly, it looks like Louisville is losing other conventions of similar sizes like the FFA which is close to 60,000 people. That article actually notes that new hotel space is only going up downtown, away from the Expo Center. That only compounds the traffic concerns.

As for the immediate future, the dates and locations are:

2017 – Atlanta, Georgia

2018 – Dallas, Texas

2019 – Indianapolis, Indiana

2020 – Nashville, Tennessee

2021 – Houston, Texas

Got back home sooner than expected, despite taking a more scenic route through West Virginia, avoiding Maryland. We discovered if you do a custom route on Google Maps, it’s fine unless it has to recalculate, in which case it defaults to the shortest route. Ordinarily, that would be fine except that the shortest route could get me thrown in a Maryland State Prison. Google has a multi-destination feature on the web version, but the mobile and tablet versions don’t. They allow you to avoid “Highways,” “Tolls,” and “Ferries,” but they don’t have an option for “Anti-Gun States.” Maybe I should make a feature request.

My source from the NRA Board Meeting had reported in, and attendance this year was 80,452. This is the second highest attended Annual Meeting. Houston still holds the overall record of 86,228. Houston was when we were under the most significant attack we faced after the antis successfully exploited Sandy Hook to go after us. Also, on Friday, traffic gridlocked in Louisville. Saturday the venue was managing the parking situation pretty poorly. There’s a good chance this could have been a record breaker if not for the venue. In Nashville last year, attendance was 78,865, and before that in Indianapolis, 75,267. I’m afraid that for us Pennsylvnians, NRA has outgrown our venues. Pittsburgh gridlocked with under 70,000.

In a way, as the event grows it gets less fun for me. It’s harder to move around the floor and you don’t run into people as much. If I missed you this year, sorry about that. Even the law seminar has gotten so big, there were several readers there who I’ve met before that I’ve missed because the room really is that big.

Panel 4 was the ethics part of the seminar. I had to skip coverage to get caught up on a few things. But I’m back with Panel 5. First up is Derek DeBrosse on Firearms Rights Restoration by the Numbers. There have been a few seminars about this over the years, and it’s a complex topic. I’ll do my best to sum up the important points. He notes that this is really a state centric area of law, and he will be speaking in regard to Ohio law, since that is where he practices. Starts with the common disabilities:

• Felony conviction.
• Mental health adjudications.
• Misdemeanor Crime of Domestic Violence conviction.

And the tools used to restore rights:

• Expungements (favored)
• Set Asides
• Pardon (rare in OH)
• Restorations
• Voluntary Appeals File
• Lawsuits

Character witnesses can be important in restoration cases. I’m always amazed what a complicated area of law this is. It’s hard to write and keep up with all the facts. There are a number of circuit splits that have impact on rights restoration, depending on what circuit your state is in. Types of restoration:

• Automatic (rights fully restored upon release)
• By Petition
• By Expungement

There are a lot of cases where there are concealed carry restrictions which can trigger prohibitions. The feds demand that all your rights are restored. If any restrictions remain, you’re still prohibited. There are also some cases where states have expungement, but it’s not really expungement for federal purposes.

Mental health restorations seem to be more difficult than criminal restorations. There are cases where people who are admitted voluntarily were listed as being involuntary. Records are important.

I’ve also always found it interesting that it can be harder to lift a misdemeanor prohibition (MCDV) than it is a felony, but it is.

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Next up is Jonathan Goldstein, who is a local (to me) gun rights attorney, speaking on Firearms Preemption being the next frontier in firearms regulation. The talk begins with a review of just how far we’ve come. So what’s a frustrated anti to do?

• Work at the state and local level
• Land use restrictions (lead issues, noise issues, etc)
• Carry, use, and purchase restrictions (“Heart strings locations” – Parks, Schools, Religious institutions, “Sensible Locations” – Bars, Government Buildings, Government Gatherings, Signage, Scary Looking Guns)
• Localization of penalties (e.g. Lost & Stolen in Pennsylvania)
• Public health vector (“gun violence” as a disease & lead issues)

He’s making a lot of the same point I’ve made in regards to the motivations of the antis, in terms of fatiguing people out of exercising their rights. This is very entertaining. He’s probably great before a jury.

