Senate Democrats Continue to Exploit War on Terror by Attacking Gun Rights

Senate Democrats Continue to Exploit War on Terror by Attacking Gun Rights
  Wes Vernon, NewsMax.com
  Thursday, Nov. 27, 2003
WASHINGTON - Legislation on Capitol Hill seeks to use the threat of
terrorism to do an end run around the Second Amendment and could be abused
to ban sales of firearms.
The so-called Homeland Security Gun Safety Act of 2003, referred earlier
this year to the Senate Judiciary Committee, purportedly seeks "to enhance
the security of the Nation by increasing the time allowed to track
terrorists during periods of elevated alert ."

That sounds commonsensical enough on its face. After 9/11, who could argue
with wanting to track terrorists during periods of "elevated alert"?

It is in the rest of that paragraph that raises red flags for National Rifle
Association: "... closing loopholes that have allowed terrorists to acquire
firearms, maintaining records of certain handgun transfers during periods of
heightened terrorist risk, and for other purposes."

The NRA says the problem lies with Section 2, which says Section 922 of
title 18, United States Code, is amended so that sections of the gun law
"shall not apply during any period in which the threat condition under the
Homeland Security Advisory system is elevated, high or severe." Later it
stipulates that the changes "shall remain in effect until the threat
condition has been at the lowest level for 180 consecutive days."

The NRA sees the bill as something that is being slipped under the radar.
The "terrorist threat condition" has never been down to its lowest level
since 9/11, the Second Amendment group notes.

'Permanent Suspension of Law'

"In effect, it's a permanent suspension of existing law," NRA Communications
Director Andrew Arulanandum told NewsMax.com. Further, he sees it an "an
attempt to create a national firearm registration system."

The NRA spokesman says the bill would suspend statutes that limit law
enforcement to three days for completing background checks of firearms
purchases, as well as a law that requires the destruction of records of
anyone whose purchase is approved, "meaning they're law abiding."

It would mean "a suspension of rules that protect firearms owners, as long
as we're in a state of heightened alertness," Arulanandam declared.

Larry Pratt, executive director of Gun Owners of America, said when the
legislation was introduced: "These are the very laws that were used by the
Nazis to register everybody's guns, to confiscate the Jews' guns and then to
commit genocide. Why the senator would want to do something as horrible as
that, I can't understand."

Supporters of the Constitution said at the time that law enforcement
agencies could block sales of firearms by refusing to complete background
checks.


Sen. Lautenberg's office did not get back to NewsMax by deadline. However, a
Senate staffer requesting anonymity told us that "is not the interpretation"
the legislation's co-sponsors "want it to mean, if that's what you mean."

Lautenberg's co-sponsors are Sens. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., Jon Corzine,
D-N.J., and Jack Reed, D-R.I.

This staffer could see "how someone may misunderstand it," but that's not
the impression supporters of the bill want "to get across."

NRA maintains that if one wants to avoid "misinterpretation," the wording
could be made clear. The statutes are loaded with laws that elected
officials wrote in vague wording so as to leave it to unelected regulators
or police to enforce its unpopular provisions and let them take the blame
for any backlash.

When he introduced the bill, Lautenberg said that to "protect our homeland
and keep our families safe, we must deal directly with the ability of
terrorists and criminals to get their hands on guns."

The problem with that, says NRA's Arulanandam, is that it affects the
ability of law-abiding citizens to "get their hands on guns" for their
protection.

Second Amendment watchdogs will keep their eyes on the progress of this one.



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-- 
James Ehlers

Outdoors Magazine
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