Clinton
Semi-auto Ban, McCain Gun Show Ban and Kohl Lock Up Your Safety Killed in U.S.
Senate
South
Dakota Gun Owners E-mail Alert
PO Box 3845, Rapid City, SD 57709
(605) 737-5583
LibertyTeeth@sdgo.org
http://www.SDGO.org
(Tuesday,
March 2, 2004) – Congratulations! Thanks
to your hard work, and the efforts of other no-compromise groups all over the
U.S., the gun control laden S. 1805 was defeated just hours ago, 90-8.
Before
the final vote was taken, the ill fated law suit protection bill included the
Lock Up Your Safety amendment, a ten year re-enactment of the Semi-auto Ban, a
new list of debilitating requirements designed to put gun shows out of business,
and a new law allowing hunting rounds such as the 30-06 to be added to the
banned list of “cop killer bullets.”
Earlier,
the NRA told members who called about S. 1805 that they would not oppose the
bill, even when it was laden with these anti-gun amendments.
Their plan was apparently to get this gun control abomination into
committee, where they hoped to strip it back down to the underlying liability
bill. But this is an incredibly
risky game, especially considering that President Bush has stated that he
supports a renewal of the Clinton Semi-auto Ban, and the House Leadership has
indicated that they may follow the President’s lead.
But thanks to your stand, the NRA finally decided to oppose the bill. The strong message you sent to your Senators and to the NRA, asking them to oppose S. 1805 if it was loaded down with gun control provisions, defeated one of the worst anti-gun bills to be seen in the last decade.
The
following is a description of the critical provisions that were tacked on to the
lawsuit protection bill before it was soundly defeated.
It is written by Gun Owners of America, http://www.gunowners.org
Lock
Up Your Safety Requirement
Senator
Herb Kohl (D-WI) offered this gun control amendment last week. It would
require all handgun purchasers to pay an implicit "gun tax" by
requiring them to buy a trigger lock when they purchase their handgun,
irrespective of need. In addition, the amendment would create a broad and
implicit cause of action against gun owners who fail to actually use the storage
device to lock up their firearms. Of course, a locked gun then becomes
unavailable for self-defense. The Senate passed the Kohl amendment 70-27.
Feinstein
Semi-auto Ban
The
Senate voted 52-47 in favor of the Feinstein semi-auto amendment. This
amendment would extend the ban that was signed into law by President Clinton in
1994 -- a ban which outlaws certain magazines and more than 180 types of
semi-automatic firearms. Unless Congress authorizes such an extension, the ban
will sunset in September 2004.
McCain
Gun Show Ban
Senator
John McCain (R-AZ) offered this amendment to outlaw the private sale of firearms
at gun shows, unless the buyer agrees to submit to a background registration
check. The language could effectively eliminate gun shows because every
member of an organization sponsoring a gun show could be imprisoned if the
organization fails to notify each and every "person who attends the special
firearms event of the requirements [under the Brady Law]."
Thus, if the person responsible for handing out "Brady
pamphlets" took a break to go to the bathroom, everyone responsible for the
event could be sent to prison. The McCain amendment passed 53-47.
Ammunition
Restriction Study
This
amendment, offered by Senators Bill Frist (R-TN) and Larry Craig (R-ID), passed
the Senate 85-12. Among other things, the language of this provision would
commission the Attorney General to determine whether the ban on so-called
"cop killer" ammunition should include superior performance bullets in
popular hunting calibers such as the 30-06.
GOA
also offers this analysis:
The
good news is that the attempt to renew the Feinstein semi-auto ban is dead...
for now. Of course, there are still semi-auto ban bills pending in the
House and Senate, and we can expect Feinstein to again offer her gun ban as an
amendment to some other "must pass" bill.
The
bad news is that the prospects for getting any kind of legislation to the
President's desk this year to protect gun makers is very slim.
Today's
vote makes it very difficult for a pro-gun senator to offer this bill as an
amendment to another bill. After all, anti-gunners can demand that any
provision to protect the gun industry now be offered as a "package"
with the anti-gun amendments that were attached to the bill over the last couple
of days.
It
would have been far better for Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-TN) to have brought
this Senate bill to the floor in such a way that NO gun control amendments could
have been offered. Doing so would have involved using parliamentary
tactics that are somewhat difficult to detail in an e-mail alert. But the
Senate has often used these tactics in the past. A vote to pass a
"clean bill" could very well have succeeded, as almost 60 Senators had
cosponsored the underlying legislation.
SDGO would like to thank all of its members who took action this past week. Thanks to your calls and e-mails, gun owners have won the first round in the battle against renewing the Clinton Semi-auto Ban. Keep up the good work!