Jonathan’s prescription for this is preemption; the process of ensuring that laws are uniform. Lessons from Pennsylvania:

• Explicit grants of standing matter.
• Findings matter.
• Pre-ambulatory language matters.
• Look towards standing jurisprudence in your state’s law and make sure the relief you can obtain under your new law incorporates that.
• Be careful about ambiguity. (e.g. the school gun ban in Pennsylvania)
• Watch out for executive agencies.
• Don’t give the courts wiggle room (He contrasts Florida’s strong preemption language with Pennsylvania’s weak language)

He goes over the history of our preemption drama in Pennsylvania, which you’re all well aware of. Roadmap to Preemption Success:

• Start early and demand action. Don’t let the legislature stall you.
• Watch the technical requirements – single subject and original purpose.
• Look for allies. Most regulated industries also demand uniformity.
• Get help with drafting! NRA has a lot of useful resources.
• Analogize – drugs, cars, firearms are just another consumer product.
• Hold local government accountable.
• Read preliminary rules from agencies.
• Watch appointments to appellate courts.

Very good presentation, and definitely the right guy to put between attendees and the booze. Not only did he make the time fly, but kept people awake. Sometimes if you get a snoozer presenter late in the day it can be brutal.

First up is Sarah Gervase, who has worked in the Office of General Counsel ten years, and is talking about ATF 41F and Trusts. If you recall, 41F was ATF’s proposal to require background checks on Trusts for “responsible persons,” and also proposed to eliminate CLEO sign-off in favor of CLEO notification. She goes over some of the history of the National Firearms Act. She recommends if you’re an attorney, getting a copy of the paperwork for NFA items. Apparently it’s not uncommon for gun collectors to also hoard collect other things, and for family upon death to tell family attorney’s “We’re pretty sure this is legal and registered, but it’s going to take us a year to find the paperwork,” and there’s a limited period of time in which the transfer can be legally affected.

There were some smaller changes to 41F that many readers might not know about. ATF codified existing policy that when an NFA owner dies the executors of the estate is permitted to possess the firearm during probate without it being considered a “transfer.” She warns though that only the executor of the estate can keep the NFA item. They cannot designate a third party to look after it.

The big sticking issue is what constitutes a “responsible person.” She notes that the beneficiary of a trust doesn’t count as a “responsible person” provided that they don’t have the legal capacity to direct the trust, possess, transport, etc the NFA item. She does note that if you add responsible persons to an existing trust, you can do so without notifying ATF, however you will upon another application to make or application to transfer.

Another interesting detail is that while NFA forms are considered protected tax documents, the CLEO notification documents are not, and the CLEO can do what they want with them.

She notes that a common misconception is that ATF has a 24 month rule that if a trust is unchanged, the responsible persons don’t have to go through the background check again. This is not true. This only applies to submitting trust documents. Responsible persons have to go through a check each time there’s an application to make or transfer.

Question of the day: “Can I be buried with my guns?” Apparently there can be, in some states, safe storage implications! There’s also an issue with who is in possession of the firearm.

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The next panelist, Brent Weil, is speaking about first party and third party liability claims against firearms instructors. Starting with a few videos which represent great examples of high derp, he dives right into negligent training. There has been a great increase in demand for firearms training, lead by the substantial growth in new shooters, including the 271% increase in gun ownership among women. What is negligent training:

• Range defects. Trip and fall is a common liability. When you’re directing a student, that is potentially your liability.
• Firearms incidents – accidental discharge, mechanical failures, eye and ear protection.
• Inappropriate tactics.
• Improper use of deadly force – legal issues and advice.
• Lack of proficiency by student.

First party claims are brought by students against instructors. He points out that lawsuits in this area have not been common, but these are potential areas of liability. There have been many cases involving law enforcement, which could be potentially applied to civilian shooters. There is also third party liability claims, where a third party that was harmed by a student sues the instructor for negligent training.

It would seem obvious, but instructors should seek the limited liability of corporations and LLCs, but he notes that won’t necessarily protect from liability, just as a GM employee who gets into an accident delivering a car is still liable for harm caused to others, even though the employee was acting on behalf of GM.

Other advice is to document what you teach both in the classroom and on the range, don’t teach beyond what you’re certified to teach, get students to sign releases, and get insurance.